Memorandum submitted by the Assessment
and Qualifications Alliance (AQA)
INTRODUCTION
1. This memorandum represents AQA's response
to the invitation from the Select Committee to submit evidence
in connection with the Select Committee's inquiry into the new
14-19 Specialised Diplomas, the first lines of which are due to
be taught in schools and colleges from September 2008.
2. This memorandum offers background information
on the preparatory work AQA has been undertaking with City &
Guilds. The memorandum then addresses those of the questions posed
by the Select Committee in its published terms of reference on
which AQA takes a view.
3. AQA is the UK's leading Unitary Awarding
Body and, as a long-standing provider of high quality general
qualifications at GCSE and A level, the awarding body of choice
for schools. We are an educational charity so all our income from
examination fees goes into running and developing our examinations
and other services to schools and colleges. We place great emphasis
on engagement with our stakeholders in educational centres to
ensure we are fully meeting their needs. As the UK's main Awarding
Body, one of our primary roles is to engage with our regulators
and policymakers on issues of curriculum design and wider educational
and assessment policy, utilising our educational research department
which has a considerable international reputation. One of our
priorities is the effective use of innovative technology to facilitate
and modernise assessment techniques. AQA is pioneering the introduction
of new methods of electronic assessment and marking that increase
accuracy and reliability while maintaining and enhancing the integrity
of the examination system.
4. AQA strongly supports the concept of
the new Diplomas. They will provide education in vocational contexts
which will be more relevant to many young people than what is
currently on offer and hopefully will increase motivation, success
and therefore retention beyond the age of 16.
5. AQA and City & Guilds announced a
partnership for the development and delivery of Specialised Diplomas
on 3 February 2006. The largest unitary awarding body in the UK
and the leading provider of vocational qualifications in the UK
were convinced that, working in partnership together, they could
provide the most comprehensive curriculum offer across all 14
lines of learning. Schools and colleges could access a wide choice
of coherent progression pathways with the administrative simplicity
of one point of contact. The resources of the two awarding bodies
would provide a variety of means of support for deliverers especially
in the all important initial years of this new qualification.
6. Over the past year, the partnership representatives
have worked with the lead Sector Skills Councils for the first
five Diploma Development Partnerships in Construction and Built
Environment, Creative and Media, Engineering, Health and Social
Care and Information Technology as they have progressed through
the process of employer and public consultation towards publication
of the draft Diploma structure and indicative content for all
five Specialised Diplomas.
7. The partnership has contributed to discussions
with the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA) and Department
for Education and Skills (DfES) on such issues as the content
and structure of the Diploma, its assessment, moderation, verification
and reporting mechanisms and whether or not the Diploma should
be awarded an overall grade.
8. The partnership has discussed with QCA
the possible format and assessment of the Functional Skills units
and has contributed to discussions with QCA, DfES, the Federation
of Awarding Bodies and the Joint Council for Qualifications on
a variety of matters to do with accreditation, regulation, assessment
and awarding of Specialised Diplomas.
9. Later in 2006, QCA commissioned AQA to
carry out technical work on the new Specialised Diplomas. This
important contract was primarily to devise a methodology for grading
the Diplomas. In taking the lead on this work, AQA assembled a
project team from the awarding bodies and expects the work to
be completed by the end of February 2007. However, an initial
recommendation on the grading system was submitted to QCA and
DfES in December.
10. As a final introductory comment, we
believe there should be a monitoring programme for the introduction
of any new national qualification system that involves ensuring
that teaching and management systems in schools are coping, as
well as the assessment system. In this case, the results delivery
mechanism is different and complex and will also need to be monitored.
RESPONSES TO
QUESTIONS
Design and development of Diplomas
11. What progress has been made on the development
of Diplomas to date? Where have been the sticking points?
12. The introduction to our memorandum offers
AQA's views on developments to date.
