The Covid Test

[00:00:00] Hello and welcome to the Exam Man podcast.

[00:00:30] I'm your host John Gaston and I'm here as ever with my partner in crime Sophie Gaston.

[00:00:35] Hello.

[00:00:36] Hey Sophie, how are you?

[00:00:37] Yeah, not bad thanks.

[00:00:38] I'm good.

[00:00:39] We're sort of struggling through our holiday lurky but we're excited to be back again

[00:00:45] and also just really excited about some of the comments and feedback we got from the last

[00:00:51] episode in particular, the interview that we did with Marina which people seem to really

[00:00:56] like.

[00:00:57] Yeah, which is lovely.

[00:00:58] Which is lovely.

[00:00:59] Yeah, absolutely delighted about that.

[00:01:03] So we had some really nice comments people sent in.

[00:01:06] I'm just going to read one from Fee Martin which says fantastic episode everything you

[00:01:12] talk about with your guest is so true, the fear.

[00:01:16] It's so good to have something to listen to that we can all relate to in so many ways.

[00:01:20] On that though, we've had a few people of me ask us who aren't exams officers say what

[00:01:26] actually is that fear?

[00:01:27] What's the tarry you're on about in relation to exams?

[00:01:30] Yeah, yeah.

[00:01:31] That's a good point actually because Marina talks about a couple of things like she talked

[00:01:34] about the terror and she talked about that she would, she might have done something that

[00:01:41] had cost the money and waking up in the middle of the night.

[00:01:44] Yes, that's right.

[00:01:45] And I realised afterwards that for probably for people who work in exams there would

[00:01:50] have been obvious what she was talking about but for anyone else listening to this they

[00:01:53] might not have known what she meant by that.

[00:01:56] So just very quickly to explain for any lay people out there, every year we have to enter

[00:02:04] the students for their exams and that's quite a big job because obviously you're talking

[00:02:08] about all your students being entered for, well if it's GCSEs probably sort of like 9 or

[00:02:13] 10 qualifications and then sick form you'll have A levels.

[00:02:16] So what this is every gift that's an exam has to be entered?

[00:02:20] Yeah, you have to enter them to the exam board for each individual subject.

[00:02:27] And what happens is there's obviously a deadline to do that by which is usually around

[00:02:31] the kind of middle to end of February and so you have to get all of your entries in

[00:02:39] by that day and if you miss that deadline for any entries then after that date in February

[00:02:45] they're going to cost every entry it's going to cost you double.

[00:02:48] So what if you forget?

[00:02:50] So yeah so if the exam's also hasn't submitted the entries properly then you're going to end

[00:02:55] up with it.

[00:02:56] So that's what she was saying about wandering by the shoe, you have to tell her head

[00:03:00] to take out a versana rate which is something like that.

[00:03:02] Exactly and which is a thought that I've also had before as well when I've been panicking

[00:03:07] about entries that I thought I'd be convinced.

[00:03:10] How much does it cost?

[00:03:11] Yeah good question.

[00:03:12] It's about 50 pounds for GCSE entry and probably-

[00:03:16] No, what if you don't?

[00:03:18] So if you don't-

[00:03:19] No so that's the standard fee.

[00:03:20] Oh right okay.

[00:03:21] And then so then obviously if you missed the deadline and then made an entry after the deadline

[00:03:24] then that same entry would cost 100 pounds.

[00:03:27] So you imagine say for example that you didn't enter like 30 kids for a quality of-

[00:03:36] I'll have really stick to myself up now because we can have to do the maths if you didn't

[00:03:39] enter 30 kids.

[00:03:42] So then you'd have something that-

[00:03:43] I can't do that.

[00:03:44] It would have cost 1,500 pounds costing 3,000 pounds.

[00:03:48] So that's obviously in a school's budget-

[00:03:50] budget's tight.

[00:03:51] You know you don't want to be making those kinds of mistakes but of course it-

[00:03:55] you know things like this do happen from time to time so that's a-

[00:03:58] That's one I think that really does keep exams officers up late at night.

[00:04:02] A level is even more expensive they're like 90 or 100 pounds of that.

