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IS IT TIME TO SCRAP EXAMS?
English public examinations have been tested like never before. Thanks to the pandemic, questions about the way in which exams are managed have been pushed to the fore. But more longstanding concerns about the values they embody and the role they play in education have also been reignited.
The exam system is massive in scale, with an immense public cost. In 2019, the last year in which the system fully functioned, there were approximately 4.6million GCSE and more than 737,000 A-level qualification entries. The Office for Qualifications (Ofqual) estimates that in 2014, schools and colleges spent nearly £300million on exams, with costs continuing to rise.
Critics have consistently drawn attention to the alleged narrowness of exams, the system’s distrust of local teacher-led assessment and the negative psychological impact of ‘high stakes’ terminal exams. Recent changes to the system have, if anything, increased the ferocity of criticism. Teachers, students and unions were united in calling for education secretary Gavin Williamson to resign after the government repeated the mistakes made in 2020 with another round of cancelled exams in 2021.
A renewed emphasis from the government on the importance of practical or vocational skills – which tend to require special forms of assessment – suggest that exams cannot be a one-size-fits-all solution. With a renewed interest in apprenticeships and skills, some argue that the narrow focus on academic exams risks limiting young people’s options when it comes to further education.
Defenders of exams insist that it is the fairest and most effective way of objectively measuring intellectual excellence. Thanks to the chaos created by repeated lockdowns and exam cancellations, many staff and students realised the benefits of examinations – bemoaning undue pressure resulting in unfair results from a system based purely on teacher-led assessment. But even those sympathetic to the exams system bemoan widespread practises such as ‘teaching to the test’. While some regard exams as deeply unfair, privileging only certain kinds of intelligence, others argue that challenging all young people to sweat a little is no bad thing.
Has the pandemic taught us that it might be time to embrace new forms of assessment with the teacher front and centre? Is there still much to be defended in the impartiality and rigour of exams, or are they hopelessly outdated? Do exams in fact constrain creativity, and are students, and teachers in fact liberated by alternative methods of assessment? Should we be thinking about expanding our notion of education beyond the exam hall? Or are there some aspects of the ‘old normal’ – like exams – worth keeping?
Speakers
Dr Tony Breslin
educationalist; school governor; author, Lessons from Lockdown: the educational legacy of Covid-19; director, Breslin Public Policy Limited
Ian Burns
religious studies and ethics teacher
Louise Burton
history teacher
Dr David James
deputy head at a London independent school; author, Schools of Thought; former teacher-in-residence, Department for Education
David Perks
founder and principal, East London Science School
Chair
Toby Marshall
film studies teacher; member, AOI Education Forum
