Exam fiasco will ripple for years
STUDENTS and teachers across Wales must again be congratulated for a stellar set of results posted in an extraordinary year when schools were shut and exams cancelled.
Wales posted record breaking GCSE results following an excellent set of A-level grades.
The mess made of results this year by those in charge of “standardisation” - ditched at the 11th hour - will have ripples for years to come.
It has been a national disgrace for Wales and the whole of the UK to admit the algorithm agreed upon to arrive at results had anomalies which led to downgrading, and worst of all, affecting the most disadvantaged bright students particularly.
Why the system was not scrutinised and any anomalies rectified earlier is anyone’s guess. None involved has yet revealed detailed information of the process or communications with Welsh Government despite being asked by the Senedd’s Children Young People and Education Committee, among others.
The Western Mail and our sister website WalesOnline received information from Qualifications Wales on August 7 revealing thousands of A-levels and GCSEs had been downgraded.
The regulator said teacher assessments, fed into the process to award grades, were “confident” and had been downgraded to ensure this year’s results were similar to previous years.
They wanted to maintain credibility and trust in our qualification system.
The debacle that followed not only eroded trust, it utterly destroyed it.
The U-turn to award results on Centre Assessed Grades brings another set of issues.
These grades are very much better than normal years when exams are sat.
How fair will that be when comparisons are made with previous and future years?
It is no good the regulator and Education Minister saying they had to act at top speed in “unprecedented times” during a pandemic. They had a job to do. They were tested and they failed.
Schoolchildren are told to prepare and perform to their best ability under pressure in exams.
It’s a shame those responsible for the exams process didn’t do as much. They should be awarded nothing more than a “fail” for overseeing an exam results season that will be remembered for all the wrong reasons.