Principals’ angry after A-level grade reductions

More than a third of A-level students had their grades reduced by the exams body CCEA, prompting outrage from both students and teachers.

Lagan College Principal Amanda McNamee told the News Letter three of her students, who had performed well in previous exams, had results reduced from B all the way down to U — the lowest possible grade.

“Are you trying to tell me that we, as a society, are concerned with young people’s wellbeing,” she asked.

Mrs McNamee said 57% of pupils had their results reduced by CCEA, with 14% of pupils having had more than one grade reduced.

“I am encouraging each and every one of them to appeal,” she said. “From 9am this morning, I had already started putting the appeals in.”

She continued: “I have two students whose home language is Spanish, so of course they are fluent and we predicted them As. They got Bs.

With exams cancelled this year, schools had been asked to put together detailed information to predict how well each pupil would perform.

These predicted grades were then subject to a process of ‘standardisation’ by CCEA.

Bangor Academy principal Matthew Pitts said 63.4% of his school’s grades had been lowered while Alan Hutchinson, from Glastry College, said 56% of their grades had been reduced.

The controversy has prompted calls for the First and Deputy First Ministers Arlene Foster and Michelle O’Neill to intervene.

The First Minister acknowledged “anomalies” with the grading system used in the absence of examinations this year.

“Those anomalies have been pointed out to me today and we have an appeal system,” Mrs Foster told the BBC.

This followed calls from the SDLP leader Colum Eastwood for Mrs Foster and Mrs O’Neill to follow the example set by Scottish First Minister Nichola Sturgeon, who announced earlier this week that the grades predicted by teachers would stand.

“It is a disgrace that students across the north have been let down by the Education system,” the Foyle MLA said.

“Not only does the Education Minister needs to hold his hands up and apologise — this situation needs to be fixed. It is now time that the joint First Ministers must show some leadership and intervene.”

He called on the First and Deputy First Ministers to “admit” the system has not worked and “trust teacher’s assessments” rather than the ‘strandardisation’ processed used by the CCEA.

The UUP education spokesperson Robbie Butler, meanwhile, urged the Education Minister yesterday to sort the situation out within 24 hours.

“Regrettably this A-Levels results day has been a nightmare for some students, teachers and parents,” he said.

“What we need now is for the Education Minister to provide a roadmap to a solution within 24 hours. We cannot allow students from Northern Ireland to be disadvantaged.”