SQA set for grilling by MSPs after teachers tell committee of 'lack of trust'

Exams - PA

Leaders of Scotland's exam body will appear before the Scottish Parliament's Education Committee this morning after teachers reported a lack of trust in the body.

Submissions to a survey conducted by the committee revealed around two thirds, mostly teachers, disagreed or disagreed strongly with the Scottish Qualifications Authority's assertion that “our customers and users trust us to get it right for them".

Concerns include overly complex support materials, inconsistent marking and exam papers differing from coursework. In 2015 the SQA lowered the pass mark to just 34 per cent after pupils found the content differed from what had been taught.

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“We no longer trust anything that comes from them,” one teacher told the committee.

In its own submission, the SQA stated it “has faced significant challenges in developing a sustainable financial model”.

The break down in the relationship between teachers and the exam body stems from what was perceived as a lack of support during the roll out of the new Curriculum for Excellence (CfE) senior exams, including National 4 and 5 and the new Highers.

In its submission teaching union the EIS reported: "Some of the quality assurance approaches adopted by the SQA, for example the overly extensive unit verification regime, have contributed significantly to the excessive workload burden carried by schools and teachers and have led to a significant deterioration in the relationship between the profession and the SQA."

The Scottish Government has since announced unit assessments of the new system will be dropped in order to reduce the excessive pressure on pupils and teachers. 

Academics told the committee that the new exams have narrowed the curriculum at S4, the opposite of what was intended, making teachers less likely to try innovative ways of teaching.

"While the rhetoric of CfE continues to emphasise teacher autonomy, the system within which teachers work effectively disables them from exercising that autonomy," said Professor Mark Priestley of the University of Stirling in his submission.