Will this secondary shake-up boost standards for all?

Today's Daily Mail splash on the future of GCSEs, the national curriculum, league tables and exam boards has the air of a brainstorm session at Sanctuary Buildings that has been released before being fully thought through. Nothing wrong with that, if Michael Gove spends some time thinking through all the implications of what he is proposing. But he needs to be careful that his proposals don't end up undermining a wider drive to raise standards for all.

There are some perfectly good ideas in what appears to be being considered. It makes perfect sense to have a single exam board for each exam. The effect, of course, will be to have a single syllabus in these subjects. Which makes the supposed removal of the national curriculum from secondary schools rather less radical than is being suggested: indeed it would ensure that academies and free schools work to a single syllabus. Lord Baker is right to argue that it is as important that technical subjects are examined at a high standard as well as Gove's favoured subjects like history and geography.

The second question concerns the proposal of splitting the GCSE into a CSE and O-level exam. There is a seductive sense to this idea if you believe that the only impact of GCSEs has been a 'dumbing down'. But this is a tabloid caricature. It is perfectly fair to feel that there needs to be more rigour involved in getting an A grade, but that doesn't mean writing off thousands of youngsters who could today strive for a C. There is a terrible canard in the notion that the use of the 5 A-C benchmark itself denies ambition: in fact, a C is worth far more to a child than a D when talking to employers, and the existence of the benchmark has led many schools to push such pupils towards a grade they can achieve in a way that the average point score would not necessarily do.

But there is a good argument for saying that achieving an A grade should be really demanding. With a single syllabus there is no reason why this cannot be achieved in a single exam, particularly since Gove wants to move back to linear testing at the end of two years. That is not to say there is no place for more practical exams in English, Maths and Science. Such tests should be available, however, at GCSE standard of level 2 as well as the less demanding level 1, and less 'academically -minded' students should not merely be expected to achieve level 1. It would be a serious and terribly retrograde step to move in this direction, and Gove will find that it could have as serious an impact as Labour's scrapping of an expectation that all schools study languages through to 16.

This raises the issue of league tables and floor targets. And it is here that Gove could be making his biggest mistake. The big improvements in London and by academies over the last decade have been spurred in part by ever-more ambitious floor targets based on the 5 GCSE standard. It is a realistic but relatively demanding ambition for schools to expect a majority of their pupils to reach this level, and Gove has sharply increased the demand of the floor targets. Of course, one could set a target based on the average point score, but this could have the perverse effect of lowering expectations in terms of breadth. And since there is no longer a strong incentive to use high GCSE vocational alternatives, the main concern here has been addressed. By all means publish a 5A target alongside this, though in truth the EBacc is becoming the more rigorous target here.

Gove has time to get this right. More rigorous GCSEs, particularly for top achievers, do not have to place a cap on ambition for many other students. More practical business-focused English and Maths tests should not themselves be set unambitiously. And Gove should not throw away one of the most effective drivers of improve standards for many schools in the process.

Reforming the curriculum

The Government has started to realise how much harder it is to deliver change than it is to advance rhetoric. Any changes to the National Curriculum have been postponed until 2014 as ministers try to work out how their plans relate to each other. There has, it is true, been some good early work by the curriculum review team, albeit in the parameters set for them. However, there is still a real danger that in the Government's zeal to widen the academic requirements for the majority, the needs of the minority will be neglected.

The curriculum review are recommending that history, geography, the 'arts' and modern languages should all be compulsory until the age of 16, and that GCSEs should be taken over three rather than two years to allow time for the further study. The latter idea reflects existing practice, and is a good one, even if it belies the rhetoric criticising those who entered students for early GCSEs that seemed to come from government a few months ago. At the same time as requiring study in these additional subjects, schools will be expected to teach citizenship, technology and ICT, though it will be for them to decide how to do so. In line with the Wolf Review, but counter to the direction of travel of Lord Baker's University Technical Colleges, there is no room for serious vocational learning before 16.

All of this is certainly in line with the direction of travel signalled by the English Baccalaureate, and its weighting for particular GCSE subjects. And while the majority - perhaps four in five students - should certainly be able to take this range of academic subjects through to GCSE standard, there is a serious question mark over its appropriateness for the minority who will undoubtedly be turned off this mix. There needs to be a serious option of college-based vocational and pre-apprenticeship courses, with English and Maths, for the remainder. This means that it should not be compulsory for all to take the extended national curriculum through to 16.

