Tens of thousands of children may have had their SATs inaccurately marked after three quarters of teachers in a survey reported problems with the tests.
The Daily Telegraph is reporting that thousands of SAT scores may have been marked wrong when students took the test in May of this year.
More than a third of heads questioned by the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) said problems with marking were “severe” or “outrageous”.
The warning came as ministers confirmed that the Sats writing test is to be abandoned. In future, pupils’ writing skills will be assessed by their teacher throughout the school year.
Coming in 2013, children will also face a new test covering spelling, grammar, punctuation and vocabulary. The move follows a review of national curriculum tests, otherwise known as Standard Assessment Tests (SATs), which was published last month. The recommendation was that serious changes to the current system are needed. The English and maths exams, taken by students at the end of junior high, are fiercely opposed by teaching unions. The writing paper, which is part of the English test, has long been seen as the most controversial. Teachers say answers are too open to interpretation.
In a survey of 1,689 NAHT members, 93 per cent reported problems with the marking of this summer’s writing test.
More than one in four (27 per cent) reported problems with the reading paper, which makes up the other half of the English test, and more than one in 10 (11 per cent) warned of problems with the maths exam.
Russell Hobby, the general secretary of the NAHT, said there was a real sense from head teachers that “the efforts of their teachers and pupils have not been matched by the quality of the system”. He said there were “too many tests” and that this affected quality control. Mr Hobby suggested tests were not “objective” and said there were better measures of pupils’ achevements.
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