By Eleni Kontou
On the 4th of August, around 500,000 pupils received their exam results. Exams were cancelled this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, meaning that the results this year were supposed to be down to pupils’ predicted grades by their teachers, and their prelim results. However, 133,762 grade estimates were adjusted, with pupils from disadvantaged areas receiving the brunt of this injustice.
There is no denying that pupils do not try as hard in their prelims, without knowing there was a pandemic looming it is unfair to give somebody a grade based on their result for a prelim. To then further reduce that grade in order to fit in with statistics is an outrageous attempt to attain ‘credibility’.
In 2019 the national 5 pass rate was 78.2%, this year it has risen to 81.1%. In 2019 the higher pass rate was 74.8%, this year it has risen to 78.9%. Finally, in 2019 the advanced higher pass rate was 79.4%, this year it has risen to 84.9%. Despite the improved pass rate, thousands of pupils have expressed their disappointment in the grades they have received. Labelling the system as ‘unfair’ and ‘biased’ towards pupils from the most deprived areas. Their claims are backed up by statistics provided by the SQA themselves. Of the 133,762 grade estimates that were adjusted by the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA), only 9,198 of the predictions were adjusted upwards, with 124,564 of them being lower than the teachers’ predictions. Out of the adjusted grades, 96% of them were changed by a full grade.
SQA statistics show that pupils from the most deprived backgrounds were given a grade that was 15.2% lower than their predicted grade. With the least deprived areas receiving only 6.9% lower than their predicted grade. If the results had been given according to teacher estimates, the results would have led to the highest annual change ever seen. It seems as though the SQA have lowered the grades of pupils in order to combat this change, perhaps accusing the teachers of having bias towards their pupils and grading them wrongly.
The SQA have lowered some grades in order to prevent the system from looking like the pandemic has benefitted pupils, however they have been biased in which pupils’ grades to lower. They appear to have denied the possibility that pupils may have just exceeded previous years, or the most likely conclusion that the whole exam system is flawed. Memorising facts does not necessarily equate intelligence, it only proves your ability to memorise information. Yearly school work is more representative of a pupil than one exam will ever be. The SQA and the government have clearly missed the mark with their response to the issue. This is proof that exams are an unfairly marked system that cause unnecessary stress, restrictions, and divides among young people. Instead of accepting the possibility that exams are flawed, the SQA decided to lower the estimated grade provided by teachers. The teachers’ predictions are more likely to accurately represent the deserved grade of the pupils than an exam or a school's reputation ever will.
First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon, has spoken on the issue saying that ‘I would love to be in the position of standing here credibly saying that 85% of the 20% in the most deprived areas had passed Higher...But given that it was 65% last year, that would raise a real credibility issue.’ This shows how out of touch the government is with today’s youth. Despite their claims to be progressive, they seem awfully reliant on an old system that has failed many young people, especially those from disadvantaged areas. You can’t lower somebody’s grade because people the year before them received that grade. People predicted to receive C’s, should not then receive a Fail because somebody from their school last year received that. They have essentially turned individual grading into the grading of the whole school. Basing futures on statistics is a cruel and unjust way of yielding to the government’s bias. The First Minister also states that free appeals are available to young people who feel their result was unfair, but an appeal should not be necessary in the first place had they been given their deserved result that was predicted by their own teacher, and not the result of statistics based around their schools previous attainment.
The First Minister also claimed that ‘We know we have an attainment gap in education. Poorer young people don't do as well as more affluent young people, and that is something we are working very hard to rectify’. However, it is hard to be positive when the government refuses to acknowledge the injustice that the exam system currently has on young people from the most deprived areas. A yearly assessment from teachers is perhaps a more accurate and fair representation of pupils’ deserved results. Not to mention, it will cause less stress on the young people who are having increased mental health issues.
The gov.scot website states that ‘They found that children and young people ‘living in more deprived areas had poorer mental health outcomes than those living in less deprived areas’’. Surely the disadvantage that young people in disadvantaged areas face should be taken into account over the statistics from the prior year of yet more disadvantaged young people. Young people in deprived areas have many factors affecting exam grades. One exam declaring the pupils’ overall grade, whether deprived or not, is unfair and untrue to their capabilities.
On the SNP website, they claim that they ‘will tackle the attainment gap in Higher Education’ by setting ‘ambitious new targets that will ensure that by 2030, students from the 20 per cent most deprived areas make up 20 per cent of Higher Education entrants’. It does not state how they plan on tackling the issue, perhaps teacher’s grade predictions are the solution. The Scottish government needs to solve these issues with solutions, rather than money. It is true that adequate funding can help, but funding does not always lead to solutions.
Instead of questioning the credibility of teacher’s predictions, the government and the SQA should respectively question the credibility of the exam system. It is hard to have belief in a system and a government that cares more for statistics than individuals.
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