Ofsted is looking for a leader with “significant experience” at a senior level in schools or trusts and a “high degree of personal integrity” to become its next chief inspector.
Amanda Spielman will leave the role at the end of this year after seven years in the hot seat.
A job advert to find her £165,000 successor is now live.
A foreword for the role written by education secretary Gillian Keegan states government wants a chief inspector “with significant experience in the school and trust sector, but who can command respect across all the sectors” within Ofsted’s remit.
Experience in at least one of the other areas within Ofsted’s inspection and regulatory remit, such as further education, early years and children’s social care, is labelled as “desirable criteria”.
Keegan said it was an “important time” to lead the watchdog, with hopefuls able to demonstrate the ability to “embed” and “take forward, build on and improve” the “relatively new” inspection framework.
They must do so while “maintaining and enhancing a strong organisational reputation for valid, reliable, objective and fair judgements”.
They must also be able to “adapt to the changing education” landscape with the “increasing importance” of academy trusts and social care reform marking a “considering period of organisational change” for the watchdog, Keegan added.
Candidates must also show “excellent judgement under pressure and a high degree of personal integrity, including experience of taking difficult, independent, calls in a senior position with high profile”.
Trust body boss on adviser panel
An advisory assessment panel will carry out interviews and recommend candidates to the education secretary, who makes the final decision.
The panel is made up of Ofsted chair Dame Christine Ryan, Ofqual chief regulator Dr Jo Saxton, a senior Department for Education official and Leora Cruddas, chief executive of the academy trust body CST.
One issue could be a potential change of government should Labour win the next election, scheduled to take place by January 2025 at the latest.
Last week, shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson set out the party’s intention to reform the watchdog.
Proposals include scrapping its current grading system and replacing it with a new “report card” for schools and FE and skills.
‘Respond proactively to policy direction’
The advert states the chief inspector will need to “respond proactively to the direction of government policy and strategy”.
Chief inspectors are appointed for a term of up to five years by the King.
Spielman was given a two-year extension due to Covid disrupting the roll-out of her inspection framework. It means she will be the longest-serving chief inspector.
The deadline for applications is April 6, with the successful candidate taking office on 1 January 2024.
Once the government has chosen its preferred candidate, they will appear before the education select committee who decide whether to back the decision.
However government can ignore this, as then education secretary Nicky Morgan did when appointing Spielman in 2016.
The committee was concerned Spielman, who had worked in the finance sector before holding a senior position at Ark Schools and later chairing Ofqual, had not been a teacher.
Long overdue but highly unlikely to get someone who ticks all the right boxes. A CI needs to understand how inspection should improve individual providers and the sectors inspected. We all know it will be someone who has experience of schools at a strategic level, possibly governance or as a trust CEO. The inspection framework is a red herring and should be reviewed urgently, one size does not fit all.