Quality of the primary school.

Policy for quality in primary schools

The law on primary education says all schools must do quality policy. This means primary schools must work in a planned way to guard and improve education quality. In short, schools must:

• set what they want to achieve (goals)
• think about how to reach these goals
• decide which resources (time, staff, money) they need
• think about how they check if they reach the goals
• check what improvements can be made (and change goals if needed)

School plan and school guide

Schools must make a school plan and school guide. They must also have a complaints procedure. The complaints procedure lets parents, teachers, and students complain if they are unhappy with the school.

Law on education supervision

The education inspectorate watches over education quality on behalf of the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science under the law on education supervision. This law says a school is responsible for the quality of its education. It is also responsible for how quality is measured and checked. The education inspectorate fits its supervision to the school and encourages schools to keep and improve their education quality on their own.

Tailored supervision

Based on risk analysis and further research, the education inspectorate decides how much supervision a school needs. Supervision is tailored for each school. The inspectorate explains how it works, what it assesses, and when education quality is enough. It also checks the financial health of schools and school governing bodies.