The biggest overhaul of exams in a generation: what do you think?

By: Lindsay Plumpton

Communications Leader

Tuesday 18 September 2012

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GCSEs are set to be replaced by an English baccalaureate certificate from September 2015, it was announced yesterday.

The key reforms include the scrapping of modular exams in favour of a final 'tougher' exam, with pupils no longer be able to re-sit to improve their grades. It is expected that only 10% of pupils will achieve a Grade 1 with the new system, compared with the third who are currently awarded an A or A*. There will also be only one awarding body per subject area.

Education Secretary, Michael Gove, has said that the “more rigorous” methods of assessment will end years of “drift, decline and dumbing down.” However, critics have suggested that the changes are reminiscent of the two-tier system of the 1980s. Shadow Education Secretary, Stephen Twigg, commented that the reforms are “totally out of date.”

So what do you think? Will the new set of exams stretch the most able students and allow children to flourish and reach their full potential? Or is the new approach in fact a backwards step? Should new exams be based around preparing young people for the world of work?

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Lindsay Plumpton

Communications Leader
96 posts
David Grailey

Chief Executive
79 posts
Andrew Gladstone-Heighton

Policy Leader
75 posts
Esme Winch

Managing Director
35 posts
Michael Lemin

Policy and Research Manager
25 posts

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