The decision to re-grade English language GCSE was not taken lightly and is a very rare instance of a
Minister becoming involved directly in regulatory issues, as distinct from policy issues, on examination
qualifications.
The only other occasion I can recall during my time in this role was last year when the Daily Telegraph
ran a series of articles last year concerning exam seminars. As a result of that I intervened with WJEC
over a rescheduling of the GCSE ICT examination due to a breach in security and also established a
Task and Finish group to look at the structure of the examinations market in Wales. That group
reported to me before the summer recess, and I published a statement on their report in July for
Members to consider.
My officials have diligently sought to continue to operate on the basis of a three-country regulatory
system. It is the case that since June 2010, and particularly in the last year, this has become more
difficult because of policy divergence between Wales and Northern Ireland on the one hand, and
England on the other. Indeed, earlier this year, the Northern Ireland examining body, the CCEA,
withdrew its qualifications from offer in England because of the increasing policy divergence with
England.
I have of course read the evidence from the WJEC and Ofqual. I was surprised when the Chief
Executive of Ofqual told the committee that her organisation had only been in existence for a
couple of years. I have minutes of Maintaining Standards meetings held in October 2008 with
Ofqual when issues relevant to today’s discussion were discussed, which were flagged up in the
report of my regulatory officials in September. Of course, the current Chief Executive of Ofqual
was not in post at the time, and nor were a number of her senior officials. The purpose
of these Maintaining Standards meetings was to ensure that where new qualifications changed
specification, outcomes year on year should be comparable when cohorts were similar.
It is only recently that Ofqual has published this Maintaining Standards work and couched it in
terms of ‘fighting grade inflation’. The phrase ‘grade inflation’ was not used in the first three Ofqual
Chief Regulator’s reports. Instead there was repeated reference to ensuring that awards are
‘consistent and fair’ and that standards are maintained year on year. Even as late as 25 July this
year, a Standards and Research report issued to Ofqual’s Board stated that their approach was
intended to ensure comparable outcomes, meaning that ‘if the 2012 cohort entering for
a subject is of similar ability to the 2011 cohort then the proportions of candidates achieving
particular grades should be similar.’
However, in a letter to the Secretary of State in England on 22nd August, the Chief Executive of
Ofqual made it clear that Ofqual regards ‘comparable outcomes’ as an approach to containing
grade inflation, rather than ensuring fairness to candidates, saying ‘one consequence of this
approach is that it can make it harder for any genuine increases in the performance of
students to be fully reflected in the results’.
Members will be aware that the September report by my regulatory officials analysed the
information available on the 2011 and 2012 cohorts and concluded that there was no reason
why performance should have been significantly worse in 2012. On that basis we concluded that
the results were unfair to candidates. Members may not be aware that informed commentators
- such as the Financial Times’s Education Correspondent Chris Cook - have suggested that
Ofqual’s own most recent report on English language GCSEs does not really offer new evidence
about the central question – Did a child in 2012 do as well as a similarly taught child did in 2011?
That is what our report sought to do.
Members will not be aware, but need to be aware, of the issues which we have had to address in
respect of Ofqual’s poor understanding of the devolution settlement. In July this year, the
Director of Regulation of Ofqual wrote to our officials claiming that they had power to regulate
qualifications wherever they were taken, including in Wales. Following discussions with our officials
and our lawyers, they subsequently withdrew that letter. Even on the 29th August, the Director of
Regulation of Ofqual said in an email to her Chief Executive ‘I know we would all like to put the
Welsh regulation issue to one side but we can’t’.
Members will be aware that we had to ask Ofqual’s Chief Executive to correct evidence she gave to
the House of Commons Education Select Committee which was wrong.
Members will understandably wish to question us about the Key Stage 2 Predictor issue. We are very
happy to answer in detail and to supply copies of correspondence. We regard evidence given by Ofqual
to this Committee on the Key Stage 2 issue as incomplete and inaccurate. I can tell the committee
that officials told Ofqual by email on April 5th that if Ofqual wanted WJEC to report against KS2 Predictors
they should send an Ofqual only letter as ‘it would be inappropriate for the Welsh Government to be
asking for results in Wales to be determined purely on the basis of predictions for English candidates.’
We note that Ofqual’s evidence states that ‘the view of the experts is that Key Stage 2 is a better
predictor of GCSE achievement at cohort level, than common centres.’ That may or may not be true
for England but it is absolutely not true for Wales. We may ourselves have questions about the use
of common centres as a predictor, but clearly the KS2 predictor model does not work for Wales.
Finally Ofqual itself strayed from the original declared position that the reporting against Key Stage 2
predictors would be ‘for reporting purposes only’ and placed all their reliance on Key Stage 2 indicators
using them as a device to change results that were already inconsistent with the previous year.
I understand that the use of Key Stage 2 predictor methodology for GCSEs was first proposed by the
AQA examining body. Members may wish to reflect on whether Ofqual has been subject to producer
capture in its adoption of AQA’s preferred methodology.
I have reviewed these issues in detail with my officials and I am confident that the approach that was
taken was the only approach that could have been taken in the context of three-country collaboration
as it was understood until this year. Members will obviously wish to test that in their questions and we
will be happy to respond and to explain why alternative courses of action would have been unacceptable.
In Wales, we have acted to put right an unfairness. In England, a court case is pending. I believe that,
in a situation that is by no means perfect, the Welsh regulatory system has delivered fairness
for Welsh students.
Comments