Vanessa Ward: A PROFILE

Vanessa’s career began in law, as a solicitor, a job she loved. But she always knew she would work in education one day. She comes from a family of teachers – both parents and all her grandparents were teachers and, for Vanessa, this family habitus took her into “the most rewarding, and the most demanding, of jobs – teaching”.

Entering the profession as a teacher of English, she became Head of English, an Assistant Head, then Deputy Head in comprehensive schools, then Head of The Tiffin Girls’ School in London. Her leadership roles focussed on teaching and learning, and quality assurance, “working with colleagues to know that we are where we think we are”.

As a head, Vanessa trained to be an Ofsted inspector, and then was employed by Ofsted as an HMI, during which time she inspected a broad range of education provision. Subsequently working as a school improvement partner, then as a consultant in schools, Vanessa enjoyed a very collaborative role, working alongside school leaders. Further career progression took her to the Independent Schools’ Inspectorate (ISI), where she is now Chief Inspector and CEO.

Explaining her pathway to date, Vanessa feels that she can best connect the dots looking backwards: knowledge and experience of teaching in schools, training, mentoring, coaching, inspecting, consulting and quality assurance underpin her current role at the ISI.

That can come from a range of things. We look at books, we talk to teachers, pupils, staff. We talk about decision-making and about putting policy into practice.”

There is no small amount of common sense in Vanessa’s definition of inspection: “It’s part of a wider assurance system in which the school can participate.” Proportionality is about “making a judgement based on our understanding of what’s systemic in that school. If, for example, there is something that isn’t where it’s meant to be, and it could lead to a standard being not met, we would ask, is this a one-off error that’s easily correctable because the right systems are in place? Is it an oversight? Or is the issue systemic, does it reflect a lack of knowledge about what should be there, or the capacity to put it right?”

An ISI inspection is always going to hold a school accountable robustly to the

It’s also going to do so in a manner which promotes a shared understanding of a school’s complex and individual characteristics.

During the actual event of an inspection, Vanessa makes it very clear that inspecting teams aren’t looking for a checklist of evidence and experience. School leaders are encouraged to explain and articulate the characteristics of their school in a way which best fits their provision and practices. On another common-sense F