With summer exams now successfully underway, Tom Middlehurst looks at five things school leaders must be on top of, including key JCQ and DfE procedures and new guidance to support your school’s delivery of GCSEs and A levels
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The summer exam series is now well underway. So far, the national picture seems to be broadly positive, save for some issues downloading AQA papers for students with reasonable adjustments/access arrangements.

But there’s a long way to go, including some fairly significant changes along the way. Here are five key things school and exam leaders need to be on top of in the coming weeks with advice on how schools and colleges can respond to ensure the smooth running of the rest of the series – and the timely issuing of results in the summer.

 

1, JCQ senior designated contact form

All schools and colleges (exam centres) have now been sent a form from the Joint Council for Qualifications (JCQ), asking for the names of senior designated contacts who can be available over the summer. When this was requested last year, there was an understandable backlash, with school and college leaders pointing out that they essentially start work from A level results day, and so the first couple of weeks of the summer holiday are sacrosanct.

JCQ would be the first to admit that they got the messaging wrong – and out too late – last year. In fact, it has always been a requirement for the head of centre to be contactable during that period. The changes last year were designed to streamline and formalise these arrangements; and in fact to reduce the burden on the headteacher or principal. It had also become unhelpfully conflated with the VTQ (vocational and technical qualification) action plan when it in fact applies to all JCQ-run exams.

So what’s the expectation? Schools and colleges must provide the name of at least one senior leader who can be contactable over the summer holidays; but it is completely up to them how they manage this. Indeed, the head of centre could choose to name only themselves.

When we asked ASCL Council – our policy-making body made up of elected members – how they handled this last year, many headteachers confirmed that this was their approach.

Alternatively, the form allows you to name different contacts for different weeks of the holiday, meaning that everyone has a chance to switch-off at some point.

In the vast majority of cases, any issues will already have been sorted before the summer break, but if there are unresolved issues these need to be remedied to avoid any delay in results. JCQ is clear that being contactable doesn’t mean having to have your phone on you at all times. Indeed, the form allows you to choose how you wish to be contacted. All schools and colleges must complete and return the form by Friday, May 24.

 

2, JCQ guidance for senior leaders

JCQ has published a helpful guide for senior leaders for 2024, entitled Key reminders for heads of centre and senior leaders responsible for exams in summer 2024 (see further information).

Some of the key points include guidance on the JCQ centre inspection visits, which take place throughout the series. It advises senior leaders to support your exams officer with this, especially if they are new to post, and reminds leaders that this year the inspection will also be an inspection of your exams contingency policy, your internal appeals policy, and your malpractice policy.

The contingency plan should include what you will do if your exams officer is suddenly absent, what alternative venue you would use to run exams if your school or college site suddenly became unusable, and what you would do if there was an IT failure including a cyber-attack.

The guide reminds schools and colleges that your malpractice policy should, this year, include a section on the use of AI, especially generated content, and its use in non-exam assessment (NEA) coursework.

The separate JCQ guidance on this (see further information) suggests that if students are allowed to use AI, for example for research purposes, then they should include the questions/prompts they asked and the answers they got in full as an appendix.

We know many schools and colleges are using the JCQ guidelines on AI to embed the explicit teaching of ethical AI use further down the school, embedding it into the key stage 3 and 4 curriculum.

 

3, Special consideration

In the coming weeks, senior leaders (not the exams officer) will be responsible for checking and signing off the evidence that a student is eligible for special consideration.

As a reminder, special consideration is different to reasonable adjustments (modifications to the exam papers) or access arrangements (adaptations to how or where the exam is sat or accessed). These are agreed in advance, and should reflect the student’s normal ways of working, based on identified and evidenced need.

Special consideration is a post-exam adjustment to the marks a student received on the day. A common misconception by parents and students is that special consideration can be given to students who experienced difficulties during the course of their study (for example long-term health conditions).

However, special consideration is only given at the time of the exam (or very recently before it), and only if the student has completed the whole course. So if a student missed out on a term of learning due to illness, they would not normally be eligible.

Furthermore, building work which led to disruption to teaching and learning is not grounds for special consideration meaning that schools and colleges affected by the concrete (RAAC) crisis this year will not be eligible.

 

4, June checking exercise

In mid-June, the Department for Education’s data-checking exercise will be open for two weeks. As a reminder, the June slot is the only opportunity to add or remove GCSE pupils from your data-set (the October checking exercise is only for checking that the results the DfE has are correct – you can’t add or remove pupils at that point).

This year the process remains the same as the last two years, however the portal will look significantly different as the DfE is bringing the process in-house for the first time (see further information). Your data leader and data manager may want to familiarise themselves with the new portal before the checking exercise opens and ensure that you have your username and password.

It is also important to carefully read the evidence guidelines (see DfE, 2024 – Annex L, p86) for adding or removing pupils. Some schools and colleges write reams of eloquent prose about why a student should be removed, but if you don’t have the evidence specified in the guidelines, they will stay with you.

 

5, Results days and data

As always, the national picture will only begin to emerge on Level 3 and Level 2 results days. A potential upset this year may be the lack of grade protection, which students benefited from last summer – although Ofqual remains confident that the results will look broadly similar to last year and 2019.

There will also be scrutiny on vocational and technical qualification (VTQ) results, with more T level subjects being awarded for the first time. Last year 99% of VTQ results were issued on time, a remarkable improvement on the disaster of 2022. There was also more attention paid to VTQ outcomes in the media, which we hope continues this summer.

When provisional results are published in October, a reminder that the percentage of pupils entering languages and triple science will become headline measures – meaning that they will appear at the head of your school’s page on the schools performance website. Luckily plans for a change to the EBacc APS (average point score) measure next year seem to have been shelved.

 

Good luck!

I hope this exam series continues to go well for you and your students, and that it is beginning to feel a bit more like normality again.

  • Tom Middlehurst is curriculum, assessment and inspection specialist at the Association of School and College Leaders. Find his previous articles and podcast appearances for SecEd via www.sec-ed.co.uk/authors/tom-middlehurst

 

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