School inspections are a key component of the accountability system in many education systems, including England. The judgments and reports produced through these inspections are widely used by parents when they are choosing a school for their children. But should they be? This paper presents new evidence on this issue. We illustrate how parents…

In this article, we analyse the implementation and change of a specific school reform in Germany using the example of external school evaluation in Lower Saxony: the school inspection. We investigate how and why a newly implemented reform is itself subject to reform shortly afterwards. We begin with a historical background of German school reforms…

Improving the quality of education is a permanent concern for national policymakers. In that regard, a growing number of education systems have implemented a monitoring system where pupils have to take standardised tests at regular intervals during their school career (OECD, 2013). This article aims to offer food for thought to the readers of…

Background: A number of countries have had school inspection for many years. The origins of these systems date back to the nineteenth century when mass public schooling was introduced, and education and other emerging public services were required to comply with centrally mandated rules and programmes. In contrast, many countries across the world…