Julie Swan, executive director for general qualifications at the exams watchdog, told a heated session at the Association of School and College Leaders’ annual conference earlier this month that the surge in the number of A level and GCSE papers that were re-graded in 2017 was down to over-generous remarking.
“Many of the questions will allow for two, three examiners to give slightly different marks – none of which would be wrong,” Ms Swan said.
“All of them could be a reasonable application of the marks scheme.
“But what should not have happened is a reviewer saying: ‘they got 17, but I could have given them 18 so I’ll give them 18, even though 17 was fine’.”
Ofqual’s investigations had found it was “clear that is what was happening”, she added.
When asked by one attendee if this meant that, hypothetically, two students who submitted identical scripts could get a different grade, and there would be no recourse for a review because both decisions were dependable, Ms Swan agreed that was the case. There was, she conceded, the possibility with extended writing that some students could be “lucky” and get a generous marker.
During the exchange, delegates said that students could also get unlucky, and that such variations in grades were “life-changing”, and too important to be left to “a lottery”.
One headteacher said they had heard of cases where 20 additional marks had been found in a script after remarking. A December report from Ofqual suggested that about 2,000 exam results changed by two or more grades after review last year.
Ashley Tomlin, deputy head at Thomas Tallis School in London, who raised the issue in the session, told SecEd that schools “had to have faith” in the exam system, but that issues such as this made that more difficult.
“There are stretches in the system,” Mr Tomlin said. “Teachers are frustrated – they feel the amount and complexity of the changes to exams has been brought in without proper safeguards in place to make sure our young people are protected.”
Another delegate said that she knew “of teachers in Manchester being contacted on a Sunday, when the results were coming out on the Thursday and being asked to do some panic marking”.