‘Exam shambles’: mystery as Ofqual removes appeal process

Disappointed A-level students in England are facing further uncertainty after the exams regulator published guidance on who could appeal against unexpectedly low grades - only to withdraw the advice hours later.

Or as The Guardian puts it, Ofqual “threatened to plunge the A-level process into further disarray” late on Saturday night, when the watchdog “dramatically suspended its criteria for students hoping to challenge their A-level grades on the basis of their results in mock exams”.

Ofqual officials said that more information would be provided “in due course”, but did not explain the sudden reversal.

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The Department for Education has also failed to shed light on the decision, with a statement issued on Sunday merely stating that Ofqual “continues to consider how to best deliver the appeals process to give schools and pupils the clarity they need”.

Thousands of 18-year-olds are expected to appeal against grades that may prevent them from securing university places.

“Around 280,000 students saw their grades fall by one grade or more following the introduction of a new algorithm, which was put in place after the coronavirus lockdown led to exams being cancelled,” Sky News reports.

High-performing students at schools with poor track records appear to have been worst hit.

“The process adopted favours schools with small numbers of students sitting any individual A-level,” explains Paul Johnson, director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, in an article for The Times. “That is, it favours private schools.”

After spending “a large part of the past 72 hours trying to understand what has happened”, Johnson concludes that “the algorithm used makes it almost impossible for students at historically poor-performing sixth forms to get top grades, even if the candidates themselves had an outstanding record at GCSE”.