New SATs fiasco as marker leaks paper hours before exam

ANOTHER school testing row erupted yesterday after a ‘rogue marker’ leaked a spelling and grammar test hours before 600,000 ten and 11-year-olds were due to sit it.

The paper, which forms part of the Government’s new tougher tests, was leaked on Monday evening in what ministers believe was a politically motivated attempt to sabotage exams.

Officials believe the person responsible is likely to have been a teacher trying to discredit the new SATs testing regime as part of an ‘active campaign’ against government reforms.

A coalition of teaching unions, Labour MPs and parent groups oppose the tougher Key Stage 2 tests, which they claim cause children too much stress.

Last night officials were hunting for the culprit, who faces being struck off from the profession if a teacher and could even be prosecuted.

The person responsible was able to see the exams material when it was accidentally published early on a secure website accessible by official markers with passwords.

However, the tests continued as planned yesterday after the Department for Education insisted it was confident the test had not been widely circulated.

A DfE source said: ‘While the test doesn’t appear to have leaked into the public domain and can go ahead, a rogue marker did attempt to leak the test’s contents.

‘It is clear there is now an active campaign by those people opposed to our reforms to undermine these tests and our attempts to raise standards. Ministers are livid.’

It is the second time a paper has been mistakenly published online recently, and comes amid concerns about this year’s SATs papers.

Last month, a national Key Stage 1 spelling test for six and sevenyear- olds was abandoned after it emerged that the DfE had mistakenly published it online in January, months before pupils were due to sit the test.

And last week thousands of parents took their children out of school for a one-day protest against testing young pupils.

The Key Stage 2 grammar, punctuation and spelling paper and marking scheme were mistakenly uploaded onto exam board Pearson’s secure website at 5pm on Monday, where 93 contracted markers are thought to have viewed them.

The test was taken down at 9pm after the company was made aware of the error, but it appears one of the markers had already downloaded it and sent it to the Guardian newspaper. The DfE was notified when it received a call from a journalist at 9.30pm, and an agreement was made not to publish the test. Normally, markers would only be able to view the test material online at 8am on the test day, when schools are allowed to open packages containing hard copies.

Most markers for Key Stage 2 tests are full-time or part-time teachers, taking on the work in their spare time for extra money.

Yesterday, Labour claimed the original error by Pearson amounted to a ‘compromise’ of the test contents and said the system was in disarray.

The Government has made the tests tougher this year in a bid to raise standards, with those schools failing to meet the floor target facing being turned into academies.

Labour education spokesman Lucy Powell said: ‘This news undermines the validity of the SATs spelling and grammar test children are sitting today and is a body blow to parent and teacher confidence in the primary assessment system.’ But addressing the Commons, schools minister Nick Gibb said: ‘Clearly in this system it is essential that people in positions of trust can be relied upon to act appropriately.

‘We have no evidence to suggest that any sensitive information entered the public domain before children started taking the test today.’

A Pearson spokesman said it regretted that the wrong paper had been temporarily uploaded on to its secure website.

‘We are conducting an investigation to make sure it cannot happen again,’ the spokesman said. ‘As part of this investigation, we will seek to find out which individual passed this information into the public domain, in breach of their commitments to us and their fellow markers.’