Melanie Ehren.
Ofsted has come under attack for its collaboration with the Behavioural Insights Team for using machine learning to identify failing schools. According to several sources (BBC and Matthew Reynolds), BIT has been trialling machine learning models that can crunch through publicly available data to help automate Ofsted’s decisions on whether a school is potentially performing inadequately. The algorithms use information on number of children on free school meals, how much teachers are paid, the number of teachers for each subject, and particular words and sentiments in reviews of schools submitted by parents on the Ofsted-run website Parent View.
As Ofsted’s head of risk assessment (Paul Moore) explains: (more…)