Education chiefs have refused to disclose details of high school growth areas identified by external reports, saying the company needs a “safe space” to do its work.
We submitted an FoI request asking what areas of growth were identified in the external validation of each of the island’s high schools and what support the department is providing to help achieve these aims.
Our request followed an identical question from Lawrie Hooper (Ramsey) in which DESC Minister Daphne Caine said that publishing the information could harm and disrupt the Etio’s ability to continue its work.
Rejecting our FoI request, the department admitted publishing the reports “could lead to a greater public confidence in the integrity of the external validation process”
However, it said that “disclosure would hinder the open, professional dialogue between Etio, schools, educational services and the department”.
Public Interest
The department added: “The Department considers the public interest clearly rests in protecting Etio’s ability to carry out its external validation of all schools and educational services.
“The external validation team require a ‘safe space’ in which to assess the accuracy of the self-evaluation judgements formed by schools or educational services against the quality assurance framework and enable implementation of continued well – informed improvement. Disclosure may prejudice this process.”
It also said that the team “require a ‘safe space’ in which to assess the accuracy of the self-evaluation judgements formed by schools”.
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