Grade predictions can be trusted in schools with a transparent record
sir – As headmaster of a large, selective, socially and ethnically diverse co-educational day school, I had to present its predicted grades, by department and student, to the governors before the summer recess.
These were closely analysed with the actual grades once published. This process was very useful in that my teaching colleagues knew there was a measure of accountability. It was often helpful where we felt that there was inconsistency or unfairness in the way papers had been marked.
Where institutions can demonstrate ongoing evaluation of their predicted grades, surely these can be used with confidence and trust. If not, it is inevitable that doubts will arise.
Stephen Davidson
Headmaster, Bradford Grammar School, 1996-2011
Ilkley, West Yorkshire
sir – Assuming the exam system returns to normal next year, how will students sitting A-levels in 2021 compete fairly for scarce university places against deferred applicants from this year’s cohort, with their inflated teachers’ estimates?
Guy Lachlan
Caxton, Cambridgeshire
sir – It’s not the algorithm’s fault. It was only doing as it was told.
Peter Burroughs
Felpham, West Sussex
sir – It’s typical of Labour’s front bench, and in this case Angela Rayner, to criticise the Government on teacher-assessment when in April, after Ofqual announced how grades would be allotted, Labour did not trust teachers to do so. Mrs Rayner said: “We have always said predicted grades are not always accurate and can disproportionately affect children who need the most support.”
Bill Todd
Whitton, Middlesex
sir – My first experience of social distancing was in 1968 when I sat my O-levels, in the gym and the school hall. We were separated sufficiently to make seeing anyone else’s papers impossible. Am I alone in wondering why this year’s wretched A-levels and GCSES had to be cancelled?
Keith Sumner
Castle Donington, Derbyshire
sir – If the leader of the Labour Party had kept control of the teaching unions instead of playing politics, the schools could have reopened in June as planned, and pupils could have taken their A-level exams.
Phyllis Jones
Oakley, Bedfordshire
sir – The Government is operating on the tumbleweed principle – to be blown about by the slightest breeze. The education blob has noticed.
GP Brown
Norwich
sir – A merger of Ofqual and Camelot would seem appropriate.
Giles Slaughter
Woodbridge, Suffolk