THE senior chief inspector is expected to reaffirm his commitment to frank and unambiguous evaluations of school performance when he shares a platform in Edinburgh today (Friday) with Chris Woodhead, the head of the OFSTED schools inspectorate in England.
But at a conference organised by The Scotsman, Douglas Osler is also likely to challenge the notion that Scotland is not prepared to learn lessons from other countries, pointing to inspectors’ visits to Korea, Japan and Singapore in advance of the HMI maths report, and to the United States for a forthcoming report on science.
While he takes every opportunity to set out the strengths of the system, Mr Osler has been known to despair at its “chronic defensiveness” and a management failure to tackle faults.
