Coronavirus: Report calls for help for school pupils facing exams after education disrupted by pandemic

School pupils in England should take rigorous externally set assessment tests in the place of mock exams next spring, in order to provide a back-up grade for use if the coronavirus forces the cancellation of GCSEs and A-levels, an education think tank has recommended.

The Education Policy Institute (EPI) said its plan would prevent a repeat of farcical scenes in the summer, when the use of computer algorithms to decide students’ grades provoked such fury that the education secretary, Gavin Williamson, was forced to switch to teacher assessments, resulting in a massive increase in the number of teenagers qualifying for university.

Today’s EPI report warns that there should be no repeat of the use of teacher-assessed grades until more evidence has been gathered about their reliability.

The government has said it intends to go ahead with all major school exams in England next summer, but has delayed the tests by three weeks to give pupils and teachers more time to prepare.

The EPI report says pupils should be provided with a wider choice of questions in exam papers, in case they have been unable to cover the full course because of disruption to their learning due to Covid-19.

And it says that ministers should be ready to accept some grade inflation, to avoid the class of 2021 being left at a disadvantage in the race for jobs compared with those who received better-than-normal results based on teacher assessments this year.

The report calls for £1.3bn in catch-up funds to be targeted at poorer pupils to give them more chance of making up for classes missed because of the Covid lockdown and self-isolation.

The government is currently consulting with exam boards and watchdog Ofqual on contingency plans for use if exams are disrupted, and these are expected to be announced before Christmas.

The EPI’s executive director, Natalie Perera, said: “Given the extent of lost learning time due to the pandemic, the government cannot simply adopt a ‘business as usual’ approach to exams next summer. Doing so would be unfair to thousands of pupils, particularly those from disadvantaged backgrounds, who have seen great disruption to their education through no fault of their own.

“We must ensure that summer exams are as fair as possible and have a credible plan B if they cannot go ahead. The government must also urgently provide more catch-up support for the poorest pupils this year.”

Former schools minister David Laws, now the EPI’s executive chairman, said: “Pupils will face huge challenges to their education this year, so we must have a system that is fair. We cannot see a repeat of the turmoil that we had in the summer.”