This group may be 1 in 5 nationally, but they will number as many as half the cohort in some schools and academies. The latter, in theory, should be able to ignore these strictures. But the Department has its levers - including the EBac - to cajole them in a different direction. Meanwhile, what of the compulsory subjects without programmes of study? This is fine, so long as there are some clear expectations of what young people should know about civics and citizenship, as the research for the review team shows to be the norm in most countries, and which concepts are crucial in ICT. But the real problem is the exclusion of technology as a subject on a par with history and geography on the GCSE curriculum: the call for computer science, for example, is being sidelined. And citizenship is to be sidelined competely as an add-on to PSHE, as was the case before it became a compulsory subject. Democracy is to be an afterthought.

Today sees Ofqual reporting on the growing errors and ineptitude of some exam boards. There will be those who might ask whether it would make more sense to have a single board for England (with separate boards in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland) to deal with the GCSE and A-level syllabuses. That way, there could be some clear expectations and no room for gaming. When I suggested this before, I was accused of undermining the innovation delivered by competition. I do wonder whether we have not seen rather too much such innovation from examiners in recent weeks.

The maintenance of exam standards

The A level and GCSE results can only be weeks ago, because the dumbing down debate has started in earnest. First off, the universities select committee publishes a report attacking universities for a virtual doubling in the number of candidates awarded first class honours degrees. Then comes the shadow schools secretary promising to advance his enthusiasm for history by publishing past exam papers online.

Both rather miss the point. With universities, there is certainly room for greater input by external examiners, preferably from overseas, to ensure that standards remain rigorous. But it is virtually impossible to make a meaningful comparison between a First won for a professional or vocational qualification against one in a scientific or humanities subject. Just as with school exams, there is not a lot of point making bald comparisons over time either. No 1950s exam paper would have displayed much familiarity with modern computers or bioscience, for example. Equally, there is little point in young people today using the log tables I had to use in my youth.

What matters most is the currency of the exams with employers and international students. So what's needed is a proper system within different subjects to ensure high standards across countries. And within countries, there is some merit in publishing employment and postgraduate data for each course and grade so students can see their currency. (There may also be a good case for simply publishing student marks, and skipping the 2:1s and 2:2s which have become less meaningful, alongside the level of work needed to gain those marks). What is definitely not needed is a huge new layer of bureaucracy to force the sort of 'parity of esteem' on higher education that has bedevilled vocational education for younger people.

With school exams, I'm all for transparency. When I worked with David Blunkett in the first term of this government, we allowed students to see their marked papers by right, something we did in the teeth of fierce opposition from the exam boards. Of course, past papers should be published online. But let's not pretend that they offer much more than historical curiosities in most subjects. What matters is that there is a robust independent mechanism in place - and has been since 1996 - ensuring that standards are maintained over time. It has not been afraid to point out where it believes standards are slipping. But it is able to take full account of advances in knowledge and technology as well as that which is timeless. Ensuring that mechanism remains and is strengthened is the best way to guarantee standards.

Why our exam system needs re-examination

It is good news that the new exam regulator Ofqual has expressed its disquiet about the rigour of last year's new science GCSEs. Not because it is good that the questions were too easy. But because it shows that the new regulator (about whose creation I was sceptical) has teeth and is prepared to bare them. It makes their pronouncements about the English and Maths papers the more credible and gives some assurance that the new regulator will not hesitate to act where dumbing down is taking place.

Unlike some commentators, I have never held the view that there is a conspiracy to dumb down GCSEs and A levels. Rather it has been changes made to the nature of the exams that have led to changes in the marking. I can see some point in modularity at A-levels, particularly with innovations like the new extended essay or project, but have always argued for a substantial synoptic element. Equally, while it is good that coursework (conceived before use of the Internet became widespread) is being reined in, it is absurd that costly modular exams are being introduced across all GCSEs.

I also don't share the view that the attempt to popularise science necessarily leads to a dumbing down of the exams. It is perfectly possible to compile challenging questions for a popular curriculum. Indeed, it should be remembered that there has also been an increase in schools offering the three science subjects separately; these are the students most likely to take science at university. Those scientists who complain confuse the need for a minority to gain expertise in science with the importance of the majority having a basic understanding of the subject.

But there is one overriding lesson from this whole sorry saga. Competition between the exam boards has always led schools to shop around and there is a pressure on the boards to provide schools with syllabuses that will be attractive to them. Labour drastically cut the number of boards in 1997. But we didn't go far enough: this is an area where competition is unhealthy, as any innovations that it creates are outweighed by perverse incentives to make things easier. As I have argued before, there should be a single board contracted to provide each exam and Ofqual should work to make the whole process simpler and more transparent.

