National Entitlement: Benchmark and Backstop

Recommendation 9a of the Commission on Religious Education report hopes that ‘Ofsted or Section 48 inspectors must report on whether schools are meeting the National Entitlement’[1].

For Section 48 inspections in Church schools, this is reasonably straightforward. The Church of England broadly welcomed the commission report; and some adaptation of the C of E’s own statement of entitlement would make this happen.

The aspiration that Ofsted would report on the National Entitlement, however, was always an ambitious punt by the commissioners. Ofsted hasn’t reported on individual subjects for years: so the idea that they would spend inspection time checking if a school were meeting a subject statement is unrealistic.

What would meeting the National Entitlement look like anyway? Would inspectors tick off every aspect of each one of the 19 paragraphs? Would they judge if schools were meeting each aspect fully, nearly, or partially? Would this be a best fit judgement? Would all criteria need to be met? Would there be any limiting judgements? Whatever the merits of the National Entitlement generally, its length and constructive vagueness makes it un- inspectable.

But all is not lost. Paragraph 159 of the consultation draft of the Ofsted inspection handbook (no doubt destined to be inscribed onto the heart of every RE teacher in the land) says:

All pupils in maintained schools are expected to study the national curriculum subjects, religious education and age appropriate sex education. Academies are expected to offer all pupils a curriculum similar in breadth and ambition to the national curriculum, including the requirements to teach English, mathematics, science and religious education.[2]

Powerful though this is for subject provision, it is in the school’s curriculum conversations that the National Entitlement may have its greatest impact. Perhaps this is just the opportunity that RE has been waiting for, to finally establish itself as an equal and accepted subject in schools. Ofsted will be looking at the school’s curriculum ‘intent’, that is the knowledge and skills the school argues their pupils need, and at how that curriculum is planned and sequenced. RE coordinators will need a curriculum justification and arrangement that fits with the school’s overall curriculum rationale. Headteachers and senior leaders will need to understand and explain what RE contributes to the school’s curriculum offer. Our subject can no longer be ‘exceptionalised’: with the inspiration of the National Entitlement, Religion and Worldviews could and should be treated in the same way as other subjects.

Ofsted will be not be seeking a specific approach, but clearly an argument based on ‘we do this because the locally agreed syllabus/diocesan syllabus says we must’ won’t cut it. Here the National Entitlement has the potential to be both the benchmark and, dare I say, the backstop of this RE curriculum intent.

It will take some clever footwork from the RE Council. It will take a willingness from the RE community to accept that there are a range of equally valid models of RE curriculum, but if we can all do that then we might just be able to make the aspiration of recommendation 9a closer to reality.

1 – Commission on Religious Education, Religion and worldviews: The way forward A national plan for RE, page 17 https://www.commissiononre.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Final-Report-of-the-Commission-on-RE.pdf

2 – Ofsted, School inspection handbook, page 41 https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/772065/Schools_draft_handbook_180119.pdf