ISM+Oct+2014+LowRes

‘It is hard to envisage atime when faith in themarking will return’The failure of some examination boards to deliver reliable results has led to aculture in which neither pupils, parents nor teachers trust the grades that arrive onResults Day, writes Dan Gabriele, Head of Sixth Form at Brighton College, Sussex.For some years now, schools suchas mine have been geared up toquickly challenge those gradeswhich seem anomalous; however,the frequency of these anomalies,not to mention the scale of theerrors, has grown to such anextent that it is hard to envisagea time when faith in the markingwill return.As a former Head of English, Ihave had plenty of experiences ofsuch mistakes. Over the last threeyears we have challenged markingerrors and twice triggered wholecohort re-marks in the EnglishGCSE examinations across twodifferent examination boards;on each occasion, it has led to asignificant number of pupils – bywhich I mean upwards of twentyper cent of a cohort of onehundred and sixty or so boys andgirls – see their overall grades forEnglish Language or Literaturerise by a grade boundary. Suchexperiences are embarrassinglycommon, especially in subjectslike English and History.What has been striking this year,though, is the extent of the errorsin A level marking in essay-basedsubjects. These have seriousramifications that can warp thefutures of pupils whose universityplaces hinge on these results.For instance, one of our 2014leavers held an insurance offerof AAB from Newcastle to readGeography. On Results Day shegot BBB – unexpectedly – andtherefore missed both offers. HerA2 History exam, worth 30% ofthe entire A level, was awarded amark of 47/120 – a U grade. In6 Independent Schools Magazineher three other History papers sheaveraged a low A grade.Something was amiss. The paperin question was submitted for apriority re-mark. It took not thethree to five days to return thatis acceptable, but around tendays, leaving the pupil and herfamily on tenterhooks. It went upto 85/120 – a B grade for thatpaper, giving her an A grade forthe whole A Level in History, and- it turned out – good enoughfor Newcastle to take her forGeography. But it was a long andpainful wait, during which timethe university accommodation onoffer was rapidly diminishing.There have been around a dozenfurther examples of pupils whoseuniversity aspirations have beencompromised by initial markswhich subsequently proved to benot just wrong, but wildly wrong,to the tune of several grades.In one risible case, a Year 12 pupilwas awarded 48% in his EnglishLiterature AS exam having testedat upper A grade standard all year– and having been predicted anA grade on the board’s estimatedgrade sheet. We sought a copy ofthe script and submitted it for remarkat the same time. The copysent to us revealed that the marksfor one of the two essays he haddone had been omitted from thefinal addition. A day later, theboard responded to the re-markrequest by ratifying the original,erroneous mark – and chargingthe pupil £49 for the privilege.We had to point out to the boardthat the script copy they sent tous demonstrated incontrovertiblythat this was wrong – that eventhe basic administration of addingup two plainly stated marks hadnot occurred.For this to have happened in thefirst place was dreadful. But for itto have happened at re-mark toosuggests that the paper had noteven been glanced at, never mindre-marked.In the end, the mark was alteredto 96% - by which time, inmid-September, the pupil haddropped English Literature asan A2 subject, thinking thathis ambitions in this line weremisplaced. He has since returnedto the subject, having missedthree weeks of teaching, andis re-calibrating his universityapplication as I write. As weall know, your grades andpercentages have a significantbearing on your credibility withthe best universities.What happens to pupils in schoolsthat cannot afford the risk ofputting in for re-marks? It is veryexpensive and, if the grade on thepaper does not go up, the fee isnot waived. The fee is designedto discourage re-mark requests,as the cost is nonsensically high.So plenty of state schools simplyhave to settle for what they get.Our leading universities have astandard offer A*AA for a goodnumber of popular arts andhumanities courses. But it seemsto me that asking for A*s inHistory or English and rejectingon that basis when they are notachieved is untenable, given theobvious collapse in the accuracyof the marking.One of our pupils missed anEnglish Lit A* by 5/200 UMS(uniform mark scale), andconsequently was rejected byDurham. That’s three raw marksout of sixty, across two essays.To have awarded her those markswould have been within officialtolerance, and another markermay have done so.