P-05-1025 Ensure fairness for students taking exams in 2021, Correspondence – Petitioners to Chair, 03.02.21

Dear Chair,

Please accept my apologies for the lateness of our response, I hope you can consider the following:

It is our belief that the "Ensure fairness for students taking exams in 2021" Petition has largely been met through the latest announcement from the Welsh Government to use Centre-Determined Grades (CDGs) for this years' students.

NEU Cymru are part of the Welsh Government's stakeholder group "Learning, Qualifications, and Progression - External Stakeholder Reference Group" and hope to work with them to ensure that education professionals have everything they need to ensure that young people do not have any of the same issues as last year. This includes appropriate training and assistance with the appeals process.

We believe that the work of the Petitions Committee has helped to shape this debate, and whilst we believe that it would have been helpful for everyone in education to accept CDGs sooner, we have welcomed this announcement. Young people have faced disruption over the last twelve months, which will vary across the cohort, so it is right there is some flexibility for educators in determining student's grades.

We do believe a this sheds a light on the unfairness of exams and especially the algorithm used in future years, and believe decisions need to be taken soon about how young people due to sit exams next year should be assessed.

We are happy to discuss this with the Committee.

Yours,