The Department for Education has rejected peers’ calls for major changes to be made in secondary education, saying it does not plan to review Progress 8 or scrap the English Baccalaureate (EBacc) measure or targets.
The government has said it will not be making any changes to the national curriculum and has no plans for wholesale reform of GCSEs.
In its response to a cross-party Lords committee report on 11-16 education, published today, the DfE has also said it “cannot currently commit to moving to on-screen assessment in the long term”.
However, the DfE has said that it will consider the burden of assessment at GCSE and the “possibilities for streamlining”.
The response came as a major exam board today announced that it has asked former education secretary Charles Clarke to carry out a review looking at how the burden of GCSE assessment can be reduced.
The Lords’ report on secondary education recommended getting rid of the EBacc, reviewing the national curriculum to cut the overall content load and looking at proposals to cut the amount of external assessment that students are expected to do at 16.
Here are six key points from the government’s response to the peers’ report.
1. DfE has ‘no plans’ to drop EBacc take-up targets
Peers had called for the government to “immediately abandon” the 90 per cent take-up target for the EBacc in mainstream schools. Peers also said that EBacc entry and accountability measures “should be withdrawn in their entirety”.
The committee had called for all mentions of the EBacc to be removed from the Ofsted school inspection handbook.
In response, the government said: “We have no plans to abandon or amend the EBacc or our ambition for high levels of take-up.”
It said the EBacc is important for a broad and balanced curriculum, and Ofsted inspectors do “not just focus on EBacc” when looking at the quality of secondary education.
2. ‘Possibilities’ for streamlining GCSEs
In response to the Lords committee saying that the current amount of external assessment places “considerable pressure” on students, the DfE said it had no plans for wholesale reform of GCSEs.
The government said it did not “consider a full review appropriate at this time” but agreed that the burden of assessment at GCSE and possibilities for streamlining should be considered.
It added that, as part of the process of introducing the new Advanced British Standard (ABS) qualification, one of the considerations would be how GCSEs “best prepare” students for education post-16.
The government said it will work with Ofqual, schools and students to identify whether there are ways to reduce the burden of assessment while retaining the “breadth and rigour” of pre-16 education.
The DfE also said it considers the current national curriculum to “meet the needs of pupils appropriately” and it has committed not to make any changes to it for the remainder of this Parliament.
3. Government ‘yet to decide’ on digital exams
Several exam boards have published proposals for on-screen exams starting in the next few years, subject to Ofqual regulatory approval, and peers had recommended that the DfE lead this transition towards digital assessment.
However, the government said it has “yet to decide whether we should transition to on-screen assessments in the long term”.
It is currently working with Ofqual to conduct research to fully understand the implications of on-screen exams for schools and students, and said it cannot commit to moving exams online yet.
4. DfE does not think additional literacy and numeracy assessments are needed
The Lords committee had recommended that literacy and numeracy qualifications focused on applying essential skills should be available for key stage 4 students. The government responded by saying that existing GCSEs already include essential literacy and numeracy skills.
The committee had pointed out that around one-third of students do not secure a grade 4 in maths or English GCSE every year, and said the government needed to determine why this was happening.
The DfE said it agreed that there should be a focus on raising standards in literacy and numeracy, but disagreed that any further investigative work was needed in addition to factors the department is already addressing that contribute to underperformance at GCSE in English and maths.
5. Government does not think Progress 8 needs updating
The Lords’ report had also called on the government to review headline accountability measures, particularly Progress 8, saying that evidence pointed towards these failing to support schools in delivering a broad curriculum.
The DfE said it did not consider that Progress 8 measures needed updating at this time but that it would “continue to consider opportunities” to review headline performance measures.
It said that all performance measures are kept under ongoing review.
6. No reform of the national curriculum
The DfE stated that it does not plan to widely reform the national curriculum or add to the number of GCSEs currently offered, beyond what has already been announced.
It did not accept peers’ recommendation to introduce a new applied computing GCSE to help digital literacy, and it said climate and sustainability was already covered within existing curricula.
The DfE agreed that it should address barriers to promoting language learning in schools, that promoting oracy in the curriculum was important and that careers education in schools must be prioritised.
However, it did not agree that accountability measures should be changed to increase take-up of creative and artistic subjects.
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