School students gathered in Glasgow today to protest against the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) results process, which left many with lower grades than their teachers anticipated.
There has been huge controversy since Tuesday after it emerged that teacher estimates of students’ Higher marks in the most deprived parts of Scotland were more likely to be downgraded than those in the most affluent areas.
Around 100 young protesters gathered in Glasgow’s George Square this morning - while another protest was due to take place in Edinburgh - carrying placards with messages including “trust our teachers”, “judge my work, not my postcode”, and “SQA - widening the attainment gap since 2020”.
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SQA exams were cancelled in March because of the coronavirus and teachers were advised that their professional judgement would be used to grade students. However, there was concern from the start about how the SQA would “moderate” grades submitted by teachers, and which students would end up getting worse results than their school advised.
Controversy over SQA results
The SQA did not publish details of its moderation process until Tuesday of this week, the same day that students received their results.
This is Erin Bleakley, 17, who organised the protest against the SQA in Glasgow today. #SQAresults #SQA pic.twitter.com/GLJo4GrW50
- Henry Hepburn (@Henry_Hepburn) August 7, 2020
There has been particular anger over the higher pass rate for students in the most deprived 20 per cent of postcodes. They had their overall pass rate brought down by 15.2 percentage points, while those in the least deprived of postcodes saw their overall pass rate come down by 6.9 percentage points.
The SQA and the Scottish government have come under extreme pressure since then, and it emerged yesterday that SQA chief executive Fiona Robertson would appear before the Scottish Parliament’s Education and Skills Committee next Wednesday.
At the protest today, 17-year-old organiser Erin Bleakley, who goes to school in Glasgow, said “it was completely unfair that just because we’re from areas that are classed an area of deprivation that we’re downgraded on our work”.
She added: “It’s not only an insult to us but an insult to the teachers as professionals - the SQA have asked the teachers to make a judgement call and then downgraded from that. It’s unfair, to say the least.”
Another protester, Ifeoma Okolo, 17, said her own grades were not severely downgraded, but that she wanted to represent friends who received lower marks than expected.
She said that the SQA had “decided to turn that around and fail them and give them grades that are way below what they were expecting and what they actually deserved”.
Ms Okolo wants to study medicine but said that a friend’s plan to join her on the same course had been thrown into doubt. She added that, at the very least, she wanted to see an apology from first minister Nicola Sturgeon.
Another protester in Glasgow today was Ifeoma Okolo, 17. #SQAresults #SQA #resultsday2020 pic.twitter.com/QN8cglgfjS
- Henry Hepburn (@Henry_Hepburn) August 7, 2020
Meanwhile, a letter sent by a school student in the Western Isles to education secretary and deputy first minister John Swinney - who will make a statement on the SQA to Parliament next week - has been retweeted 2,500 times.
Eva Peteranna asked for an explanation of “how young people in my position are supposed to progress without the grades that we have worked hard towards and without the comfort that our circumstances will be taken into account when we make applications to universities”.
If anyone is interested I have just sent this letter to John Swinney and Head of Education in the WI#SQAResults pic.twitter.com/V2XWd03cp3
- Eva (@evapeterannax) August 5, 2020
Young people are also expressing their anger about SQA results through a petition which, before 2pm today, had gathered 38,000 signatures.
Ms Sturgeon made fresh comments on the SQA situation at her daily coronavirus briefing this lunchtime. She said young people were “entitled to be angry” and “to feel that this is not just”, adding that “the government will listen carefully to that” and urging them to use the free appeals process that is operating this year.
She added: “But please don’t lose sight of the next part of the process [which] is not a statistical model.
“This is is the part of the process that looks at your individual circumstances, and if you did well in your prelim but have got a result that is lower than that, that gets looked at. If you’ve done coursework that your teacher thinks is relevant, that is what is looked at - this is the bit of the process that is about looking at your individual circumstances.”
Patrick Harvie, the Scottish Greens’ co-leader, said at the protest in Glasgow: “I have no doubt that we are going to force the Scottish government into a U-turn to start to fix the injustice and ensure that there’s no detriment policy in place for young people.
“I am also convinced that many of the young people who are angry about the situation are going to turn the anger into something positive and will be a really important force for change in our society.”
Scottish Conservative Glasgow councillor Thomas Kerr also got up to speak but was heckled by some of the protesters.
One student accused the Tories of “only speaking for us when it suits you”, but organisers reminded those attending that it was not a political event.
