Uncertainty takes its toll on children

ATHIRD year of exam chaos and retribution beckons. As the second half of the autumn term begins, disruption in schools continues.

In the week before half term almost one in five GCSE students and nearly a quarter of A-level students missed school, according to official Welsh Government data.

School leaders have been warning for weeks about the worrying state of affairs with so many Covid cases and absences and the effect on education. Now there are calls to cancel exams once again.

Headteachers say the same problems as last year are looming in regard to GCSEs and A-levels.

But it’s worse this year with pupils in the current exam Years 11, 12 and 13 having missed more face-to-face school and had more pandemicdisrupted learning than any previous exam years.

In many ways the 2021-22 exam cohort are the worst affected so far in terms of what they have lost. Current Year 13s last had a normal school year when they were in Year 10. For GCSE Year 11s the last normal year was in Year Eight. Pupils are missing varying amounts of learning and there is no real level playing field for running traditional exams again.

Covid has already led to some candidates being pulled out of this week’s November series re-sit and early entry GCSEs. That should surely act as an early warning signal that it’s not exam business as usual.

Teachers warn that the effect of all the uncertainty and pressure around exams are affecting the well-being of teenagers. Headteachers report increased anxiety among pupils, increased requests for counselling, absence for illness caused by anxiety and worry about when all this will end and fear about the future.

Specialist teachers are off, pupils are off. The message from Welsh Government is that Covid is still here and there’s a hard pandemic winter ahead, yet those in charge of exams appear to be ploughing on as if this is not the case. They do so at their peril. This generation, their parents and teachers, will not thank decision makers for failing to step up at such an important moment.

Decisions made about the education, exams and assessment of young people will affect them and the economy and health of Wales for many years to come.

While those in charge at Cardiff Bay talk about planning the new curriculum the main issue for schools is not what’s on the horizon, however important that may be. The pressing issue for schools is right in front of them – Covid and the chaos it continues to cause to the education of our young people.