Headteachers say they have been left “up against the wire” as they wait for guidance from exam boards about how to assess GCSE and A-level students this year.

The guidance on how teachers should award grades this year is expected by the end of this month, and boards are understood to be working towards releasing the information by Friday.

But heads fear it may come later next week, when some schools will have broken up for the Easter holidays.

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Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, told Tes: “Even if they publish on a Friday, for some schools this will be the last day of term before the Easter holidays, so we’re really up against the wire with this, with teachers not quite knowing how the good intentions around assessing young people are going to work in practice.”

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The Joint Council for Qualifications said it aims to issue the guidance “as swiftly as it is feasible to do so”.

But first, exam boards need to see the outcome of a technical consultation by Ofqual on awarding grades - also due this week.

A spokesperson for Ofqual said: “We are set to publish the outcomes for the general qualification, and vocational and technical qualification, consultations soon,” adding that this would “probably” be this week.

The exam board guidance is expected to lay out how teachers can use evidence to grade GCSE and A-level students, including the use of optional external tasks set by exam boards. 

Mr Barton said heads were increasingly frustrated about when this information would be released.

“It’s one of the biggest questions we’re getting in our inbox, is the frustration of knowing by [18] June the grades have to be submitted, a grade for every child in every subject, but not knowing what is precisely ruled out - do we count the seventeen-page Bleak House essay or Friday spelling test?

“There is a growing sense…of pressure coming from parents in terms of ‘my child needs a grade 9 to become a doctor, and you’re the teacher’.”

Mr Barton added that the guidance would help heads to articulate why particular evidence had been used to parents, but that schools were running out of time.

He said: “A lot of schools would have finished this term and started next term with a training day, and that’s the opportunity for them to put all this in place.

“But if we’re not going to get some of this until the middle of April, that’s an incredibly truncated amount of time, particularly if you have big year groups of 350 students, with teachers with two Year 11 groups - 54 kids where you need to put together a basket of evidence.

“The frustration for me, if I was teaching English today, ever since Gavin Williamson’s announcement of plan B [is] a child would say, ‘So how are you going to arrive at my English grade, Mr Barton?’

“To which my answer would have to be, ‘I still haven’t got the details,’ so there’s a lot of frustration in the system about that.”

He said that the guidance would help teachers to use the most valid forms of evidence, but that as time went on, students might spend most of their time doing mock exams.

“The trouble is there’s not a lot of time and if you haven’t got sufficient assessments which we’re deeming as particularly valid, you’ve already got some youngsters complaining that all they seem to do all the time are mini mock exams in lessons,” he said, adding that it was understandable for teachers to aim for “as much externality under the belt as possible”.

Mr Barton said: “The stakes are high because any young people who don’t get the grades they think they should have will be entitled to appeal, and that’s why I think there’s a lot of stress in the system….and why we have to have all materials by the end of March.”

A spokesperson for the Joint Council for Qualifications said: “JCQ and the exam boards appreciate teachers, schools and colleges are very much anticipating the full guidance.

“We are doing everything we can and have been working hard with the Department for Education and Ofqual to ensure this is published as soon as possible before Easter. We are also working closely with the teaching associations and unions to ensure they are kept up to date and are able to offer feedback.
 
“We are awaiting regulations from Ofqual following its technical consultation, currently due this week, at which point we will be able to finalise our guidance. We understand the urgency, and will aim to issue it as swiftly as it is feasible to do so.”