Over the past few years, the very words “Ofsted inspection” have, sadly, come to be considered something of a portent of doom for Charedi schools. So it was with great joy that I read the recent report from Stamford Hill’s youngest school for boys, Talmud Torah London (TTL), which was rated good in all areas.

Unlike most independent schools, TTL cannot and does not support itself by charging parents tens of thousands of pounds a year and operates on a tiny fraction of the budget available to most schools. Its Ofsted report represents a real achievement. TTL has done this while providing a first-class education in Chumash, Talmud and the Yiddish language, and without compromising on any of the principles of Charedi religion or culture.

TTL’s achievement rests on three pillars. The first is by being one of the first Stamford Hill boys’ schools to employ female teachers, ensuring every child at the school has a qualified and dedicated teacher. The second is dedicating two-and-a-half hours a day to secular studies, which may not sound like much to some readers, but has proved ample when properly utilised. 

The third, and by far and away the most important factor is the extraordinary dedication of the school’s governors and leadership team to achieving the dream of a Charedi school that provides the education required for a citizen of 21st-century Britain.

In June 2017, the very same school was inspected and received an overall rating of inadequate. For a school to improve, more than just will is required, critical guidance from outside is a must. The school’s leadership and Ofsted were able to form the kind of constructive relationship that is central to driving improvement. 

You may well ask why this kind of constructive and critical relationship can’t be replicated throughout the Charedi community, where relations with Ofsted are certainly critical, but not at all constructive. The answer lies partly in a lucky accident. 

In the past year, Ofsted have moderated their approach somewhat, accepting, in primary schools only, generic teaching of tolerance for different lifestyles in place of specific mention of “protected characteristics” of a sexual nature (which include same-sex orientation). 

In most Charedi schools, however, this made no difference because pupils typically graduate from primary to secondary level after barmitzvah, meaning that, with only a couple of exceptions, every school in Stamford Hill is defined as providing secondary-level education. TTL was able to benefit from this leniency for a very simple reason: since it was founded in 2015, it still only goes up to year four. 

As a result of the “protected characteristics” issue being removed from the picture, TTL was freed to concentrate on implementing the national curriculum and raising standards of teaching. In the rest of the Charedi sector, by contrast, Ofsted’s role is demoralising. 

Schools have got the message that they cannot pass an inspection except by doing something that would cause the entire parent body to withdraw their children en masse and hence have no effective outside motivation to improve. 

I firmly believe that standards of secular education in the Charedi community should be raised regardless of what an inspector says. However, there is a reason an inspectorate exists: all of us need motivation and incentives in life and Ofsted’s role is to provide the carrot and stick needed to overcome the natural human desire to rest on our laurels.

According to a recent Institute for Jewish Policy Research report, 58 per cent of children enrolled in Jewish schools are Charedi and this is only going to grow in future. Everyone concerned about the future of Judaism in the UK should want these children to grow up literate, numerate, and with all the skills they need to compete in the 21st-century economy. 

As someone committed to this goal, I can attest that the number-one obstacle to achieving it is the impasse regarding the teaching of protected sexual characteristics. TTL has shown that, when this issue is removed, Charedi schools and Ofsted can work together to achieve great things. 

Eli Spitzer is headteacher of Talmud Torah Tiferes Shlomoh in Hendon