13. In response to the second question,
we have some concerns over the timetable. Principal Learning units,
which constitute approximately 50% of the qualification, could
not be commissioned until the qualification criteria were published
on 30 November 2006. These require endorsement by Diploma Development
Partnerships (DDPs) in March prior to submission to QCA on 30
April 2007 for accreditation. Although this timetable is just
feasible, it is tight and carries risks to the quality of the
units as a result.
14. Although the Extended Project Pilot
tender has been let to AQA and another awarding body, it will
not be completed until autumn 2008, after teaching begins for
specialised Diplomas. Level 1 and level 2 projects follow the
same development timetable as Principal Learning and will not
be piloted. The all important Functional Skills qualifications
have undergone limited trials but pilots will not commence until
September 2007 and will not report before teaching begins for
specialised Diplomas.
15. The inclusion of so many unpiloted components
in a new portmanteau qualification produces a high level of risk.
It will, therefore, be important for all involved to recognise
the importance of evaluating the various aspects of the Diplomas
in the light of operational experience and be prepared to make
modifications to ensure that any lessons learnt are applied in
practice.
16. Development of the course specifications
for the Principal Learning units is currently underway. However,
assessment materials cannot be developed until technical issues
relating to the approach to assessment and grading have been resolved
by QCA. This resolution is not expected until the end of January,
significantly compressing the development period since proposals
are due to be submitted for endorsement by the Diploma Development
Partnerships in March, prior to accreditation by QCA at the end
of April. There are clear risks to the quality of the assessment
materials as a result and it will be crucial for the technical
issues to be resolved, on schedule, by the end of January.
17. Where proposals have been made by the
Diploma Development Partnerships (DDPs) for specific units of
Additional and Specialist Learning (ASL) to be developed, the
proposed development timetable is very tight. At present, only
indicative content has been set out by the DDPs for these units
but the deadline for fully developed assessment units is 31 May.
There are clear risks to quality from this timetable and, since
the ASL units are optional for students, awarding bodies may conclude
that the risks of attempting these development outweigh the benefits.
18. What role have employers and Sector Skills
Councils played in the development of Diplomas?
19. Through the DDPs the SSCs have played
the lead role in designing the content of the Diplomas.
20. However, that well intentioned process
has also caused some problems, as the awarding bodies and practising
teachers were not involved until after the content and learning
outcomes had been published in June 2006. A great deal of remedial
work has had to be carried out, including the retrospective drafting
of subject and qualification criteria, in order to make sure that
the content can be organised into manageable teaching and learning
(as well as testing) specifications, which are comparable across
lines. For the remaining lines of learning it will be important
to ensure that the roles of the various organisations and the
criteria requirements under which they are working are clear from
the outset. The involvement of practising teachers in the Diploma
specification process would help to diminish the need for retrospective
drafting.
21. Who is responsible for the co-ordination
and development of Diplomas?
22. Our understanding is that overall responsibility
at official level rests with Jon Coles, Director, 14-19 Reform
Group at DfES.
23. Is there a case for a stronger co-ordinating
role for one of the agencies involved, or for the appointment
of a senior responsible officer or champion?
24. We very much welcome the recent appointment
of a professional project manager for the Diploma and would encourage
the application of a rigorous project management approach for
the remainder of the work. We also welcome the establishment of
the 14-19 Chief Executives' Group chaired by Phil Hope and Jim
Knight where the Chief Executives of the many organisations that
can contribute to the success of the Diploma meet to discuss progress
and issues. However, we believe this group, and the project as
a whole, needs to move rapidly to establish the precise roles
of all the organizations represented and the specific contributions
they will make to its success, along with firm timescales and
commitments to deliver.
25. Is there a clear system for accrediting
and awarding the Diplomas?
26. AQA is the leading body for expertise
on technical, assessment grading issues in the UK. As referenced
in our introduction, we have been commissioned by QCA to conduct
a six month project to advise on the grading system for the first
tranche of Specialised Diplomas. Our Project Team is composed
of experts from within AQA and consultants from other Awarding
Bodies and QCA itself, and the Project Director is Dr Mike Cresswell,
AQA's Director General. We reported our recommendations on the
grading method at the end of December to QCA, which is then responsible
for advising the Secretary of State. Our Final Report, outlining
the rationale for the recommendations more fully, will be submitted
to QCA at the end of February.