[00:04:05] Why is that?

[00:04:06] About entry.

[00:04:07] Good question I don't know.

[00:04:09] One day we definitely need to get someone from the beginning to come on and talk about

[00:04:13] this because I-

[00:04:14] It's really interesting I don't know.

[00:04:16] Specific questions about this and I think-

[00:04:18] Including that one that we'll write down and ask them why A level is more expensive.

[00:04:21] Yeah definitely definitely.

[00:04:22] I suspect it's something to do with the volume so they generate more marking probably

[00:04:30] but yeah other than that I'm not sure.

[00:04:33] Because anyone's got any questions for them as well, let us know.

[00:04:37] And hopefully we can get someone on here and talk to the questions.

[00:04:41] Love that.

[00:04:42] So yeah so we really enjoyed last week's episode.

[00:04:45] We're really pleased with the reaction to it.

[00:04:47] But this week we've decided that we're going to do something a little bit different.

[00:04:52] So what we're going to do now is rewind the clock almost exactly four years ago.

[00:04:59] They're now follows a ministerial broadcast from the Prime Minister.

[00:05:04] If too many people become seriously unwell at one time, the NHS will be unable to handle

[00:05:11] it.

[00:05:12] Meaning more people are likely to die, not just from coronavirus but from other illnesses

[00:05:17] as well.

[00:05:18] The time has now come for us all to do more.

[00:05:23] From this evening I must give the British people a very simple instruction.

[00:05:27] You must stay at home.

[00:05:29] Oh lovely memories there John.

[00:05:34] Good times.

[00:05:35] Yeah great great.

[00:05:36] What was I mean, I'm usually very aware at this time that it's the build up to exams

[00:05:42] and lots of good on board.

[00:05:44] I really can't remember what you were doing at this time four years ago because there's

[00:05:49] a bit preoccupied.

[00:05:50] Yeah yeah yeah.

[00:05:51] I mean I've been sort of, I really wanted to do an episode on this but it's amazing

[00:05:55] how much you forget and I've been sort of spending the last week trying to block out.

[00:06:00] You can block out.

[00:06:01] Yeah I've been spending the last week trying to piece together.

[00:06:06] What happened because obviously Covid impacted everyone and had a massive impact in so many

[00:06:11] different areas.

[00:06:13] But exams obviously was one of those areas that impacted very directly as well.

[00:06:18] So I thought it would be good for us to sort back over the day.

[00:06:22] And exams are very really affected aren't they?

[00:06:25] They are, they are.

[00:06:26] They are.

[00:06:27] I mean the public exams had never been cancelled before so that was a real quite big deal.

[00:06:33] I think and I think it showed because you know like it's like well what do we do now

[00:06:37] when we don't have exams.

[00:06:40] So that was all quite interesting.

[00:06:41] But what were you doing at that time?

[00:06:44] So in March of 2020 we were doing our mock exams but I think there was a feeling building

[00:06:51] even while we were doing that, that you know we're all going home soon.

[00:06:57] I mean I had been I'd been fairly blase I think.

[00:07:01] I think I'd sort of you know back in January February I've been kind of like my attitude

[00:07:09] have been like oh you know we've sort of seen this before, stars etc this will probably

[00:07:14] blow over but I do remember having one very specific memory which was being at my desk

[00:07:21] and I've actually looked this up this was on the 10th of February 2020.

[00:07:26] Looking at my desk and seeing a news alert on my phone from BBC News and it was the leads

[00:07:32] breaking news, leads story on BBC News that a doctor's surgery in Brighton had been closed

[00:07:39] because a staff member had contracted coronavirus and closed that whole.

[00:07:43] Just for everyone who doesn't actually know where we live we live in Brighton hence why

[00:07:48] you were particularly interested in that stuff.

[00:07:50] It was it wasn't our doctor's surgery but it wasn't too far away from where we are

[00:07:56] and it was a massive story at the time that they shut this this surgery completely

[00:08:02] and a staff member contracted covid and I remember that was the point I think when my attitude

[00:08:08] to the whole thing kind of shifted and I was like oh my god this is serious.

