Evolution of Beacon status

The approach of self-regulation and a sector-led quality improvement service offers a tremendous opportunity for Beacons to be at the heart of developments. We might build on the ‘sharing expertise’ work to redefine Beacon status more as an indicator of the sector’s significant agents of change, rather than simply as a badge to delineate its outstanding providers.

There was much interest in, and support for, this view at the recent Beacon Forum. We also need to consider the tenure of Beacon status when, as has happened in a very few cases, inspection grades indicate that a Beacon is no longer performing at Beacon standard. The indicators could be an absence of grade 1s, or the appearance of grade 3s.

Beacons, at the Beacon Forum, were overwhelmingly in favour of maintaining the high standards associated with the award of Beacon status. We would welcome your thoughts about the nature of Beacon status in a self-regulated sector, and what LSIS’s approach should be to those organisations apparently no longer performing at Beacon standard.