Give Us Exams That We Can Believe In

I AM headmaster at Pate’s Grammar School and was previously head at Sir John Lawes, a top comprehensive in Hertfordshire, so I know teachers at private and state schools are equally worried about the exam system.

The tireless toil of students to study and revise, and the endless support and love from parents, are undermined by the annual sport of knocking the validity of the GCSE and A-level results. We need to restore public confidence.

Are exams getting easier? To a certain extent, they test different things in a different way. It is less about recalling facts and more about a process of learning. I am certain better results have a lot more to do with higher standards of teaching and learning.

Are students unprepared for university? More first-class degrees have been awarded in recent years than ever before, so undergraduates must have learned something at school.

Is it impossible to fail? The pass rates continue to rise, as do the percentage of top grades. This is largely because, rather than setting up students to fail, schools take great care to guide them on to courses they can pass and where they can excel. For example, though physics is thriving at Pate’s, nationally fewer students study physics A-level, but those who do are more suited to the subject and nearly all pass.

Do the exams fail to discriminate between the brightest students? Nationally, only a few get four or five A grades at A-level. Even so, I look forward to next year where an A* will be available at A- level.

So why do results go up? It is because for the past two decades everyone who meets an agreed standard has got a grade A, while in the past, only the best five per cent were awarded that grade, no matter how good the next few students were.

Today’s teachers are getting better at coaching students to meet the criteria.

For most students, their success is justified. It comes from increasing professionalism among teachers and from students who are better prepared and harder working than ever before.

In some ways, the results have more validity than ever. To secure a grade A requires commitment over 18 months, including coursework and modular tests.

Twenty years ago, when I finished my school exams, I saw many students who did not have the aptitude for sustained high performance, but could do well in a system that entirely focused upon what could be regurgitated in an exam.

I have a high level of confidence in today’s system. It is flawed, but not fatally. So why do I feel there is a need for an overhaul? Students deserve a system where we all believe in the results.

SHAUN FENTON, Cheltenham, Glos..

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