Your School’s Best OFSTED Rating at Your Fingertips [Google Admin Guide]

Imagine that an OFSTED inspector calls to your school and announces a visit the following day. Your principal’s goal is clear: to get the best grade ever.

The challenge for the school admin?

Provide inspectors with granular reports on e-learning results. On time. Without a tool for ongoing auditing of your domain, a sudden inspection means that you, Google admins, are in trouble.

But you’re in good hands (or rather, on a good website). Read on to find out how reporting such a large amount of school data can become just a piece of cake—a speciality of the house for your visitors from OFSTED.

The OFSTED Rating. Why it Matters for UK-based Schools

If you’re working in a UK-based educational institution, you’ve undoubtedly heard about OFSTED. The Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills inspects all schools regularly to improve academic standards. 

Their goals, apart from raising the quality of education, are to enhance school management and ensure children’s safety. They appreciate a school’s achievements and indicate areas for improvement to achieve the best learning results. 

Their reports are among the factors parents consider when choosing a school for their child, as well as for teachers seeking employment. The rating also impacts each school’s position in the local community.

In 2025, the OFSTED inspection guidelines have been refreshed. Since November, OFSTED inspectors have been evaluating schools in six areas (Safeguarding, Inclusion, Curriculum and Teaching, Achievement, Attendance and Behaviour, and Personal Development and Well-being) using a 5-grade scale.

Keep Calm & Get Ready for an OFSTED Inspection 

Once upon a time, OFSTED paid a visit to a school. Everything went like a charm. The inspectors joined perfectly organised classes with highly engaged students and a relaxed and professional teacher. The school principal showed detailed student learning and behaviour summaries. School staff spoke with the visitors about how effortless it is to work with the latest edtech tools. The institution got the highest OFSTED grading and lived happily ever after…

Well, that sounds like a perfect tale. But life is brutal. 

The visitors provide just a few days’ notice to the school, causing stress and time pressure. Students sometimes get bored in the classroom, and technology frequently fails at the most inopportune moments.

However, whether the inspection runs smoothly and yields the best results also depends on the school admins.

You can easily find out what they will be evaluating during a visit. Now, it’s about leveraging advanced solutions to meet the highest education standards and showcase your school’s achievements. 

We started doing this homework for you. Here is your cheat sheet with OFSTED evaluation areas and how to address them using GAT Suite for Education. 

And the best part? Each of the following features is part of the same toolkit ✅

Address the OFSTED Evaluation Areas with GAT Labs

OFSTED Evaluation Area	GAT Labs’ Feature	GAT Labs’ Tool
Safeguarding	Online activity monitoring and real-time alerts	GAT+
		GAT Shield
	Detecting cyberbullying and other forms of child-on-child violence online	GAT Shield
	School student online safety policies compliance	GAT Shield
	Staff behaviour and well-being monitoring	GAT+
		GAT Shield
Curriculum and teaching	E-learning progress monitoring and personalisation	Teacher Assist
	Learning integrity and assignment monitoring	Taskmaster
		GAT Shield
	Classroom resources management	GAT+
		Teacher Assist
Attendance and behaviour	Student behaviour monitoring, including lesson disruptions, bullying, harassment, violence, and derogatory language	GAT Shield
		Teacher Assist
	Student attendance monitoring	Teacher Assist
	Prompt tailored reaction to address student misbehaviour	Teacher Assist
Personal development and well-being	Student mental health monitoring and assessment	GAT Shield

Learn more about how specific GAT features help your school to stay safe, track student behaviour, and monitor teaching progress in Google Classroom. Our guide for school admins explains step by step how to address new OFSTED evaluation areas and prepare for an inspection.

Maximising School Devices Value and Usage

To meet OFSTED requirements for an e-learning environment, each student must have access to safe, secure, and inclusive technologies. That might sound challenging for underfunded schools. However, expecting parents to provide devices to students isn’t the best option either, as technology costs are a primary concern for 27% of families. 

In addition to a financial burden on parents, the Bring Your Own Device model may raise security concerns. Still, some schools also struggle financially and can’t afford additional laptops.

💡Solution? Managing existing devices smarter rather than buying new ones.

There is plenty of money in our schools, but too often it is being used inefficiently, a former OFSTED inspector says. 

So, why not adjust edtech spending to be more effective?

With GAT Labs, you optimise the usage of all your school devices by:

• Tracking device usage in real-time
• Identifying inactive users and devices
• Managing every Google licence efficiently

Additionally, you get a comprehensive toolset for:

• Proactive and smart school domain management: Complete oversight of your Google Workspace activity with GAT+.
• Accessible in-depth insights: Detailed reporting on users, classrooms, and groups with GAT+ and Teacher Assist.
• Safe and trustworthy e-learning space: Full monitoring of real-time online activity on every device and automated alerting with GAT Shield.

Closing Thoughts for Google Admins

Automated real-time monitoring, classroom management, and auditing of your Google Workspace for Education relieve your workload during inspections and everyday rushes. 

And most importantly, they constantly ensure strong online protection for students, reinforcing trust with parents and the local community.

When the D-day comes, say a cheerful ‘good morning’ to your guests from OFSTED. With robust reporting solutions at hand, it will be a truly very good day for you.

See GAT Suite features in action—book a demo or request a free 15-day trial for your school domain.