16th May 2013 9:00
By Blue Tutors
This week Oxford University have produced a report which claims that tougher exams will not necessarily boost standards. The university’s Centre for Educational Assessment pointed out that around 40% of school students already fail to achieve five “good” GCSEs under the current system. It concludes that making exams harder will do nothing to help those who are under-achieving, and are often from poorer backgrounds. The report has been released in response to the government’s planned changes to exams, which were outlined in parliament this week.
The new exam system requires students to take exams at the end of two years’ study, and has scrapped the controversial modular aspect to exams. The reforms are in response to claims that exams have become too easy, with results rising year on year. The report argues that there is no evidence to support the view that exams are becoming easier, and points to better teaching and harder working students to explain the rise in A grades. It also points out that the gap between those performing well and those underachieving was widening, suggesting that the trends in results are due to socio-economic factors rather than poor exams.
The government rejected the University’s report outright, claiming that the evidence for their reforms was “very clear”. Ministers have expressed concern over the need to compete on an international level, and have claimed that British students are slipping in worldwide rankings. The Oxford report suggests that there is little evidence to support this, and examined statistics from The Programme for International Student Assessment as well as the 2011 Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study, which suggest that British students are firmly in the top ten for OECD countries.
Where there is a problem, the report found, was that the gap between the highest and lowest performing students is considerably higher than in other countries. This is not a problem that can be addressed by making exams more difficult. Rather, more needs to be done to address the growing inequalities between students from affluent backgrounds and those from disadvantaged backgrounds.