Furious headmaster calls for pupils' grades to be based on teacher assessments

17 August 2020, 14:51

This headmaster explained to LBC why the "logical step" for the Government is to award A Level and GCSE results based on teacher assessments.

The government is due to make a major announcement on students' grades at 4pm today amid mounting pressure surrounding disputed A-Level results.

Exam results LIVE: major announcement due on students' grades

A-level and GCSE grades will now be awarded to students in Wales on the basis of teacher assessments, the Welsh Government has recently said.

Students were seen last week marching through central London to protest against the "complete injustice" of exam results after more than 200,000 results were downgraded in a new system brought in due to the pandemic.

Creating further friction, private schools saw a greater increase in the proportion of students getting As and A*s than other types of school this year, data from regulator Ofqual has shown.

Headmaster Leo Winkley of independent Shrewsbury School told LBC that teachers and pupils "are all in this together" no matter the type of school.

"We all work to getting the best possible results for our children...any sense that the independent sector is quietly hiving itself away and looking after itself is absolutely misinformed," Mr Winkley said.

Education Secretary Gavin Williamson announced on the eve of the A Level results that mock results could be used for the basis of appeals which Mr Winkley said "posed quite considerable problems because we know mock exams are conducted in different ways in different schools and in some cases weren't sat at all."

However what this announcement did prove was the presumption the results were not likely to be fair, pointed out the headmaster.

"The only next logical step surely would be to allow pupils to receive the teacher assessed grades which were much more carefully produced and much more carefully moderated than mock exam results," Mr Winkley said.