Promoting the awareness and understanding of regulated qualifications is one of Ofqual’s key objectives and one without which we cannot hope to win public confidence. This vital part of our work has included talking to learners, visiting employers and addressing a wider audience through conferences.
Ofqual’s staff and myself have continued to visit schools, colleges and workplaces in various parts of the country to encourage learners to talk to us about their views of qualifications and the issues that they think Ofqual needs to address. In June, for example, we held a learners’ forum in Newcastle, meeting teenagers and adults who had experienced difficulty trying to gain qualifications in a traditional school environment. We also went to Canterbury, where the UK Youth Parliament was meeting, to get members’ views on the reliability of examinations, tests and assessments.
There was a strong feeling that young people are under too much pressure to succeed – not just in secondary school qualifications but in primary schools. While success might be motivating, failure was demoralising. ‘There’s a perception in our heads that unless we do well in those tests we’re not going to get anywhere, and that’s wrong because not everyone’s good at examinations,’ we were told.
Learners felt that examinations gave only part of the picture. They suggested more emphasis on coursework and on building up qualifications in smaller sections over a period of years. In addition they wanted more advice from people with a more rounded view of them than a subject teacher might have. The new Diploma, discussed in Section 2, was regarded as a good initiative because it puts more emphasis on applied learning outside the classroom.
The value of qualifications as the basis for both better job satisfaction and improved quality of life was emphasised by members of the Youth Parliament. They regarded reliability as important but felt ‘it would be unrealistic to expect examinations to be 100 per cent perfect’. However, their views indicated a lack of consensus on what reliability meant. Some felt mathematics was more reliable ‘because it’s a number subject’ while others felt that ‘English examinations are more reliable because you can be more varied with those examinations’.
When asked how reliability could be improved a number of suggestions were made including:
- removing multiple-choice questions
- having several markers for the same paper
- the involvement of recent candidates for the examinations in the development of future materials
- the development of more rigorous criteria.
Other aspects of the examination process were important but most learners recognised that their results were primarily a reflection of what they did on the day.
It was also interesting to hear what they thought affected their performances in examinations. The timetabling of papers was important to allow time for revision, they said. Other aspects of the examination process were important but most learners recognised that their results were primarily a reflection of what they did on the day.
A particularly interesting visit was to McDonald’s at its UK headquarters in East Finchley, North London. The restaurant chain was one of the first employers to become a recognised awarding organisation. I was given a tour of the McDonald's university and had the opportunity to meet staff, talk to them about their roles and discuss the training ethos of the company. I also met some of the learners who were all testament to how McDonald’s invests in its crew members.
McDonald's employs some 75,000 staff in the UK and 60 per cent of these employees are under 21 years of age, making it one of the largest employers of young people in the UK. The emphasis is on making the best of the talents of its staff through its talent management programme. It launched its first apprenticeship scheme early this year. The company has spent a great deal of time and money working on its education strategy. Over the last five years it has concentrated on improving employee engagement, including offering flexible working and a continuous learning programme to address the personal and professional development of staff.
I was very pleased to hear that McDonald's found that achieving awarding organisation recognition enhanced the quality of its own in-house training. It was evident that gaining this status is working well for both McDonald's and its employees, many of whom are currently working towards functional skills qualifications. Senior managers at McDonald’s praised QCDA for their help and guidance as well as the support they had received from the awarding organisations Edexcel and City & Guilds. The company has also developed partnerships with a number of colleges and universities.
When I met Simon Waugh, Chief Executive of the National Apprenticeship Service, I was pleased to hear him state: ‘At the National Apprenticeship Service one of our absolute priorities is the quality of training people receive. While our focus is to increase the number of opportunities for young people, the quality of these opportunities must be of the highest standard. Therefore the assurance that Ofqual can give in terms of quality of the qualifications that apprentices gain is vital for us.’
Over the past few months Ofqual staff members and I have spoken at a number of conferences, explaining about the organisation and the work we are doing. I addressed the Open College Network North East Region (OCNNER) Conference in Gateshead and the Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference (HMC) in Liverpool. I have already mentioned in Section 2 the presentation that Ofqual gave at the Cambridge Assessment Conference. We have also:
- presented a paper to the Westminster Forum in which we discussed confidence, standards and technology
- discussed the reliability of results programme at the third National Conference of the Chartered Institute of Educational Assessors (CIEA)
- explored some of the problems of explaining results at the International Association for Educational Assessment (IAEA) Conference in Brisbane
- spoken to the Westminster Education Forum in July on preparing and developing the workforce for 2020
- spoken at the Northern Ireland Apprenticeships Award Ceremony
- focused on Diplomas for a presentation at the Westminster Education Forum Keynote Seminar in October.
Ofqual provided three speakers and contributed to a number of workshops at the annual conference of the Federation of Awarding Bodies (FAB), which took place in Coventry in November. The theme of the conference was ‘The Qualifications’ Manifesto’, with an emphasis on the need for awarding organisations to be properly prepared for the QCF. FAB represents the interests of a large proportion of the awarding organisations across a wide range of qualification types and the conference was an opportunity for members to get together and discuss important issues.