[00:08:12] You think about exams?

[00:08:14] How quickly did you all...

[00:08:16] I don't think I know I think it was going to affect it.

[00:08:19] I don't think I thought that straight away but obviously as then time went on through February

[00:08:25] and then into early March and then when it became clear and clearer that we probably

[00:08:31] weren't going to go into some kind of lockdown.

[00:08:34] Then obviously I did start to wonder about what was going to happen.

[00:08:38] I run the utterly shocked about exams because I don't know why, I think it's just because

[00:08:42] it's always been something that has always happened.

[00:08:45] Yeah and I mean at the time as well I think there was some discussion.

[00:08:49] It wasn't a face of complete.

[00:08:51] I think it took a few days for the decision after the lockdown announcement, for the decision

[00:08:56] to be made to cancel exams because I think there was the idea that maybe year 11 could

[00:09:04] come back in and do their exams and that could be something that actually still continued.

[00:09:10] But I think probably as well the timing of the lockdown meant that that probably wasn't ever

[00:09:18] going to happen because I think it would have created a kind of chaos.

[00:09:24] Honestly I feel bad they were cancelled.

[00:09:27] That's a good question.

[00:09:29] Because at that time of year you're always getting quite anxious at that point.

[00:09:33] Really?

[00:09:35] I think I was kind of relieved, I think would be the kind of overriding emotion because

[00:09:44] I think at any point when you're about to do something stressful, if someone says to

[00:09:48] you don't have to do it.

[00:09:49] You don't have to do that until the relief that washes over you.

[00:09:54] As it turned out there was still a lot of work to do.

[00:09:58] It was just very different to what?

[00:10:00] Possibly.

[00:10:01] It was different to what we would normally do.

[00:10:06] But yeah I think it's kind of feeling of relief of like oh god thank god I don't have

[00:10:09] to recruit any extra invigilators.

[00:10:11] I don't have to organise all the seating, I don't have to do all the allocations of staffing

[00:10:17] and things like that.

[00:10:19] So yeah there was a bit of a feeling of relief.

[00:10:22] And actually on reflection as well having gone through the whole experience.

[00:10:28] I have worked in exams now for about 13 years and actually having a couple of years where

[00:10:37] it was a bit different has probably meant that I've been able to sustain it longer.

[00:10:47] I think I personally, it was kind of good for me to do something different for a couple

[00:10:52] of years and then get back to exams and realise that I do enjoy doing it.

[00:10:57] So what did you do to change in March?

[00:10:59] I'm trying to do something more role for exams.

[00:11:02] So when the exams were cancelled they decided to move to a different system for award in

[00:11:10] qualifications and so we were asked to generate for each student in each subject what were

[00:11:18] called centre assessed grades.

[00:11:20] Now they're called centre assessed grades because every school that runs exams is called

[00:11:25] an exam centre.

[00:11:28] And you can have exam centres actually as well, there aren't schools.

[00:11:31] So there are private centres out there for candidates who are homeschooled or adults who

[00:11:37] want to take exams and they're private exam centres.

[00:11:41] But if you run exams you're called an exam centre.

[00:11:45] And so we were asked to generate centre assessed grades.

[00:11:49] And the idea behind that was that we would give a student a grade based on what we thought

[00:11:55] they would have got if they were taking exams.

[00:11:59] So that was quite a long administrative process so we had to set up the system.

[00:12:04] So I was responsible for setting out the system for collecting that information and then obviously

[00:12:09] it had to be properly analysed and kind of moderated by people within the school, senior

[00:12:18] leaders, heads of department and things like that.

[00:12:20] So it was quite a lengthy process.

[00:12:22] It was quite a long wasn't it as a process?

[00:12:24] The exam board set up new areas on their websites where then you would kind of enter and upload

[00:12:31] your or your student's results.

[00:12:34] I say upload, it wasn't really upload, it was enter manually enter which obviously itself

[00:12:40] took quite a long time and it had to be really really accurate obviously as well.

[00:12:46] So there was lots of checking and double checking.

[00:12:48] So it was basically just a big bureaucratic exercise really, a massive admin exercise.