“exam boardsneed toreform, orbe made toreform, theirmarkingpractices”In short, it’s something of alottery, and everyone knowsit. The exam boards need toreform, or be made to reform,their marking practices, ensuringthat they secure the services ofexperienced teachers with goodjudgement. But this can onlybe done by making the job ofmarking a more attractive one,with better pay and greaterrecognition for the important taskthat is being carried out – a taskthat shapes the futures and livesof thousands of young peopleevery year.Historic unfairness in top gradesHeadteacher organisations (ASCL,NAHT, HMC) and universityexperts have welcomed a reportby the exams regulator, Ofqual,into unpredictable and inaccurategrades in A-level ModernLanguages. They particularlywelcome its commitment to takeaction in time for summer 2015exams.Ofqual’s investigation wasundertaken in response toconcerns expressed over a decadeby languages teachers about anunfairly low percentage of A*grades awarded in these exams,and unexplained variability inmarking.Teachers knew that the bestcandidates were not getting thehighest grades and Ofqual has nowconcluded that this was due to theway in which marking rules havebeen designed by exam boards.Scottish independencereferendum ~ pupilvoters mirror resultAs the people of Scotland went to the polls last month (September),pupils at Oundle School, Northamptonshire, around 40 of whom comefrom Scotland, did so too.Oundle’s Head of Politics, Matt King, opened the referendum with ashort introduction while a member of the School’s bagpipe ensemble,Freddie Wood played a warm welcome. For the ‘YES’ side, pupilsRuaraidh Richardson and Ed Willey gave their reasons for Scotlandbecoming independent. Then, preceded by a verse of the NationalAnthem, played by Ian Ostojic on the trumpet, the ‘NO’ side, pupilsMorgan Ball and Rupert Warre put forward arguments for Scotlandremaining part of the United Kingdom.After hearing the arguments, pupils and staff of Oundle headed to thepolls. The result? A 67% win for the ‘NO’ campaign.Head of Politics, Matt King commented, “Having an Oundle versionof the Scottish referendum ensured that all pupils were aware ofwhat was happening and the importance of the constitutionalconsequences.I think the Oundle results were as we expected, with the majorityof pupils and staff deciding it was best to keep the Union together.Turnout was a little larger in the main event and the result a littlecloser, but, we reached the same conclusions!”Ofqual’s technical report, publishedlast month (September) finds that:• the bunching of raw marksand the statistical calculationby exam boards in setting theA* boundary has, indeed, ledto inaccurate allocation of A*grades. It recommends thatthe exam boards ensure a widerspread of raw marks for thesummer 2015 exams so thata fair number of A* grades isawarded to the right candidates.• specific aspects in the designof the exam boards’ markschemes have led to unreliable/variable marking, with detailsvarying from board to board andlanguage to language. Ofqualintends to require changes atexam boards in time for nextsummer’s exams. This meansthat schools should find that the‘rank order’ of their candidatesis more in line with expectation.• other findings from theinvestigation, important forINCISIVESTRATEGYDISTINCTIVEPROSPECTUSESEMOTIVEPHOTOGRAPHYENGAGINGFILMINNOVATIVEWEBSITESTheSchoolBrandingExperts.cominclusion in the design ofnew ‘linear’ A-levels, includeways to improve assessment ofspeaking and writing elementsin particular.Peter Hamilton, Chair of the HMCAcademic Policy Committee andHeadmaster of Haberdashers’Aske’s Boys School said:Thanks to the joint persistence ofthe state and independent schools’languages associations, Ofqualwill now be acting to correcthistoric injustices that have hugelydamaged confidence in these examgrades over recent years.It is extremely important thatthe proposed changes are madefor summer 2015 as the currentA-level will continue to be offeredthrough to summer 2017. Itis also vital that the reformedlanguages A-levels currently beingdesigned for first examinationin 2018 have the Ofqualrecommendations built-in at thedevelopment stage.Independent Schools Magazine 7