Who is this template for?
This template is designed for Headteachers, Senior Leadership Teams, Governors, and Trustees in independent schools. It is also an essential tool for MAT CEOs and central teams responsible for quality assurance and strategic oversight across a group of independent schools in England.
Why use this template?
- Inspection Readiness: It provides a clear, structured framework that mirrors the official ISI inspection framework, ensuring your self-evaluation is comprehensive, compliant, and inspection-ready.
- Build a Robust Evidence Base: The iAbacus process guides you to link every judgement to specific evidence, creating a secure, organised, and compelling portfolio to present to inspectors, governors, and other stakeholders.
- Foster Collaboration: Involve your entire leadership team in the evaluation process. By inviting contributions, you can build a shared, 360-degree view of the school’s performance and foster collective ownership of the improvement plan.
- Drive Meaningful Improvement: The template moves you beyond compliance. The built-in analysis of 'helping' and 'hindering' factors helps you understand the root causes behind your judgements, leading to more strategic and impactful action planning.
- Increase Confidence: By following a logical, evidence-based process, you can be confident that your self-evaluation is accurate and robust, allowing you to articulate your school's story with clarity and conviction.
- Save Time and Reduce Workload: Consolidate all your evaluation notes, evidence, and action plans into a single, living document. This eliminates the need to manage multiple files and streamlines the reporting process.
How does it work?
This template uses the standard, intuitive iAbacus process to guide you seamlessly from reflection to action. You will evaluate your school's performance across the key areas defined by the ISI framework:
- Skills and Knowledge
- Understanding and management of risk
- The curriculum
- Teaching, learning and assessment
- Special educational needs and/or disabilities
- Recreation
- Pupils’ physical and mental health and emotional wellbeing
- Pupils’ social and economic wellbeing, and contribution to society
Gaining Strategic Insight
For leaders overseeing multiple schools, such as a MAT CEO, iAbacus provides a unique panoramic view of performance. By using the 'Overlay' and 'Stack' features, you can instantly combine the 'Whole-School Self-Evaluation' abacuses from all academies in the trust. This allows you to quickly compare overall performance, identify schools that require targeted support, and pinpoint successful strategies in high-performing schools that can be replicated across the group.
Clear, Professional Reporting
With a single click, you can export your entire evaluation into a polished, professional PDF report. This is perfect for sharing with stakeholders or providing to an inspector who requires a clear and comprehensive summary of the school's self-evaluation. You can customise the report to include the level of detail required, ensuring the information is perfectly tailored to its audience.
References / Source Material
How to Get Started
New to iAbacus? Discover how this template can support your improvement strategy. Book a personalised demo or start a free trial to explore the full platform. Visit www.iabacus.com to learn more. Already a subscriber? You can find this template in the template library within your iAbacus account. Simply log in, create a new abacus, and select it from the list to get started.
