11th August
Meanwhile, we still have to keep a close eye on Ofsted. There are now quarterly monitoring visits for local authorities rated by Ofsted as inadequate for safeguarding, and where we know from published advice letters that in at least one area (Birmingham) the focus has been on children out of school and home education. Sir Michael Wilshaw, head of Ofsted, continues to extremely preoccupied with the high number of illegal faith schools, particularly Muslim and Jewish schools, and invariably links this with councils being lax and with the abuse of home education freedoms. However, at the end of the year Sir Michael will be replaced by Amanda Spielman and I anticipate this will mark a difference in emphasis, as the Government said they didn’t want another ‘crusader’ in charge of Ofsted.
More about illegal faith schools here http://edyourself.org/articles/unregschools.php