The Sun Never Sets on the British Educational Empire: School Inspections as Imperial Boomerang

Context This poster explores the colonial legacy of the British empire in education systems through an international analysis of school inspection regimes past and present. This poster aims to connect current critiques of inspections by Ofsted, the inspectorate in England, to historical and contemporary critiques of inspection regimes across the Global South in countries formerly colonized by Britain. School inspections originated during the British empire in 1840 and were exported to British colonies across the Caribbean, Asia, Africa, and Oceania shortly after. London (2004) argues that “the inspectorate, was a major tool in accomplishing the mission of imperial control”. This poster aims to analyze if this dynamic of the inspectorate as a tool of control is salient across different national contexts including England today. School inspections originated against the backdrop of the extreme violence and policing of the British Empire and the empire’s spread of racial capitalism throughout the world (Gerrard et al., 2022; Robinson, 2000). This poster argues that this context is imperative to center in understanding the motivations and impacts of inspection policies across the world. Drawing on a systematic literature review and empirical data from a national inquiry into school inspection in England (Beyond Ofsted, 2023), this poster explores the history and present of school inspection regimes as a policy technology of surveillance and control and conceptualizes them as an ‘imperial boomerang’ (Césaire, 2000). Method Research Questions: 1) How are inspection practices in Jamaica, Trinidad, Nigeria, Ghana, Uganda, Botswana, India, and Pakistan before and after independence from Britain marked by themes of surveillance, policing, and control? 2) Are these themes of surveillance, policing, and control salient in current inspection policy in England? This poster draws on a systematic literature review of school inspection regimes in eight nations (Jamaica, Trinidad, Nigeria, Ghana, Uganda, Botswana, India, and Pakistan) formerly colonized by Britain as well as empirical data from a national survey on school inspection in England (Beyond Ofsted, 2023). Ehren et al.’s (2017) systematic review of inspections in low-income countries provided initial insights into issues surrounding inspection feedback, the credibility of inspectors, and inspection outcomes as well as sources relevant to this poster. An initial screening of additional inspection literature included 48 sources but following an appraisal of the relevance of these sources for the research questions, focused on 20 sources. The Beyond Ofsted survey was conducted between March 2023 and May 2023 and attracted 6,708 participants who identified as state school educators in England (school leaders, teachers, teaching assistants). The survey resulted in over 500,000 words of open responses. The survey data was analyzed thematically using Qualtrics. This poster draws on decolonial theories (Quijano, 2000; Mignolo & Walsh, 2018) to situate school inspections within a wider context of racial capitalism, white supremacy, and colonial control. Findings Although inspection regimes reflect neoliberal imaginaries and are associated with neoliberal education policy, their origin cannot be separated from British colonialism, racial capitalism, and white supremacy (Shajahan, 2011). The findings show that since their inception in the 1800’s, inspections have enshrined the coloniality of power (Quijano, 2000) rather than functioning as a tool of school improvement. I argue that school inspections operated as an imperial technology of surveillance, assimilation, and control during the colonial era which has now come back to the imperial core as an ‘imperial boomerang’ (Césaire, 2000). The inspection experiences of educators in the Global South during the colonial era and the present chime with findings of the Beyond Ofsted Inquiry (2023) on the inspection experiences of educators today in England. Across the different national contexts of this study, educators experience the inspectorate as a policing arm of the state or the empire and a cause of extreme stress. The inspectorate enshrines educational hierarchies and dictates which knowledge and educational practices are ‘worthy’ and which are erased (‘epistemicide’- de Sousa Santos, 2014). The resultant assimilation and ‘performativity’ lead to educational environments marked by fear, compliance, and control rather than improvement. Educators experience inspections as a deficit-oriented policy technology that erases their teaching context and professional autonomy. These critiques of inspections connect to wider issues in education policy today including crises related to teacher retention (Perryman et al., 2024) and debates over whose knowledges and practices are valued and accepted in education systems. References Césaire, A. (2000). Discourse on Colonialism. Monthly Review Press. De Sousa Santos, B. (2015). Epistemologies of the South: Justice Against Epistemicide. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315634876 Ehren, M. C. M., Eddy-Spicer, D., Bangpan, M., & Reid, A. (2017). School inspections in low- and middle-income countries: Explaining impact and mechanisms of impact. Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education, 47(4), 468–482. https://doi.org/10.1080/03057925.2016.1239188 Gerrard, J., Sriprakash, A., & Rudolph, S. (2022). Education and racial capitalism. Race Ethnicity and Education, 25(3), 425–442. https://doi.org/10.1080/13613324.2021.2001449 London, N. A. (2004). School inspection, the inspectorate and educational practice in Trinidad and Tobago. Journal of Educational Administration, 42(4), 479–502. https://doi.org/10.1108/09578230410544080 Mignolo, W. D., & Walsh, C. E. (2018). On Decoloniality: Concepts, Analytics, Praxis. Duke University Press. https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822371779 Perryman, J., Bradbury, A., Calvert, G. & Kilian, K. (2023). Final Report of the Beyond Ofsted Inquiry (London, Beyond Ofsted Inquiry). https://beyondofsted.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Beyond-Ofsted-Re… Perryman, J., Bradbury, A., Calvert, G., & Kilian, K. (2024). ‘A Tipping Point’ in Teacher Retention and Accountability: The Case of Inspection. British Journal of Educational Studies, 1–20. https://doi.org/10.1080/00071005.2024.2439791 Robinson, C. (2000). Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Shahjahan, R. A. (2011). Decolonizing the evidence-based education and policy movement: Revealing the colonial vestiges in educational policy, research, and neoliberal reform. Journal of Education Policy, 26(2), 181–206. https://doi.org/10.1080/02680939.2010.508176 Quijano, A. (2000). Coloniality of Power and Eurocentrism in Latin America. International Sociology, 15(2), 215–232. https://doi.org/10.1177/0268580900015002005