Each year as a HT I would – sometime between May half term and September 1st – pull out my old SEF from a cupboard or laptop folder, and summon up the courage to rewrite it. Yesterday I met with five experienced current and past school leaders and, with a pile of our school’s SEFs on the table in front of us, we thought about the process of self-evaluation. The impetus for this conversation came from two things:
Firstly, we wanted to help our forty plus school leaders with some tips and a few exemplars to provide clarity and save them time and energy. We don’t want them spending their summer holiday worrying about it.
Secondly, with the knowledge that a new inspection framework will at some point emerge, and with more than fifty years of headship experience between us, we wanted to support our school leaders be ready for this with a balanced, ‘road-tested’ approach. An approach which has seen us through a few frameworks, a structure which means they won’t need to re-invent the wheel, and with straight-forward language which means they won’t end up panicking about what we mean by ‘secure’ or ‘strong.’
So here are my reflections from that conversation, and some principles and tips for writing your SEF:
What is a self-evaluation form?
-A SEF is a succinct way of answering three questions: How well are we doing? How do we know? What do we need to do next to improve the school?
– Your SEF should be an evaluative statement which describes the position your school is on the journey to excellence. It’s a working document to support school improvement, not something you write just for inspection.
– On the one hand, the more that you make it only about inspection, the less likely you and your team are to use it effectively. On the other hand, the best inspection experiences I’ve supported school leaders through over the last three years have been where the SEF is the most significant document throughout the process, and is almost as key as the inspection handbook. Written well, it can help school leaders take back some control.
– The final document is really important in helping move your school forwards, but it is the process of evaluation which will engage your senior team and governors and help them be part of the plan going forwards. In many respects, the process of your evaluation is as important as the final document.
What should be in the SEF:
– Your evaluation from recent school improvement visits.
– The recommended areas for improvement (AFIs) from the previous inspection report.
– A summary of the outcomes of the school and a more detailed analysis of attainment and progress of all groups.
– A succinct summary of the key strengths of your school and areas for development.
– The most up to date parent, staff and student survey, your response to this, and resulting actions.
Using evidence:
– Use external reports; Trust visits; internal review processes; scrutiny of pupils’ books; T&L observations; SEND and safeguarding records; performance data; pupil/staff/parent surveys.-
– Keep your self-evaluation summary concise, and use bullet points. Once of the best way to keep your SEF short is to signpost it to other sources of evidence, eg. the school’s evaluation of teaching, CPD training records, behaviour indicators.
– Try to use a sophisticated range of indicators to enhance the quality of your self-evaluation (eg. what creative ways are you using to build relationships with families to boost attendance?)
– Your SEF should identify impact of actions you’ve taken: eg. how has teaching of maths or phonics changed? How do you know? How do you know that reading has improved?
Writing the SEF:
– Decide on the two or three key weaknesses of the school: It is tempting to include too much detail in a SEF, and then you lose the key purpose of the document. Prioritise the weaknesses which need to be worked on first: which are your crocodiles nearest the boat?
– Look at examples of excellent Ofsted reports together. This will help your team get their heads out of their own school they know so well, and see what success looks like across different schools.
– Have the handbook next to you and judge each area of your school against grade descriptors.
– Establish what the DNA of your school is. Stamp your school’s key strengths front and centre on your SEF.
– Look at the strengths of your senior leaders: who has an understanding of data, or the ability to evaluate critically, or a clear vision for one area of the school? Use their skills to build the different elements of the SEF.
– Decide which stakeholders should be part of developing it: chair of governors & fellow governors? Middle Leaders? Teaching staff? Support staff?
– You could take the teaching descriptors and use these as a resource to lead a staff meeting – asking your team to identify strengths and weaknesses. This then becomes a helpful part of the process of evaluation with your team.
Ensure your language helps you evaluates the evidence, for example:
‘Because of…’ ‘this meant we did…’
‘The progress of…’ ‘and compared with national this shows…’
‘The impact was…’ ‘as a result of…’
Examples of using evidence: so what?
– State your judgement (‘behaviour in school has improved’), describe how you know this (‘reduction in FTE days and number of pupils, reduction in x behaviour this year, positive teacher and parent survey’) define next steps (‘pupils self-regulate in unstructured times’).
– State your judgment (‘teaching has improved’), describe how you know this (‘pupil NOR increasing, ‘school outcomes in last two years, evidence from learning walks, student and parent voice, increased parent tours’) define next steps (‘teaching now needs to lead to strong progress in all subjects’).
– State your judgment (‘pupils now enjoy coming to school’), describe how you know this (‘student voice, attendance data and other ethos indicators’), define next steps (‘we want the proportion of disadvantaged pupils taking part in clubs to increase’)
The proposed 5-point scale:
Will the words Requires Improvement/Good/Outstanding morph to Secure/Strong/Exemplary in the new framework? Possibly. Should this materially change the way I go about running my evaluation? I think not. Does it mean a complete SEF rewrite? I doubt it. When you know what the next framework looks like you can decide whether you want one more column or not, but worrying about this will not help you evaluate more successfully. Stick to the principles you know.
The proposal of ‘exemplary’ practice‘ and ‘above and beyond’:
Following the ‘Big Listen’, many of our school leaders asked what Ofsted meant by these phrases? The wording is vague, unhelpful, subjective and hard to quantify. Any use of inspection language which suggests that the job of leading a school cannot be done within the working day is a problem for me. It places unrealistic expectations on headteachers, at a time when recruitment and retention of school leaders is already tough. Language is important. While I will of course support school leaders to work closely with the inspection handbook, I might think carefully before I choose to incorporate such phrases into my evaluation lexicon.
Don’t dos:
– Don’t change the structure and layout of your SEF based on supposition of what the next inspection framework might look like. A good evaluation has the essentials above. Don’t over-complicate it.
– Don’t produce this in a dark room by yourself. It should be a joint and collaborative effort, not a lonely pursuit. Ask to see some examples of SEFs from across your Trust, or from partner colleagues. Seeing other models is magic.
– Too many Ofsted inspections talk about an over-ambitious evaluation of the school. This is your document so make sure you evaluate critically. Don’t be tempted to make assertions which are over-descriptive or which you cannot evidence.
Internal data:
If you choose to include internal data in your SEF think carefully about the purpose of this. Decide what you want inspectors to see, and what you do not want them to see.
RAG-rating:
RAG-rating is definitely not a perfect method of showing progress towards, but you could consider:
– Green – an area of sustained strength over time. Several elements of solid evidence.
– Amber – progress is being made, but not yet secure. Needs more time to be confident that sustained improvement.
– Red – Not yet secure, work has begun but only some evidence that things are progressing.
Reviewing your SEF:
Once your first draft is written, it feels good – you have succeeded in capturing the picture of your school! Plan regular sessions with senior leaders and governors once you have your first draft up and running so that the team can update it – no more than once a term.
Other resources:
– You can find some helpful EYFS checklists on The Key website here.
– The Church of England’s advice and self-evaluation forms for SIAMS (statutory inspection of Anglican and Methodist schools) can be found here.
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