Of course Chris Woodhead is right (TES, October 27). Keith Anderson’s menacing threat of a “continuous process of monitoring, evaluating and inspection” by LEAs does send shivers down my spine.
Most governors and heads welcome the freedom conferred by recent legislation. Moreover, ministers made it clear in debates on the 1992 Act that the only inspection to which schools would be routinely subjected would come from the Office for Standards in Education. Keith Anderson confirms my fears that under Gillian Shephard’s regime, education authorities will try to re-assert their old controls by the back door. Resurgent authorities with their stifling bureaucracy and political agenda would be bad news for pupils.
I welcome a chief inspector who is genuinely on the side of schools.
Geoffrey J Samuel
The Heathland School Hounslow, Middlesex
