Industry News
"Python-like" Ofsted 'must not regulate independents'
Posted on 23rd October 2007
The Independent Schools Council (ISC) recently attacked proposals that Ofsted should regulate the private sector, claiming the suggestions were based on "serious factual errors".
Chief executive of the council Jonathan Shephard said Britain has an independent sector which is recognised as providing one of the best educations in the world by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.
He said: "It would be an act of folly to put the future of the most successful part of UK education under the red tape of Ofsted."
Currently, ISC member schools are inspected by the Independent Schools Inspectorate who reports to the secretary of state.
Mr Shephard called Ofsted "python-like" in its bureaucracy and claimed its fitness for purpose was recently questioned.
ISC member schools account for more than 80 per cent of children attending independent schools in Britain. It reports that the British independent sector educates around 620,000 children across 2,500 schools.
This means around seven per cent of British school children are educated independently.
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