School Inspection in a Polycentric Context
School Inspection in a Polycentric Context : The Case of Northern Ireland authored by Dr. Martin Brown, Prof. Gerry McNamara and Prof Joe O’Hara of EQI strongly endorses school and stakeholder networking and area based inspection in Northern Ireland. The report is based on research undertaken for an Erasmus + project which evaluated the impact of school networking linked to area based or polycentric inspection in four European countries – Northern Ireland, Bulgaria, the Netherlands and England. The element of the research focused on West Belfast where the West Belfast Partnership Board brings together the schools, training agencies and other education, community and youth services into an active network which is supported by the Education and Training Inspectorate. The research concludes that networks of educational organisations and institutions guided and advised by the Inspectorate can achieve progress and improvement across a range of areas which is impossible to envisage any single organisation acting alone being capable of. The report notes that networking has brought about increased cooperation between agencies, continuous professional development for teachers, curriculum planning and sharing and inter-agency cooperation transcending traditional boundaries. Moreover the report also suggests that networking of this type closely linked to area based or polycentric inspection can contribute significantly to enhanced educational outcomes for students.