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| Call for exam board to be sacked A head teachers' leader has called for Edexcel to be sacked as one of the main examination boards, following a series of blunders condemned as "sloppy" and "unacceptable" by Downing Street. David Hart, general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers, said the government should remove Edexcel's licence as one of the three main exam boards for England, Wales and Northern Ireland. And the Association of Colleges has said that a survey it conducted revealed widespread concern among its members about the performance of Edexcel. The Conservatives have asked for an independent inquiry into the qualifications system. The association - representing the colleges which teach the majority of post-16 students - said it had warned Edexcel months ago of continuing problems with its quality assurance. The Education Secretary, Estelle Morris, has received a report on Edexcel which she demanded on Monday as a matter of urgency. She has asked the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority - the regulatory quango - to bring forward an audit of Edexcel. She was also having a routine meeting with the prime minister, who is said to be concerned about Edexcel's "sloppy" and "unacceptable" behaviour. Mr Hart said: "If Edexcel have been as incompetent as they appear to have been, I don't see that the government has any option other than to sack them as an examining board. "The apparent lack of quality assurance and cavalier disregard for the interests of students is breathtaking." Edexcel came under fire at the weekend after it emerged that there had been an error in an AS-level maths paper sat by about 2,500 students on Friday. BBC News Online then revealed that Edexcel had known about the error some hours earlier because the same paper was taken by students in Hong Kong - but decided not to tell test centres. Other errors have also been reported. A college in Kent was told that two pages were missing from a key skills exam which a thousand students were due to sit on Tuesday. And performing arts students in Devon complained that Edexcel had lost their first year coursework, although it was later found at the school. Mr Hart said the government needed to ask serious questions also of the QCA and the Joint Council for General Qualifications, the umbrella body for the three main exam boards. "They must take some responsibility for Edexcel's lack of quality assurance procedures," he said. On Tuesday the QCA sent its director of quality audit into Edexcel to oversee its efforts to improve its performance. The director of curriculum and quality at the Association of Colleges, Judith Norrington, said: "Despite the millions of pounds colleges spend with them, we have had repeatedly to warn Edexcel of the problems colleges are facing across the country with their service." In its survey of 200 colleges last August, almost seven out of 10 said Edexcel's responsiveness was either poor or very poor, compared with 18% in the case of the AQA board and 3% for OCR. · 67% said Edexcel did not produce their results on time · 73% still had unresolved issues with the exam body · 73% said its performance was deteriorating. "Students' interests have to come first. If Edexcel do not get their act together very quickly, colleges will have to look elsewhere," Ms Norrington added. The survey findings were no surprise to Martin Cooper, exams co-ordinator at Salisbury College, which spends about £250,000 a year on entering its students for exams. He liaises with all three big boards and many smaller ones. "The loss of exam scripts is unfortunately not uncommon and Edexcel are by no means the only culprits - I suspect most teachers have horror stories to tell," he said. "Where Edexcel have fallen down is in their failure to realise that the culture of examinations - as of so much else - has changed dramatically in the last 10 years. "At one time the exam boards were able to exert the same sort of arbitrary authority as the Inland Revenue. Today schools and colleges are aware that they pay the boards very substantial sums of money and expect corresponding levels of service." The shadow education secretary, Damian Green, has written to Estelle Morris urging her to set up an independent external inquiry into the workings of all exam boards and the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority. "Students work hard everyday towards their coursework deadlines and exams," he said. "They must be deeply concerned to hear reports of lost coursework and of incorrect or incomplete examination papers. "The continuing controversy over whether exams have been made easier, either in the setting or the marking, has dogged teachers, students, and parents for years, and the effects can be unfairly demoralising for those involved." The Liberal Democrat spokesman, Phil Willis, said Edexcel had made "one mistake too far". He said it was important for students' sakes to restore some confidence in the exam system. 23rd January 2002 |
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