27. Although our work is not yet complete,
the technical experts are already clear that the Diploma grade
should be generated on the basis only of candidates' work in the
Principal Learning and Extended Project. These elements of the
Diploma incorporate PLTS (Personal, Learning and Thinking Skills).
QCA has accepted our advice on this issue. In addition, we have
recently advised that it would be unwise to produce a grade for
the Additional and Specialist Learning, as it is not possible
to ensure comparable grading standards for students choosing different
routes through ASL or between the lines of learning. Our December
report to QCA also included recommendations on matters such as
the number of grades required at each level of the Diploma and
the impact of hurdles for the functional skills on Diploma outcomes.
28. It is pertinent to record that all the
awarding bodies are on record as being opposed to awarding Diploma
grades because of the risks involved in terms of fairness to students
and the credibility of the Diploma. However, assuming that the
policy decision which has been made to grade the Diploma is irrevocable,
AQA believes that the recommendations in the interim report submitted
at the end of December provide a sensible minimum-risk basis for
doing so. The recommendation for grades to be based only upon
Principal Learning and the Project is crucial to reducing the
risks involved in grading the Diploma. Nonetheless, significant
risks remain and it will be essential to monitor closely the achievements
being recorded for the first Diploma students during their courses.
This will enable the robustness of the proposed grading method
and the utility of its results to be partially tested and confirmed
before the first grades for the Diploma as a whole are issued.
It is important to note that adjustments may still be necessary
to the grade standards set in the first years of the Diploma as
information accumulates about the utility of the overall results.
Teacher and lecturer training
29. What are current levels of teacher/lecturer
training activity in preparation for Diplomas? Is this sufficient
to make Diplomas a success?
30. There is much goodwill towards the Diploma,
as teachers recognise that programmes leading to existing general
qualifications do not offer a diet that is suited to some students,
who then fail to gain appropriate qualifications that will hold
them in good stead for working life. The consequential disillusionment
and under-performance of a minority of young people has long been
a priority target for DfES and the Diploma is the latest attempt
to provide a qualification that is motivating for learners, relevant
to their life beyond full time education and recognised and valued
by employers.
31. However, that general level of goodwill
needs to be made effective by the recruitment of teachers with
relevant sector experience and the provision of appropriate CPD
for existing teachers. AQA, working in partnership with City &
Guilds, will, in common with all the awarding bodies, be working
hard to deliver early information about the requirements of the
specifications. There is a serious role for government to play
in fully supporting those efforts, ensuring that funding regimes
are in place and, in particular, that opportunities for work experience
(a fundamental requirement of all Diploma programmes) are available
throughout the UK, whether in urban or rural areas.
CO-ORDINATION
BETWEEN SCHOOLS
AND COLLEGES
32. What is the current level of co-ordination
between colleges and schools in local areas?
33. We believe this is extremely variable.
There are some excellent examples of an integrated approach involving
all 14-19 providers, but there may also be a risk that the long-standing
history of competition between school sixth forms and colleges
might make this difficult to achieve for some.
34. What are the barriers to co-ordination?
35. Undoubtedly the existence of Performance
Tables has contributed to a greater degree of competition between
schools, which are subject to those pressures, and colleges, which
may not be. Certainly schools have been working hard to avoid
losing able students to colleges in their area, leading to the
development of new courses in popular, emerging subjects which
were formerly more often found in colleges (Psychology, Sociology
and PE, for example).
36. What are the lessons that can be learned
from areas where there is strong co-ordination on 14-19?
37. Experience suggests that it takes a
minimum of five or six years to encourage the regional co-operative
ethos and to build the administrative infrastructure which is
essential for a successful area partnership.
38. We strongly welcome the Gateway process
for approving consortia delivering the first Diploma courses.
AQA believes it is essential to ensure that the Gateway process
continues to prioritise competent delivery over achieving target
volumes if the Diploma is to be a long-term success.
January 2007
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