Scottish education secretary Shirley-Anne Somerville has taken to Twitter this afternoon in an attempt to provide reassurance over the 2022 exams.
She did this after an interview on Sunday in which she confirmed that it may not be until the end of March before a definitive decision is made on whether national Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) exams will go ahead for the first time since before Covid.
This afternoon, Ms Somerville tweeted: “For learners, parents and teachers who are understandably concerned about exams and Covid disruption, a thread...
“The clear intention is for Nat 5, Higher and Advanced Higher exams to take place in the spring. However, due to uncertainty over the pandemic, two contingency plans are in place.
“If there is significant further disruption across the country, learners will get additional support to help them prepare for exams.”
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Ms Somerville added: “Exams will only be cancelled if public health advice says they can’t go ahead, eg, because of restrictions on gatherings. We can’t know now what advice will be at the time of the exam diet in the spring, but as much notice will be given as possible.
“If exams are cancelled, awards will be made on teachers’ judgements based on normal in-year assessment. There will be no need for any extra assessments.”
One teacher, responding to Ms Somerville’s tweets, wrote: “What about the disruption to learning that has *already* been caused by student and staff absences? Not to mention those absences which will inevitably come now that we’re back with no improvement to mitigations...”
On BBC Scotland’s The Sunday Show, Ms Somerville had been asked when the decision would be made to give children and teachers some certainty, and replied: “The very latest we think it can be made is the end of March but it doesn’t have to wait until then.”
In response, Tory education spokesperson Oliver Mundell said: “The SNP appear to have learned no lessons from the last exams fiasco.
“March is far too late to ask pupils and teachers to prepare adequately. A third year of last-minute disruption is unacceptable. It would mean many pupils going through the entire senior phase with this cloud over them.”
In her interview on Sunday, Ms Somerville added: “We would make it clear right from the start that modifications have already been put in place to take account of the fact that learning is still being disrupted.
“The [SQA] made that announcement before the [2021] summer holidays.
“Very importantly, they are still keeping in close contact with stakeholders to see if any of the contingencies that the SQA have designed need to be put in place.
“We have two contingencies - one if we get to the exam diet and for public health reasons exams can’t take place, the young people would have the professional judgment of the teachers being used based on evidence.
“We also have another contingency that is ready to be used if necessary if we see even further disruption to learning over the next couple of terms but that children can still have exams.”
The education secretary also said that that the situation would be kept “under very, very close review, because I understand that the build-up to exams is a stressful time for young people in any year but in a Covid year even more so”.
