CHRIS Woodhead was never going to be the teachers' pet. For teachers to like the chief inspector of schools would be similar to turkeys liking Christmas.

His achievements in the job need to be assessed, not according to his popularity, but to his positive contribution to education.

Even his most ardent critics would not reject the notion that Mr Woodhead has opened a debate into the quality of teaching received by our children.

The dreaded Ofsted visit may not be welcomed by schools and is not a foolproof gauge of their performance. But Mr Woodhead deserves some credit for establishing a means by which schools and teachers, in which society places a lot of trust and investment, can be judged.

Before he arrived on the scene, quality checks on schools and teachers were limited. Poor schools could continue in perpetuity. Poor teachers could teach until retirement without redress.

However, poor schools and poor teachers are in the minority; a plain and simple fact which Mr Woodhead either rejected or overlooked.

While individual Ofsted reports offered praise where it was due, Mr Woodhead's public utterances never did.

He concentrated his utterances on poor teachers, to the detriment of the morale of the many, many more excellent teachers.

His biggest failing was to deny the teaching profession the encouragement it needed as it embarked on the most fundamental reforms to our education system for a generation.