Ofsted Science Reports and Resources

Ofsted is the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills. Ofsted reports directly to Parliament and is independent and impartial. They inspect and regulate services that care for children and young people, and those providing education and skills for learners of all ages.

Each week they carry out hundreds of inspections and regulatory visits throughout England, and publish the results on their website. As a consequence of their work they have published annual reports on science in primary and secondary schools and colleges.

Science HMI have contributed findings to Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector’s Annual Reports and now publishes a major subject report for science every three years. The reports on individual science survey visits to schools are made available on the Ofsted website.

The aim of all this work is to promote improvement and value for money in the services that they inspect and regulate, so that children and young people, parents and carers, adult learners and employers benefit.

Ofsted's original structure, function and purpose as the " Office for Standards in Education" were created by the Education (Schools) Act of 1992. The new organisation replaced Her Majesty's Inspectorate (HMI). Such a change from the use of HMI, who had "previously offered central government officials advice [without 'fear or favour'] about the effects of government policy" to Ofsted, and their large number of private contractors, was the "subject of considerable controversy”.

However, since 1992 the number of private contractors has decreased dramatically (three now cover large geographical areas), HMI have been reintroduced to carry out inspections and Ofsted has expanded to include, for example, regulating Children's Services.

Ofsted regulates and inspects:
• childcare and children’s social care
• schools?
• colleges
• initial teacher education?
• work-based learning and skills training
• adult and community learning?
• education and training in prisons and other secure establishments
• the Children and Family Court Advisory Support Service (Cafcass)

The collection in the elibrary is confined to science related reports and publications concerning primary schools, secondary schools and colleges.