[00:12:56] But like I said it was very different.

[00:12:58] I did a lot of it in our attic where we're now doing our pop-offs.

[00:13:05] So ours sort of spent up here just going over and over and over things.

[00:13:11] So yeah so it was a very very different kind of experience.

[00:13:17] So how did results in the summer differ then with centre-ings, the SES grades instead of exams?

[00:13:23] So this was the sort of controversial bit if people remember back to that time.

[00:13:31] So obviously very quickly they had to get a new system in place, that was the centre-ings

[00:13:35] SES grades but then there was obviously always a question Mark Hanger over that of like

[00:13:41] well there's no standardisation of this process.

[00:13:44] Like how do we know that the grades that people have been given are?

[00:13:48] Yeah and obviously there is a risk in the situation of grade inflation like you'd be naive

[00:13:54] to think there wasn't.

[00:13:55] So what off-qual who are the regulators of qualifications decided to do was to try and

[00:14:03] introduce a kind of standardisation to the results that all the schools were inputting.

[00:14:13] So they came up with what became known as the algorithm.

[00:14:16] I mean I don't know whether an algorithm is really like the correct name for what they did

[00:14:21] but what they did was they used a kind of formula to adjust some of the grades that had

[00:14:29] been given to students by their schools.

[00:14:32] And the way that they did that was to look at how schools had done in the past in certain

[00:14:37] subjects and then sort of judge the grades they'd given against that sort of benchmark.

[00:14:45] My head's hurt and even at the same time.

[00:14:47] Yeah I know it was.

[00:14:48] I just imagine in a group of people in Off-Core actually they probably weren't physically

[00:14:52] able to set random tables at that point.

[00:14:54] Probably not, no, who were probably in there.

[00:14:55] But literally on Zoom trying to work out what this algorithm was going to be.

[00:14:59] I mean they got an awful lot of flak.

[00:15:01] I don't think how hard that must have been.

[00:15:04] I understand why but at the same time I do have quite a lot of sympathy because they were

[00:15:08] trying to do their job which is to try and add some kind of rigor to the grades that

[00:15:13] are awarded.

[00:15:14] I mean in the end what they came up with was really, really clumsy and I'll explain why

[00:15:20] I think that wasn't a minute.

[00:15:22] But yeah basically they introduced this kind of mechanism for adjusting grades and it was

[00:15:28] based on the past history of the school.

[00:15:30] So for example if a school was doing I don't know something like A level sociology and

[00:15:35] in the past it students had pretty much all got D's and E's and then all of a sudden

[00:15:40] in the covid year, suddenly a bunch of their students were getting A's and B's.

[00:15:45] Then as I understand it the adjustment formula would look at that and downgrade some of

[00:15:52] those students who'd been given A's and B's on the basis that it was unlikely based

[00:15:56] on past data that they would have achieved, actually achieve those grades.

[00:16:01] Now this is obviously a problem because firstly it's a really blunt way of deciding how

[00:16:09] well you know what grader kid gets in their qualification and obviously that sort of

[00:16:15] formula where you're adjusting like that is going to really punish some students very

[00:16:22] hard.

[00:16:23] And we actually saw it before it, before we got the results in England we saw it happen

[00:16:26] in Scotland and they did a similar thing in Scotland.

[00:16:31] And sort of what was shown was that the kids would come from more deprived disadvantaged

[00:16:38] backgrounds.

[00:16:39] Their grades were being hit harder and so there was obviously a big controversy about

[00:16:44] that.

[00:16:45] And in the end they decided in England to go with giving students, they had a choice.

[00:16:52] They could either accept the grade that their centre had given them, their school had

[00:16:56] given them or that they could accept the adjusted grade because obviously some grades got

[00:17:01] adjusted upwards.

[00:17:02] You know if the opposite had occurred I mean I don't think that happened very much to be

[00:17:07] honest but students could then choose which grade they wanted to accept.

[00:17:11] So that first year in 2020 they really ended up being no standardisation at all of any

[00:17:16] of the grades awarded.

