Advance guidance about GCSEs and A-levels too late to ensure fairness, school leaders fear Students sitting an exam Summer exams are due to go ahead this year after two years of cancellations due to Covid. Photograph: David Jones/PA Sally Weale Education correspondent Mon 7 Feb 2022 19.59 GMT Headteachers have cast doubt on the government’s efforts to ensure fairness for pupils sitting their GCSEs and A-levels in England this summer, warning that deprived pupils in areas severely affected by Covid will be at an unfair disadvantage as exams return. The warning came as exam boards published advance information about some of the content due to come up in the summer exams, to help teachers and pupils focus their revision. School leaders warned, however, that the information had come too late and would do little to mitigate widely varying levels of Covid disruption in schools across the country. “It’s very late in the day,” said Caroline Derbyshire, the chair of the Headteachers’ Roundtable and CEO of the Saffron academy trust in Essex, adding: “The extent to which students have been affected is quite different across different parts of the country, which makes it impossible to ensure fairness.” Advertisement There are also warnings that tens of thousands of pupils could lose out on top grades compared with last year’s results, as the government attempts to rein in grade inflation over the past two years and begin a glided return to pre-pandemic grading. This summer is a transition year, when examiners will be asked to be more generous when setting grade boundaries to provide a safety net for students who might otherwise just miss out on a higher grade, but there will be significantly fewer top grades when results are published in August. On Monday, pupils and teachers were given access to long-awaited details of topics, themes and skills likely to be assessed during the exams. Advance information has been provided for the majority of GCSE and A-level subjects, including maths, biology, chemistry and languages. It does not provide exact questions that will appear in exams, however, and is one of a range of measures intended to recognise the impact of the pandemic on learning. Mike Walters, the chair of the Kent Association of Head Teachers, said pupils and staff were glad to have some advance notice of topics, but warned: “The extent to which this really mitigates, when there’s been such different levels of disruption for children in different areas of the country, is questionable.” Glyn Potts, the head of Newman RC College in Oldham, said areas such as the north-west and north-east of England had been more severely affected by Covid over a sustained period than other areas, with high levels of absence among staff and pupils. “I welcome anything that addresses lost learning, particularly for disadvantaged students, but this doesn’t actually do it. I think exams are the fairest approach, but this doesn’t seem to be fair to those students for whom challenges before Covid were then amplified during the pandemic.” Some heads complained there were inconsistencies in the advance content made available by different boards in different subjects, and that some were more useful than others. “Overall I think young people deserved better than this, especially at such a late stage,” said Ben Davis, the headteacher at St Ambrose Barlow RC high school in Greater Manchester. Analysis by the Liberal Democrats suggests about 90,000 pupils could miss out on top grades in their GCSEs and A-levels because of the government’s planned changes. Summer exams are due to go ahead this year after two years of cancellations owing to the pandemic. The teacher-assessed grades that were used instead led to record results for students. The exams regulator, Ofqual, has said it wants to get back to normal grading, but over a two-year period. According to Liberal Democrat analysis, planned changes for this summer could mean that almost 25,000 GCSE pupils miss out on grades 7, 8 or 9, and 66,000 A-level students miss out on As or A*s, compared with under the grading system last year. This year’s results are still expected to be higher than 2019. The Liberal Democrat leader, Ed Davey, said: “Students taking exams this year have had their entire course affected by the pandemic, from the start through to the finish. Lowering grades this year is arbitrary, senseless and heartless when the pandemic is still ongoing. “Our children have worked as hard as they can in incredibly difficult circumstances and their grades should reflect their hard work, instead of being artificially reduced by a thoughtless government.” In addition to the advance information published by exam boards on Monday, the government has introduced adaptations include a choice of topics in some GCSEs such as English literature and history, and support materials such as formulae sheets in maths. The education secretary, Nadhim Zahawi, said: “Exams are the best and fairest form of assessment, and we firmly intend for them to take place this summer, giving students a fair chance to show what they know.”