Mr Gove dismisses GCSE grade critics
An unusual thing happened today. The Secretary of State for Education came out to do an interview on GCSE results day.
When I spoke to the press office this morning, they said, that never happens. “In the six years I’ve been here,” said the press officer cheerily, no one’s done one.”
So, was Michael Gove forced to come out to defend catastrophic falls in result? Er, not really.
GCSE results did fall today and, granted, it was for the first time since the exam was introduced 24 years ago, but overall the number of students achieving A*-C fell by just 0.4 percent. Not exactly a national disaster.
Breaking the figures down, the biggest fall was in GCSE Science. The number achieving A*-C fell 2.2 per cent. However disappointing for those who didn’t get their grades, the drop was easily explained – the exams had been made more difficult. No need for the Secretary of State’s comment there.
As the morning unfolded though, it was the relatively small fall in the English results which ended up gathering steam as a story.
They fell by 1.5 per cent but around the country increasing numbers of teachers were reporting that their students had failed to reach the crucial C grade in much greater numbers.
The student’s disappointment was clear, the teachers’ anger palpable. It emerged that exam boards had changed the grade boundaries in English between the set of exams sat in January and those sat in June, so students taking the exam at the end of the school year needed more points to get a C.
The teachers we spoke to were clear – this was exam boards desperate to satisfy Mr Gove’s avowed aim to make exams tougher. And they felt, it was students’ futures which were being sacrificed.
The exam boards and the regulator, Ofqual, made clear that grade boundary changes were commonplace and that students could be satisfied they got the right grade.
But the ire was up and the accusations of political interference with the examining process were out.
Next we heard, was that the Secretary of State was indeed going to be available for interview. He categorically denied any political interference of course. Grade boundaries were matters for the boards themselves.
He then went onto praise the good work of all the students who passed their exams today. Something Secretaries of State normally do with a written statement from behind closed doors.