Big education reviews tend to follow a pattern: a problem is identified, a big hitter is appointed to scrutinise it, they work behind the scenes with various stakeholders to produce recommendations, their findings are published and the government responds.
That, says Louise Hayward, professor emerita of educational assessment and innovation at the University of Glasgow, is not what is going to happen with the independent review of qualifications and assessment that the Scottish government appointed her to lead.
Instead, the review - which follows on from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) report finding a “misalignment” between the curriculum and qualifications in Scotland - will be conducted “in plain sight”, with issues able to be raised and addressed along the way, she says.
Speaking exclusively to Tes Scotland, Hayward says: “The research on the processes of change argues that if you involve people from the beginning, you identify issues or challenges as the process develops rather than having to deal with problems after things are published.
“So it isn’t just about involving people to make sure that people feel part of the process. It’s more than that - it’s the fact the process won’t work unless you have all these people involved in what’s going on.”
Of course, it’s not long since Scotland last reformed its qualifications in upper secondary. When Curriculum for Excellence (CfE) was introduced, qualifications were overhauled in a bid to ensure that they reflected its vision. In 2014, students sat National 5 exams for the first time, followed by the revised Higher in 2015 and the new Advanced Higher in 2016.
The reforms spelled the end of the Standard Grades and the Intermediates but, at that time it was decided that the Higher should stay.
However, Hayward - a former English and learning support teacher - says “no parameters like that” have been placed on the current review by the government.
She says the only caveat from education secretary Shirley-Anne Somerville came in a statement to the Scottish Parliament in October 2021, when she said that “externally assessed examination will remain part of the new system”.
Hayward does not see this as putting limitations on the review.
She says the review “has the potential to go in any direction” but the goal is to come up with a system that is “both visionary and practical”.
“Examinations only represent one way of gathering evidence and, for some things, examinations gather evidence well. But they don’t gather evidence of everything well,” Hayward says.
“So I don’t have difficulty with that statement but I think the first thing to do is identify what it is we want to gather evidence about and then to think about the best ways of doing it.”
The first stage of the review process, says Hayward, is to be “really clear about what it is we are trying to do”, which is why a vision statement will be created with a set of principles that sit behind it.
These principles will be used to design the assessment system, says Hayward, but they are also what will keep it on track in the future.
“There’s extensive research evidence - and from our own experience in Scotland - to suggest that often with innovation, the problem is not coming up with the good ideas, it’s about putting the ideas into practice and making sure that over time, as practice develops, it remains well aligned with the original vision and ideas.”
Essentially, the idea is that “you don’t end up, 10 years down the line, having to go back through this whole process again”, she says.
Once the vision and the principles are settled upon, the next stage will be to develop possible options - so, how might qualifications and awards best be designed to reflect the vision and principles? - and then to get views on those. The third stage will be to produce the interim report.
That report is due in December. Once feedback is in, it will be used to inform the final recommendations to Somerville next March.
Feeding into each stage of the process will be the members of the independent review group (IRG) who, Hayward explains, fall into three categories: “those for whom qualifications matter most”, such as young people and their carers; “those involved in the design, development and delivery of qualifications”, such as teachers, headteachers and local authorities; and “those who use qualifications”, for example, businesses, universities and colleges.
“You need parents to know what’s happening and why things are changing, and what the changes will mean for their young people,” says Hayward.
“You need young people to be part of the process - this is their future and they have a right to be involved in these discussions. You need the employers to be involved because, if the universities and the colleges and the employers don’t value and make use of qualifications, then there will be a negative impact on the system. So all of these people have to be part of the process.”
In total, the IRG has about 20 members but instead of them representing the organisation they work for, Hayward says, they are there to represent a community. For example, two members of the Scottish Youth Parliament (SYP) sit on the group - Beinn Grant and Zainab Adeleye - and they will be responsible for feeding back views not just from the SYP but from young people more generally.
Similarly, the incoming general secretary of the EIS teaching union, Andrea Bradley, sits on the group but is not there only to represent her members, says Hayward, she is there to “link with the profession”.
Hayward says: “Each person who is on the independent review group themselves has set up a group of people to make sure that they get a range of voices from their community. So people who are on the independent review group are not there to represent an organisation, they are there as a link with a community.”
However, Hayward says she won’t just be relying on the IRG and the “collaborative community groups” formed by its members to shape the review.
To coincide with the end of the summer break, every secondary school in Scotland is receiving a package to help them feed into the visions and principles that will underpin qualifications and assessment in Scotland.
A draft “vision” has been created with the SYP and the Children’s Parliament, and this, Hayward hopes, will be used as a stimulus for discussion (see end of story).
A similar process will come after the IRG develops options for the future of assessment and qualifications, and also after the publication of the interim report.
Hayward says there are also plans for a small number of town-hall events and a public consultation.
“By having all of these people in that process, I hope we can get this balance between making sure the system is right in terms of what will best support young people, and also something that is practical and useable for all of those other groups. That’s the sweet spot.”
Hayward has so far been delighted by the enthusiasm with which the teaching profession and others are getting involved in the process.
That was something that could not be taken for granted, given that the OECD report found a “general acceptance that there is more work needed to better align qualifications” in the secondary senior phase but “little appetite for more reform”.
However, recent research has come to light that questions the OECD’s finding that the qualifications are a poor fit for CfE and focus too much on “traditional exam- and memory-based assessment”.
Research by the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) found “a stronger degree of alignment than suggested by OECD’s report”. It said that class sizes, timetabling and resources - as opposed to its courses - were getting in the way of key features of CfE being realised in Scottish schools.
Hayward, though, says that even without the OECD review, there are wider reasons for undertaking a review of assessment and qualifications - including the debate about assessment triggered by the Covid pandemic and the cancellation of the exams - and that “the world we live in is changing rapidly and significantly”, citing climate change specifically.
She also says the SQA findings are “a salutary reminder that you can’t only look at one part of the system”.
“You have to look at what it will take to make ideas work in practice,” says Hayward. “The advice we will offer to the Cabinet secretary will be the best possible advice that we can gather about what we believe should happen, and what it will take to make it happen.”
Here are the draft vision and principles that teachers and pupils will be asked to comment on when they return after the summer:
Draft vision
Qualifications and awards in Scotland should reflect what matters in the curriculum, recognise every learner’s achievements, and provide evidence to inspire the next steps in their learning journey.
Draft principles
Scotland’s qualifications system should:
- Be responsive to the fast-changing needs of individual learners and Scotland in an increasingly complex and globalised society.
- Be inclusive both in design and development.
- Reflect the aspirations of CfE.
- Recognise the achievements of every learner.
- Be clear, coherent and understood by all as part of a lifelong learning journey.
- Support flexible approaches to assessment.
- Be adaptable and kept under review to ensure that the needs of all young people and society continue to be met.
