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Education secretary Michael Gove has revealed a major shakeup of the exam system for secondary schools in England. The GCSE would be phased out in favour of an English Baccalaureate qualification.
This move is meant to end the highly criticised aspect of GCSE wherein exam boards compete with one another to offer the easiest exams to students, a system which lowers the quality of education received by pupils.
Below are some of the changes expected under the EBacc:
- No more modules allowing students to retake parts of their course
- Less reliance on classroom assessment and coursework
- Knowledge to be tested in a single end-of-year final exam
- Marking system to be revised from letters to numeric marks or percentages
Under the new system, a “sizeable” number of students will be leaving school without acquiring qualifications. Those who find the new exams difficult will receive a “detailed record of their achievement” from their respective schools. This will then be turned over to further education colleges where the students will be encouraged to take the exams at age 17 or 18. The changes will be carried out in two stages:
- Starting autumn of 2015, students will be taught for the EBacc in English, maths and science covering seven papers. There will be no coursework in English and maths, while some coursework in science is given to factor in the learning to be achieved from laboratory work. Pupils will sit an exam for the first time in these subjects in the summer of 2017.
- Starting 2016, pupils will also be prepared for the new EBacc in history, geography and languages. No coursework will be given for history. Field trips are still in place for geography. There will also be some measure of flexibility on oral exams to test the level of proficiency in languages.
The reform will not apply to the exam system currently being followed in Wales and Northern Ireland, while Scotland pupils sit for Standard Grades, Highers and Advanced Highers instead of GCSEs and A-levels.
