Contentious changes that could have jeopardised the ability of thousands of private candidates to sit GCSE and A-level exams have been averted, TES can reveal.
Guidelines on the new qualifications, published by the regulator Ofqual earlier this year, stated that learners taking them independently would have to find a single exam centre not only to sit their exam but also for their non-examination assessments (NEAs). These include oral language exams, science practicals and English coursework.
In August, the National Extension College (NEC) - the distance learning college that was the forerunner of the Open University - warned that the change would create “another barrier” that could deter many students from remaining in education.
According to the NEC, about 50,000 students take GCSE and A-level exams as private candidates each year. These are people who enter exams through a school or college but are not enrolled as a student there. Many of them are distance learners.
But TES can reveal that an agreement has been reached between exam boards AQA, OCR, Pearson, WJEC Eduqas and the NEC, representing distance-learning providers. This means that students will be allowed to take written exam papers and NEA components of their courses at separate approved centres. Rather than entering as private candidates, the learners will be formally registered with the distance-learning provider offering the NEA.
These arrangements will take effect next summer, when the first candidates will sit the new GCSE and A-level exams.
Widening participation
The agreement follows months of negotiation. This summer, university admissions service Ucas waded into the debate. Chief executive Mary Curnock Cook said that the organisation was “a strong supporter of widening participation, and ensuring that private candidates are able to undertake qualifications independently plays a key role in this”.
NEC chief executive Ros Morpeth told TES that the original plans did not create a problem for students attending a mainstream school or a college but would have made the assessment of distance-learning students “almost impossible”.
“While a college might be willing to have a private candidate come in to sit an exam paper, they would not be willing to let that student into their science labs, nor would they take on the responsibility of authenticating and marking their coursework,” she said.
The plans would have been a “terrible blow for the students who would be affected, and also a shocking loss to the country of highly motivated people willing to retrain in the very areas where there is the greatest need”, Dr Morpeth added.
‘I am incredibly relieved for all students who are studying independently’
“I am incredibly relieved, both for NEC’s students but also for all students who are not mainstream and are studying independently. The campaign would not have been won without the support of the adult education community, like the Workers’ Educational Association, the Open University and Ucas, and, in particular, TES, which raised the profile of what we were trying to achieve at every stage.”
Michael Butterworth, head of assessment processing at OCR, said the organisation had been very keen to find a solution that met regulatory requirements for new GCSEs and A levels to support distance-learning providers. “Flexibility is key for distance learners,” he added. “Their circumstances mean that they often need to take coursework (now called non-exam assessment) and written exams in different locations, and we have spearheaded a mechanism that continues to allow them to do so. This involves adapting existing JCQ [Joint Council for Qualifications] arrangements to enable the multisite assessments to take place, and I’m delighted that this common-sense approach has now been adopted as the way forward.”
Michael Turner, director general of the JCQ, said: “The new arrangements for NEAs we have agreed with distance-learning providers mean quality assurance is maintained across the exam system, and no student is disadvantaged, regardless of whether they are studying at school, college or with a distance-learning provider.”
