02 November 2007
When in 2005 the then education secretary Ruth Kelly baulked at implementing Sir Mike Tomlinson's radical recommendations on curriculum reform, educationalists complained that the agenda had been killed off.
Tomlinson's proposal to replace the GCSE and A-level with a single, overarching diploma made up of both academic and vocational elements was just a step too far, despite widespread support from education and industry leaders.
Instead, ministers decided to roll out a new suite of vocational diplomas to cater for less academically inclined pupils and review the A-level system in 2008.
But last week it looked as if new life was being breathed into the Tomlinson report. Schools Secretary Ed Balls announced that three new subject-based diplomas, in science, languages and the humanities, would join their vocational counterparts.
Tomlinson himself was brought back into the fold and will chair an expert advisory group to push the agenda forward.
Many commentators leapt on the announcement as tacit acknowledgement by the government that the A-level might have had its day. Subject-based diplomas would offer an 'academic' alternative to A-levels.
Balls said: 'If diplomas are successfully introduced and are delivering the mix that employers and universities value, they could become the qualification of choice for young people.'
But, like his predecessor, he shied away from killing off the A-level once and for all. The promised 2008 review would be postponed until 2013, by which time the market will decide which is the favoured option.
Martin Ward, deputy general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, does not blame Balls for backing off.
It would be a brave secretary of state who announced the death of the A-level, he says. The 'gold-standard' qualification has been a feature of the English education system for more than 50 years and has been little reformed.
But Ward is hopeful that the new diplomas will take off. 'It may be that in ten or 15 years time it will be politically possible to say we don't need GCSEs and A-levels any more,' he tells Public Finance.
The thinking behind the diploma is that it will offer a new approach to learning and stimulate youngsters who are turned off by traditional, classroom-based education.
While an emphasis on theoretical learning will remain, pupils will be encouraged to apply their learning to the world around them, in arts studios, in engineering workshops or on work placements.
Maggie Scott, director of learning and quality at the Association of Colleges, explains: 'The A-level way of working has never linked subjects.' Pupils are not encouraged to take the knowledge they gain studying one subject and apply it to another area, she says.
Scott adds that although the qualification serves the needs of a minority of young people very well, the less academic have been lagging behind.
The demands of employers have also shifted. They still value intellectual abilities but want these to be augmented with practical skills.
Scott welcomes the moratorium on the A-level review. It brings some much-needed stability and keeps the traditionalists happy.
'There's a huge opportunity and challenge in 2013, which is the point at which all the diplomas will become an entitlement,' she says. 'That's the point when they will either have caught the public imagination and be embedded as a viable alternative for young people, or they won't.'
But the teaching unions, big backers of Tomlinson, are frustrated that the government has again failed to grasp the nettle and postponed a decision on the future of the A-level for another six years.
'We wish they'd said: “We want diplomas to be the single qualification by 2013.” They should have stated their intention, set up the machinery and planned a way to it,' says John Bangs, assistant secretary for education at the National Union of Teachers.
Martin Johnson, acting deputy general secretary of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers, agrees. 'We were relying on the fact the government was committed to a review of the curriculum and its assessment in 2008,' he says.
'That would be a very significant moment when the government could quite legitimately say there still is a groundswell of opinion… that radical change is necessary.'
There are also worries that, as long as A-levels persist, they will continue to be the favoured option for pupils, parents, universities and many employers. After five decades their status is deeply ingrained and it will be tough for a new qualification to compete.
'While we've got a bilateral qualification system we will not have parity of esteem; it's just a myth,' Johnson says.
Scott strikes a more positive note, suggesting that a plurality of qualifications could work, with pupils taking one or two A-levels to supplement their diplomas.
But she adds that buy-in from higher education will be crucial. 'This is going to be the acid test and we need to see some really positive noises being made by universities; that the diploma is sufficiently rigorous, it does develop the skills they want, [and] it is good preparation for university education.'
Balls has made efforts to demonstrate that universities are onside. When he made the announcement on October 23, he was flanked by representatives of Cambridge, Leeds and Exeter universities. They gave assurances that the new subject-based diplomas would be developed with higher education-input and taken seriously as an entry route to university.
But Bangs is pessimistic. With a multiplicity of qualifications available, it will be universities rather than the market of young people that will decide which ones become pre-eminent.
'It's all very siren-like to say this [means] different diplomas for different types of kids. What it means is the Russell Group [of leading universities] is going to choose the qualifications that it wants,' Bangs predicts.
Even more disturbing is the possibility that the co-existence of A-levels and diplomas could create divisions between schools and erode the idea of comprehensive education, he says. Schools lack the capacity to offer the full menu of qualifications coming on stream and so will play to their strengths.
'My concern is the qualification will come to define the nature of schools and we'll have a return to secondary moderns and grammars,' Bangs says.
'Some will be offering the International Baccalaureate and A-levels and other will be offering diplomas. So in a sense, you don't need selection because what you've got is different schools offering different qualifications, and that determines the intake.'
Diplomas: a bold new future or a return to the past?
PFnov2007
