Proportion of Free Schools found to be good or outstanding rises to three in four

Source: New Schools Network

By Paul Goodman
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I reported recently that two in three Free Schools had been found to be good or outstanding by OFSTED - and that "the Department for Education says that the proportion of Free Schools rated 'Good' or 'Outstanding' is broadly in line with all state schools inspected since the introduction of the new framework".

Which promoted a riposte from a few people in the comment thread and on Twitter - namely, that if Free Schools were doing no better than other state schools, what was the point of them?  An answer is that for a new school to establish itself as a success in its very early days is no mean achievement - and that even better things can be expected in future.

You may or may not agree with that view.  But whether you do or don't, it is now out of date.  We now have the OFSTED results from 24 free schools, and the proportion of them rated as good or outstanding now stands at three in four.  The tranche of results I wrote about recently covered 15 Free Schools.

The Free Schools Network points out that "the results compare favourably with the achievements of state schools generally, with Free Schools more than twice as likely to be awarded an Outstanding judgement under the new tougher Ofsted inspection framework". There are 81 Free Schools in all.