25th February 2011 14:21
By Blue Tutors
A former government education advisor has described the exam system as “diseased and corrupt”. Mick Waters, a former director of the Qualifications and Curriculum authority, has this week published a book in which he argues that exam boards are complicit in dumbing down school exams.
His accusation of corruption on the part of exam boards is directed at the fact that exams boards profit from the sale of text books which tell teachers how to answer their own exam papers. Complaints that exams have been dumbed down have become widespread in recent years, with many acknowledging that the current exam system is a failure.
It is difficult for tutors to support their students through exam revision when there is so little faith in the exams they are about to sit. From the perspective of many students, good results do not carry the weight they should, and poor results still present insurmountable difficulties when it comes to university admissions. What is needed is an exam system in which students, teachers and universities can all have faith.