20 February 2004
Education ministers upped the ante in their battle to improve standards this week by backing radical proposals to reform 14-19 year-old schooling in England.
Education Secretary Charles Clarke and schools standards minister David Miliband both supported plans to envelop all current 14–19 qualifications with an international-style diploma system over the next ten years. The eventual aim is to merge courses to form one four-tier qualification.
Miliband described the proposals as 'exciting', 'ambitious' and 'practical'. He claimed the interim report, from former Ofsted chief Mike Tomlinson, 'builds on the strengths of the English system and offers the chance to tackle the weaknesses'.
The publication of the report on February 17 follows long-running concerns over the standard of many school-leavers' basic skills, as well as the low numbers of pupils in post-16 education.
In effect, Tomlinson's working group – a panel of academic experts and employers – has called for the abolition of the current GCSE/A-Level split and all vocational qualifications, and their replacement with a flexible, multi-grade academic or vocational diploma.
The drive to tackle past failures centres on pupils achieving a higher standard in compulsory 'core' skills – including maths, IT and 'communications' – with additional specialisms as they mature, as well as a major written project. An equivalent vocational route through the diploma would also be available, as would a mixture of the two.
Universities have welcomed the proposal to replace A-levels with a seven-point, post-16 standard at the apex of the four-tier system, claiming it would enable them to choose more efficiently between candidates who currently achieve their entry requirements.
Tomlinson told Public Finance that he believed the proposals also met Clarke's four 'key' criteria for reform in the sector, outlined this week: stretching the most able students, addressing the historic failure to provide quality vocational training, reducing the assessment burden on teachers and addressing high drop-out rates.
But Tomlinson said the change to the new system should be phased in over the next ten years so that the current qualifications do not become devalued.
Teaching unions and business leaders also backed the report. The reduction in assessment burdens and Tomlinson's suggestion that all classes could be determined by ability and not age, allowing pupils to reach core standards in their own time, found particular favour.
The National Association of Head Teachers president, Greg Matthewson, said: 'There is absolutely no justification for business or for higher education to reject the Tomlinson report.'
PFfeb2004
