Our Approach – Maintained special schools

We visit every maintained special school in Wales at least twice during a six-year cycle of inspection. From September 2024, we will carry out a core inspection and a shorter, interim visit at each school.

Find out more detail in our inspection guidance resources below.

The animation below outlines our inspection process.

After each inspection or interim visit, we publish our findings on our website. We no longer include summative gradings within these reports but instead focus on strengths and areas for improvement. 

 If you are part of a federation, you will be inspected in line with arrangements for the maintained special sector. This means that your inspections will take place at the same time. 

Each year we publish the HMCI’s annual report. This includes a summary of our inspection findings as well as examples of effective practice and areas for development within the sector.

We also publish a range of reports and tools to support development in the sector.