Effing examiners need to get a grip

Today's news that Peter Buckroyd, chief examiner of English for the Assessment and Qualifications Alliance (AQA) tells his examiners to award students marks when they write swear words like 'f*** off' (and nothing else) on their exam papers is grist to the mill of those who doubt the robustness and integrity of our exam system.

The Times reports Mr Buckroyd as saying: "It would be wicked to give it zero, because it does show some very basic skills we are looking for – like conveying some meaning and some spelling. It’s better than someone that doesn’t write anything at all. It shows more skills than somebody who leaves the page blank.” By the same token, I suppose, a student who hits a teacher is showing more dexterity than a student who sits quietly in the classroom and behaves himself, and should therefore be rewarded for his PE skills.

But such stupidity does not represent the exam boards' worst offence. The swearing student will only receive a few worthless marks. A far greater problem is the absurd way in which the boards change the marks attached to each grade every year after the event, rather than trying to set the standard before students sit their exams and stick to it.

A few years ago, I offered some thoughts on how the exam system could regain credibility through consistency, in particular:

Pass marks should stay the same from one year to the next. Students should know that 50 per cent will always be a C at GCSE or a level 4 in the key stage 2 tests. Such change would require better preparation of the exam papers to ensure that the difficulty of questions is maintained, but that effort would be a small price to pay.

To greater transparency and consistency, one might add a large dose of nous, a quality apparently in short supply at the AQA these days.

The right time for exam marking honesty?

Normally one has to endure the spectacle of aged commentators raining on the parade of cheerful GCSE and A level students as they get their exam results in August. But it is quite something when an exam boss chooses a time when students are nervously sitting their exams to tell them that the marking might not be up to scratch. Of course, complete consistency in marking essays is impossible; and it is right that students should be aware of the fact. But is this really the right moment for the new head of Ofqual, Kathleen Tattersall to share this insight?

Too many retakes?

Whatever the impact of Ed Balls' move to give the exam regulator greater independence - something that seems to have caused irrational excitement with normally reliable commentators - it risks ducking the real issues around the examination system. One is the perennial question of whether it is a good idea to have competition between exam boards. A second is raised by this morning's Times Educational Supplement: why are pupils allowed to have unlimited retakes at A-level? David Blunkett and Tessa Blackstone resisted attempts to allow unlimited retakes (just as they insisted on requiring a minimum amount of synoptic assessment in A levels) when they were at the Department for Education and Employment. That was not what independent advisers advocated, and later ministers changed the position. We are now moving away from coursework to controlled assessment again at GCSE. But it is worth remembering that in all the battles on standards, it has been politicians not regulators who have - with the exception, to be fair, of Ken Boston on coursework - insisted on keeping measures that are most likely to maintain standards.

An end to dumbing down debates?

Ed Balls is announcing today that he intends to split the functions of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority, so that testing and exam regulation are 'independent' of ministers and answerable to Parliament. This is not a new idea, but it is doubtful it will make a whit of difference to the annual dumbing down debate each August. After all, the competitive exam boards will remain, and they have no new incentive to lift standards (a single exam board would be better). In itself the split is not necessarily a bad idea, but there is a real danger that without ministerial pressure to continue regular externally marked testing of 11 and 14 year-olds (such tests for 7 year olds have already been largely abandoned) the testing system will be effectively passed over to schools. The unions have long lobbied for teachers to mark their own tests, as now happens at 7 where Balls is now rightly taking remedial action to deal with a slip in standards since. National testing could be replaced by sampling, fine for statisticians, but useless for measuring the performance of individual schools or stretching individual pupils. The legislation to split QCA must make very clear that national externally marked tests for all are here to stay, and it is the responsibility and duty of the new body to ensure this happens. Otherwise the danger is that this measure will have the opposite effect from that intended: it could lead to some real dumbing down of our whole system of accountability.

Open access

This is good news: examiners are going to let candidates see where they went wrong on their papers and show up poor teaching in the process. Funny that. I recall that when David Blunkett first proposed to follow the Irish example of allowing pupils to see their papers after they were marked, it was the exam boards who predicted the end of civilisation as we know it. Now it is the teachers' unions (who also would rather prefer that we didn't publish school-by-school results, and have successfully persuaded the Welsh not to do so) who are moaning about Edexcel's excellent idea. Let's have more such openness, not less.