Ofsted has not conducted follow-up inspections at nearly a quarter of the schools that it has failed solely over pupil safeguarding, Tes can reveal.

Heads’ leaders are concerned that the lack of return visits could leave pupils at risk.

The Tes investigation looked at the 18 schools judged to be “inadequate” solely because of safeguarding concerns since September 2015.

Four of them - almost a quarter - have not had follow-up inspections since. This has left gaps of between six and eight months since Ofsted first raised concerns about safeguarding in those schools.

The continuing delay appears to be at odds with Ofsted’s own policy. The watchdog’s handbook for monitoring inspections says: “In the case of schools where serious safeguarding concerns have been identified, it is essential that early action is taken to ensure that pupils are safe”.

And a spokesperson for the inspectorate said that schools judged to have ineffective safeguarding “will normally have their first monitoring inspection within three to six months of the publication of the report that judged them ‘inadequate’”.

Parents ‘need reassurance’

Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said:  “If a safeguarding issue has been identified, we’d want a prompt follow-up from Ofsted, so parents are reassured that it has been addressed, and that pupils aren’t at risk.

“It seems to us that it’s the only way: to do a follow-up visit as soon as possible.” 

Cranbourne Business and Enterprise College is not among the 18 schools, as safeguarding was just one of the reasons that Ofsted failed the secondary. However, inspectors were clear that pupil safeguarding at Cranbourne was “inadequate”. The school had not established a team “fully committed to equal opportunities for all…and where discrimination of any kind is not tolerated”, they wrote.

“Some pupils use unacceptable language to others - for example, homophobic language. This type of behaviour sometimes goes unchecked.”

But more than a year and a half after that inspection, Ofsted has still not been back for a follow-up.

“They said students are not safe,” said Phil Munday, who taught science at Cranbourne. “That was in December 2015 - 18 months ago. In that time, Ofsted has not visited. They never checked whether pupils were safe.

“I think that’s inadequate, really. I think that’s poor.”

Ofsted said it has yet to visit the school because it was subject to an academy order. But the local authority has submitted a statement of action, which Ofsted judged to address the relevant areas. The statment gave clear priority to safeguarding concerns, with targets and monitoring arrangements.

Cranbourne head Jane Aplin - who did not work at the school when it was last inspected by Ofsted - said: “It is clear to me, from the Ofsted inspection report, that the inspectors’ concerns related to procedures and record-keeping, and not to any incident involving one of our pupils.”

She said that procedures had since been tightened and a local authority inspection in January had “concluded that our safeguarding procedures are robust”.

Ofsted said that two of the four schools without follow-up visits are due to have monitoring inspections soon, and one will reopen in September as an academy.

A spokesperson for the watchdog added: “If Ofsted has concerns, including those relating to safeguarding, about the performance of any school [that falls within the scope of Ofsted inspections], we can inspect it at any time.

“Each situation and circumstance would be considered in context and this could affect the timing of any such inspection.”

This is an edited article from the 23 June edition of Tes. Subscribers can read the full article here. This week’s Tes magazine is available in all good newsagents. To download the digital edition, Android users can click here and iOS users can click here

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