SNS response to A level and BTEC results

Monday 17 August 2020

Dear Parent/Carer

A Level and BTEC Results 2020

We write to you following last week’s Year 13 Results Day. Whilst we are pleased that the majority of our students have successfully secured offers to their chosen destinations, be that university, apprenticeships, art school or employment; we remain very concerned that a small group of our students have been negatively impacted by the calculations used by the exam boards, meaning they have unfairly missed out on their university offer.

Back in March when the government announced school closure and the cancellation of external summer exams, our students were launched into the unknown. At Stoke Newington School when teachers were asked to produce evidenced-based centre assessed grades, our teachers undertook a rigorous process to predict the summer grade along with their rank within the class. There was no formal guidance from the government on this process. Much scrupulous hard work took place clocking up hours of staff time in order to do right by our young people. The impact of the events of the last few days have both demoralised and demeaned our students and their teachers.

We are closely monitoring communication from the government and examining boards. We want to reassure parents that we will support those affected to appeal their grades. We have so far responded to every appeal email based on current guidance which is under review. We will follow up once final guidelines are confirmed. We are pleased that the government will now cover the cost of the appeals, though it would be even better if the centre assessed grades were simply just accepted. We will do all that we can to ensure fairness prevails in what has become a most unfair situation in already unprecedented times.

Together, the governing body and leadership team are writing to key agencies including our local member of parliament, local authority, Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulations (Ofqual) and the Department for Education to express our frustrations and to demand that the centre assessed grades are accepted.

At the height of the pandemic our young people made sacrifices to their normal life, by following the national restrictions to protect the older generation from the deadly virus. The mental health and wellbeing of our young people was understandably affected, now we need to ensure they are not affected any more than necessary.

On Thursday 20 August, we have GCSE Results Day and we know some of our Year 11 students and their families may be feeling anxious given what has transpired with A level results. Please know that we are working hard to ensure we can safeguard our students from having a similar experience to their Year 13 counterparts. We will communicate more information on this to all Year 11 parents as soon as we are able.

We know many of you in our community wish to show your support and help address this situation. Thank you also to those of you who whilst not directly affected, have sent in your good wishes plus both moral and practical offers of support. Here is a link to a petition calling for the government to reverse exam grades back to teachers’ predictions, please do sign these if you can. We will of course let you know if there is anything further our community can do.

With best regards,