The “vast majority” of members of a headteachers’ union have rejected the possibility of boycotting primary assessments, it has emerged.
Despite controversy about last year’s tougher Sats tests, which saw only just over half of pupils meet the expected standard, the possibility of a boycott is not on the agenda at this weekend’s conference of the NAHT headteachers’ union in Telford.
And, as Tes revealed this morning, a survey of rank of file NAHT members suggests that primary heads broadly support the latest government proposals for changes to primary assessment.
However, delegates have submitted motions raising concerns about assessment and accountability, including the use of “unreliable” primary progress data, and calling for national sampling for all tests at key stage 2, rather than compulsory testing of the whole cohort.
Earlier this month, the ATL teaching union voted to explore a Sats boycott, while NUT general secretary Kevin Courtney threatened to “break” the primary assessment system if the government did not listen to his union’s concerns.
‘Keen to negotiate’
Speaking as the NAHT conference got underway, Amanda Hulme, aide to the NAHT president and a primary school head in Bolton, said: “The indicative ballot we sent out last term made it quite clear that our members were keen to continue to negotiate.
“It was one of those where it was very important from the assessment and accountability group point of view - we knew that if we were going to ballot our members, and we were potentially going to boycott, it needed to be a huge percentage of school leaders’ will to do that, so we sent out indicative ballots so we could gauge what sort of response we would get from people.
“The vast majority of members were quite keen to continue with negotiations and to work with the government rather than to force the government’s hand.”
She said the union welcomed the government’s current consultation on primary assessment, and said many of the proposals were as a result of the union’s work.
“I think we have moved over time into an association that is very much about, ‘Let’s work together to make the changes rather than look at boycott,’” Ms Hulme added.
However, she did not rule out action if the government were to propose lots of new tests for pupils in the future.
Union general secretary Russell Hobby said the fundamental issue was around accountability, and “taking the fear out of the system”.
“We would not be worrying about the design of the test if it wasn’t for the fact that a school could be shut down and careers ended on the basis of these,” he said.
He added that work should be done on using qualitative judgements and more than one year’s data.
Want to keep up with the latest education news and opinion? Follow Tes on Twitter and like Tes on Facebook
