Teaching and learning in further education: The Ofsted factor

The further education (FE) sector in the UK, or post-compulsory education as it is often referred to, has undergone some radical changes in recent years. Historically, FE is synonymous with vocational education and training, providing communities with courses that tended to be in practical, non-academic subjects. Many FE lecturers came from industries such as construction and engineering and were vital in providing the subject knowledge needed by colleges to enable them to offer a wide provision of courses. However, FE had not undergone the regime of teacher qualifications, regulation and inspection to the extent experienced by schools. In 2001, the New Labour government began a series of reforms that would overhaul post-compulsory education with the objective of making the sector more effective, and thereby meeting the wider objective of creating a more productive workforce. One of the many reforms was to introduce a system of inspection by placing FE into Ofsted’s remit. The new reform prompted FE colleges, for the first time, to implement their own institutional policies of observing teaching and learning (OTL) in order to prepare for impending inspection by Ofsted. This article examines the implementation of the policy of OTL, with a focus on one college of FE, and scrutinises its effects on the sector.