Schools which have received a visit from the schools inspectorate in the past year undertake more improvement programmes, according to school managers, and work in a more results-driven way than schools which have not been inspected. According to teachers, those schools that were inspected had also implemented more changes in terms of quality improvement and organized more self-evaluation activities in the school. Dr Melanie Ehren, researcher at the University of Twente says: “On the question of whether inspection visits actually lead to tangible improvement activities, we can already answer that question with a cautious ‘yes’."
Both primary schools and secondary schools (HAVO / VWO) are satisfied with the educational supervision provided through inspection and appreciate the professionalism of schools inspectors.
Schools that are in regular contact with the schools inspectorate even incorporate the appropriate standards into their everyday work. They make more improvements in their self-evaluation methods and improve cooperation between teachers and management in the school. Dr Melanie Ehren: “These results are still preliminary. In three years, we will be able to determine whether schools are actually making improvements in the quality of their education. However, this already gives us a good idea.”
These preliminary results come from a three-year European study into the effect of school inspections on the quality of education. In the Netherlands, the project - which was commissioned by the EU - is led by Dr Melanie Ehren, a researcher at the University of Twente. The research began in January 2011 and will continue until December 2013. It is being conducted in five other European countries at the same time, so that the different inspection models used in these countries can be compared. The comparative results of the inspection models in the different participating countries provide insight into how effective inspections are in improving the quality of education and which models are the most effective. For this reason, the project is being supported by the Primary Education Council, the Secondary Education Council, inspectorate and Ministry of Education, Culture and Science.
In both primary schools and secondary schools, many questions are being asked online about education in particular schools, the changes that are being made and their experiences with school inspections. About a quarter of the 400 schools that were approached participated in the first round of research. Participating schools receive a summary of the interim results and are given a score on a number of questions relative to other schools participating in the study.
Further details
The research is part of the work of the Institute for Innovation and Governance Studies (IGS), Faculty of Behavioural Sciences, Department of Education. For more information about this research please contact Dr Melanie Ehren, on +31 (0)53 4895654/+31 (0)53 4894579.
