More generous marking, advance warning of certain topics and “exam aids” will be granted to GCSE and A-level students sitting exams next year due to the disruption caused by Covid-19.
If they fail some by sickness or self-isolation, they will still be given a “second opportunity” to sit papers and in “extreme cases” where a pupil has a “legitimate reason” to miss all their tests, a “teacher-informed assessment” will be used as a last resort.
On Sky News, Mr Williamson was asked to have a cast-iron promise that the examinations will not be postponed again.
“He said that there were exams running even during the national lockdown and added: “Tens of thousands of students have taken those GCSE and A-level exams all the way during the national lockdown, and that has been achieved professionally, safely and effectively.
“I have every confidence that if during a national lockdown we were able to run a whole set of tests for GCSEs and A-levels, we will be able to run the same set of tests in the Summer Exam Plan of next year.”
The dedication of Mr. Williamson came when he announced that GCSE and A-level students would be given more generous grades to compensate for the pandemic.
In this system, each subject will “receive the same level of generosity so that, depending on their subject choice, the approach does not benefit some learners over others.”
“Exam aids” may also be offered for use in “some exams,” such as formulas or vocabulary cards, but students are not required to be able to carry text passages into the exam.
At this point, it is not clear what aids will be allowed for each subject or what FE-based courses will be included.
David Hughes, chief executive of the Association of Colleges, said there is “no simple solution that could be implemented by the government to ensure that examinations are fair for everyone in 2021, but the range of adaptations announced today will help make things more fair.”
He added that there is a “urgency about this” because in January more than 50,000 students will sit BTEC and other technical exams and “all students want certainty as soon as possible about how evaluations and grades will be carried out.”