School standards slipping? Just cut pass mark to 40pc!
SNP ‘dumbing down’ as it lowers threshold for key qualification
PUPILS will get a qualification in the SNP’s National exams by scoring just 40 per cent under a move condemned last night as ‘dumbing down’.
Education Secretary John Swinney has announced the lowering of the present threshold of 45 per cent for a grade D for National 5.
The measure is aimed at cutting the number of pupils who finish school without any sort of qualification. Ministers have also removed mandatory pupil assessments after teachers said they created unnecessary workload.
Nationals replaced Standard Grades after the pass rate came close to 100 per cent, causing a backlash among employers who said they were worthless.
Education expert Professor Lindsay Paterson of Edinburgh University described the latest move as ‘surprising’. He said ministers and examiners should ‘explain why making a course more likely to produce good examination performance is an excuse for making the grading of some performance less strict’.
The Scottish Government said ‘mandatory unit assessments are being removed from the qualification from the 2017-18 academic year to reduce teacher and pupil workload’. As a result, ‘the course assessments for National 5 – a combination of exam and coursework – have been strengthened to maintain their integrity, breadth and standards’.
The Scottish Government insisted that the grade required to pass National 5 – 50 per cent – will not change. Grade D will be extended to include candidates who achieve between 40 to 49 per cent from the present 45 to 49 per cent band. The qualifications for those in the 40 to 49 per cent range would show them as having a National 5, albeit at the lowest grade.
Chris McGovern, of the Campaign for Real Education, said: ‘When you dumb down like this, you are doing a disservice to the pupil and to the teacher because you dilute standards and lose the trust of employers.’
Scottish Labour education spokesman Iain Gray said: ‘The new exams, introduced by SNP ministers and simply “bolted on” to Curriculum for Excellence, are having all kinds of unintended consequences.
‘The most serious of those is the reduction in achievement by those pupils who previously left school with good Standard Grade results.
‘We have repeatedly shown that these pupils’ achievements have diminished as a result of the new exams. Frankly, these changes could well make that worse.’
Scottish Tory education spokesman Liz Smith said: ‘It has been obvious for some time there are major issues with National 4 and National 5 exams, the most important of which is the failure of the system to cater for the best interests of least academic pupils.
‘The current system is proving less effective in this respect than both Standard Grade and O Grade.’
Larry Flanagan, general secretary of the EIS teaching union, welcomed the cut to the ‘excessive workload burden’ but added: ‘It is a matter of regret that this Scottish Government advice has been a long time in coming, as this has led to significant uncertainty for schools.’
Mr Swinney said ‘removing mandatory unit assessments will significantly reduce teacher workload and the over-assessment experienced by some young people’.
The changes would begin to be implemented later this year. ‘Ahead of that, I’ve been listening closely to feedback about the need to ensure the achievements of young people continue to be recognised,’ he said.
Emma Cowing – Page 21
‘Disservice to pupil and teacher’