Fear of a social media backlash is preventing exam boards from setting harder questions, and leading to papers that are too easy and predictable, a prominent assessment expert has claimed.

Robert Coe, from Durham University, believes that there is currently too much emphasis on “accessibility” in exams and not enough on “high expectations” and “challenge”.

“Too much low-level thinking, what I am calling ‘predictable regurgitation’, is rewarded in exams, and that’s such a dysfunctional and distorting thing to be contending with,” the academic, who advises exams regulator Ofqual on standards, said.

Professor Coe argues that a key reason for today’s “overly predictable exams” is “the sense of public backlash that we’ll have if we ever write an interesting exam paper…you ain’t half going to get slated on social media”.

“Exam boards will be very sensitive to this and Ofqual are very sensitive,” he added. “The students will be complaining [online] straight away - probably not before the exam’s finished but not many minutes after.”

Professor Coe gave the example of a maths Higher paper set in Scotland last year, which included a question asking students to calculate the time it would take for a crocodile to reach a zebra 20 metres away across a river.

“They did put some innovative and unexpected questions in, and everyone thought they had made a terrible mistake,” he said.

Professor Coe said that today’s exams often rewarded “recall with limited thinking required”, “question spotting” and “playing safe”. Speaking to the Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference this month, he said: “We have had a period where accessibility has dominated.

“I think we ought to be devoting a bit of effort to thinking about how we can, yes, keep hold of accessibility but also make sure we are not losing high expectations and we are providing challenge as well.”

‘We’re not afraid of innovation’

The academic - who is director of Durham’s Centre for Evaluation and Monitoring - also argued that it was “an awful lot easier” for exam boards to write “predictable” papers.

But the Joint Council for Qualifications (JCQ), which represents the UK’s seven largest exam boards, has insisted that there is no fear of innovation.

Michael Turner, JCQ director general, said: “As media stories and Twitter show each year, exam boards are not afraid of being innovative in setting questions.

“And with the new set of reforms coming, we will see further stretch and challenge in the system.”

This is an edited article from the 21 October edition of TES. Subscribers can read the full article here. To subscribe, click here. This week’s TES magazine is available in all good newsagents. To download the digital edition, Android users can click here and iOS users can click here.

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