which the school and the relevant authority is facilitating the transition to sponsored academy status. Once an inadequate maintained school or PRU has become a sponsored academy, or an inadequate academy has been to a new sponsor with a new funding agreement, these will be inspected as new schools, with their first inspection being a section 5 inspection, usually, in the third year of operation. If there is a delay in any school judged inadequate becoming a sponsored academy or being rebrokered to be sponsored by a new trust, Ofsted may initiate monitoring of the school to check on what progress has been made in tackling the areas for improvement. Maintained nursery schools and non-maintained special schools judged inadequate are not subject to academy orders and will be monitored by Ofsted as set out in this section of the handbook. Notification Prior to the first monitoring inspection of a school with serious weaknesses or that requires special measures, HMI will normally inform the school up to two days in advance of the inspection. This is to allow the relevant strategic partners (local authority, proprietor or board of trustees) to be present for discussion about support for the school and the likely pattern of monitoring. It will also enable as many members of the governing board, local governing body or trustees as possible and, where appropriate, the CEO/their delegate or equivalent of the multi-academy trust, to attend inspection feedback. For the second and any subsequent monitoring inspection, HMI will normally inform the school the day before the visit. If the headteacher is unavailable, the HMI should ask to to the most senior member of staff available. Once the inspection has been confirmed, HMI will inform the inspection support administrator at Ofsted, who will send formal notification to the school by email. Requests for a deferral will be handled in accordance with Ofsted’s policy about the deferral of inspections. If a school requests a deferral, HMI must contact the regional duty desk immediately. The deferral policy makes clear that the absence of the headteacher is not normally a reason for deferring an inspection. Guidance for inspecting schools that have serious weaknesses Introduction Schools are judged to have serious weaknesses where Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector (HMCI) is of the opinion that:
leaders and managers are taking effective action towards the removal of the serious weaknesses designation or leaders and managers are not taking effective action towards the removal of the serious weaknesses designation. The crucial factor is the anticipated timescale for the removal of serious weaknesses given the current rate of improvement. A school in which leaders and managers are taking effective action is one that will be on course to have the serious weaknesses designation removed within 30 months after the publication of the previous section 5 report. A school that is not taking effective action will be likely to continue to have serious weaknesses, or may require special measures, when the section 5 re-inspection takes place. The purpose of the monitoring inspection(s) is to evaluate how much progress the school has made by considering: the school’s response to being judged as having serious weaknesses and how well placed it is to secure rapid improvement based on the actions taken since the section 5 inspection the extent to the school’s actions are rigorously focused on tackling the key areas for improvement identified in the section 5 inspection how effectively the school is adapting its existing school development or improvement plans to meet the challenge of moving out of the serious weaknesses category the impact that governors at the school are having on bringing about the necessary improvements the impact of any external review of governance and/or use of pupil premium that has taken place since the section 5 inspection. Monitoring inspections cover aspects of the section 5 evaluation schedule, but are selective and focused sharply on the areas for improvement identified by the section 5 inspection that judged the school to have serious weaknesses. The work of those responsible for governance should be evaluated to assess the extent to which they are making an effective contribution to leadership and management and the school’s performance. If governance was not identified as an area for improvement at the section 5 inspection but the monitoring inspection raises concerns about weak governance, inspectors must reflect this in the report. Similarly, where inspectors have concerns about the school’s use of the pupil premium, they must highlight this in the report.