An introduction to SICI Inspection – a SICI view across European Inspectorates P1.1/1

‘SICI’ is short for the ‘Standing International Conference of Inspectorates’ An association of European inspectorates, founded in 1995 with 6 members 29 members currently, country (national) level and also local (regional) level Well-established ‘old’ inspectorates (Netherlands 210 years old!; England, Scotland, France – all around 180) ‘New’ inspectorates (some German Länder – 5 years old; Sweden 3 years) Purpose – to share experiences / learn from each other / promote ideas about inspection / be a ‘qualitative’ voice What is SICI? 2

A representative of each member (often the Chief Inspector) attends an annual General Assembly (GA) and delegates the running of SICI to an Executive Committee (EC) A member country hosts the GA and runs a Conference – 2010 Bielefeld Germany - ‘Quality Assurance in the work of Inspectorates’ Funding comes from the annual fee paid by members There is a Secretariat in Brussels – the Secretary-General’s work, and that of an administrative assistant is paid for by the Flemish (Belgian) Inspectorate A developing feature is the SICI Inspection Academy – to co- ordinate sharing with and learning from each other How does SICI operate? 3

Main activities are supporting members to run a Workshop (3 or 4 a year) Topics for Workshops are of importance in inspecting : Citizenship / Student outcomes / Learning and Teaching / links external and internal evaluation SICI engages in specific small and larger projects – experts are provided by member countries (links with research, projects on self-evaluation, learning and teaching etc) SICI liaises with other agencies – such as OECD Links among members with common interests are encouraged A basic website exists - more sophisticated website under construction SICI’s Inspection Academy contributes to a project in Serbia to train inspectors – with the key involvement of the Netherlands inspectorate This project with Romania is the first entirely SICI project – not run through one specific inspectorate What are SICI activities? 4

Several SICI members have agreed to be part of this project Some have agreed current or former inspectors to be designated experts (HMIE Scotland, Netherlands Inspectorate, OFSTED England) Some have agreed to host a group for the study visit component of the training course (HMIE Scotland, the Czech Republic inspectorate, Inspectorate in Sweden, Netherlands Inspectorate – and another two in discussions) We make reports to the EC meetings (4/5 a year) We hope that later you will meet the SICI President and the EC Portfolio holder for the SICI Inspection Academy The Romania Project 5

SICI has gathered ‘profiles’ of the members at the time (24 in 2007) The profiles give information about inspection in that member country / region (available on the website) A former SICI President was asked to analyse the profiles and produce a report (Johann van Bruggen Netherlands) A narrative report appeared in April 2010 and is on the website Difficult to compare across inspectorate Some analysis possible of the 18 or so returns Inspection across Europe (1) 6

15 (83%) of members (2007) have a system of ‘full inspection’ of schools – –all schools inspected at regular intervals –against a national framework of indicators for good quality –using a small team of inspectors –almost always leading to a published report Many members also do inspections on a restricted topic and in a sample of schools Many produce a national summarising report of inspection findings Inspection across Europe (2) 7

Of the 18 responding members, all use interviews, questionnaires, observations, documents – but with varying emphasis Almost all use examination or test results 3 (17%) give feedback to teachers on lesson observation; 8 (44%) do not; in 7 cases it is not clear Notice of inspection varies from 2 days to 180 days Length of time in school mostly 3 to 4 days Almost all give immediate oral feedback Reports public in 15 cases (83%) Inspection across Europe (3) 8

Draft reports sent between 5 – 45 days later Discussed with school in 10 cases (56%) Length of reports varies from 10 to 80 pages Most indicate that a school is expected to indicate what it will now do In 11 cases (61%) there are clear procedures for dealing with (very) weak schools 13 (72%) do not advise schools 9 (50%) say that their primary focus is school improvement 9 (50%) say their primary focus is accountability Inspection across Europe (4) 9

There is no single ‘best model’ but there are common features which might usefully be adapted This is a constantly changing picture Change may be stimulated by altered national policy direction or occur for internal inspectorate reasons Internal reasons are often for purposes of improvement or streamlining or directing of resources to specific needs Many inspectorates’ journeys move from full, comprehensive, all- encompassing inspections with long reports through to shorter, very focused core inspections with more specific inspection, short reports and follow-through according to need This is possibly inevitable - experience counts / as do the needs of the system The focus should always be ‘Better Inspection, Better Learning’ A few comments 10