I WAS pleased to see Julie Henry and Clare Kennedy draw attention to the recent changes to the art GCSE (TES, June 29).
The greatest damage to this year’s Year 11 has been through the way Edexcel changed the assessment procedures 18 months into the course.
In February, Edexcel held an assessment workshop to introduce the new marking system. It became apparent that Edexcel were intent on clamping down on recent success due to pressure from the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority. This effectively means a drop of two grades from previous years.
This drop in results has been manipulated by changing the goal posts at the end of the course. Had we known that technical competence would only warrant five marks out of 30 at the start of the course we could then have stopped pupils at a certain point in their progress and made them jump through the next hoop to maximise their final marks.
Edexcel have abused their powers and lost the faith of many art departments.
Mrs E Edwards Head of art The Toynbee School Bodycoats Road, Chandler’s Ford Hampshire