[00:17:17] But on the other hand…

[00:17:18] Sorry, how did the kids choose there?

[00:17:21] I don't.

[00:17:22] That's really kind of interesting.

[00:17:23] I don't think, I think that was more like a kind of technicality than anything else

[00:17:28] because I don't think there were many students.

[00:17:30] They didn't turn up on results so with two envelopes and like a black peck both which

[00:17:34] one they took home.

[00:17:35] No, the grades that were given to them were effectively the grades the schools had given

[00:17:39] them.

[00:17:40] So the teachers made… sorry not the teachers, the centres made the predictions and then

[00:17:47] the students got those grades but there was no process of moderation or standardisation

[00:17:52] of those grades at all in 2020.

[00:17:57] Now it was obviously a really difficult process that had to be put together in a very short

[00:18:03] time.

[00:18:04] It was very quick to be quick to be.

[00:18:05] I think it's very easy when you're not having to make those decisions to criticise them

[00:18:12] and to find the flaws in them.

[00:18:13] I think whatever would have been implemented would have been clumsy or flawed because just

[00:18:20] by the very nature of the momentous nature of the task that they had to do and the scale

[00:18:28] of it as well.

[00:18:29] Yeah, yeah.

[00:18:30] And you have the problem as well of like trying to graft one system onto another.

[00:18:33] So obviously the system for awarding students grades is based on them doing exams and all

[00:18:40] of a sudden you've got a whole new system but you're trying to sort of superimpose it

[00:18:45] on the existing system.

[00:18:48] And I think it just… yeah, it didn't really work.

[00:18:53] But in the end it was unusual times, unusual measures and the students got their grades

[00:19:02] and they were able to move on which is the main thing.

[00:19:12] So things sort of got back to normal quite quickly in September, didn't it?

[00:19:17] Because I remember us thinking exams are back on, didn't November exams run?

[00:19:21] Yeah, yes they did.

[00:19:25] It's sort of hard to remember how you sort of saw things going forward at that point

[00:19:30] because I think although we were doing everything there was always this sense, wasn't

[00:19:34] they sort of hanging over like there's another wave coming?

[00:19:36] Like constantly.

[00:19:37] Yeah but we did… yeah November exams happens and November GCSE exams took place and

[00:19:46] what they actually did was they added an extra exam season in November.

[00:19:50] Basically for any students who have been given their centre of assessed grades in the summer

[00:19:54] they were told if they weren't happy.

[00:19:56] Oh that was it, no chance.

[00:19:57] They could choose.

[00:19:58] Yeah, their exams in November.

[00:20:00] So there was a whole set of exams in November and those exams by the way are still causing

[00:20:07] confusion to this day because they used the exam papers that they were meant to use in

[00:20:16] the summer of 2020.

[00:20:17] So when you received the exam papers in November, the date on the front of them were all

[00:20:22] like dates in May and June.

[00:20:23] Was actually didn't want to waste loads of paper?

[00:20:25] Yeah I think it was a good thing to do, they weren't going to reprint all the papers so

[00:20:29] they just used the ones that they'd already printed for the summer exams.

[00:20:35] Which was good obviously but now like obviously when you do mock exams and stuff like people

[00:20:40] ask you for the past papers so they'll ask you for can I get the November paper from 2020?

[00:20:48] And then you always get this like confusion because it's like you look at the paper and

[00:20:52] it says June 2020 and it's like they want the November paper and you always have to remember

[00:20:57] that there was this weird situation in this year so that like throws me all the time.

[00:21:06] So that was a kind of strange little exam season that happened then and then we moved

[00:21:12] into December and we started doing our normal mock exams and we kind of did them as usual

[00:21:19] I mean we had lots of students self isolating with COVID and things like that.

[00:21:22] And that would have varied a lot across the country because they were the tears and

[00:21:26] they should remember the tears.

[00:21:28] Yeah a bit, but I also remember towards Christmas particularly in London schools just shut

[00:21:33] it, they just like shutting it.

[00:21:34] Yeah.

[00:21:35] But we managed to get through a full set of mock exams.

[00:21:39] One of my clearest memories from that set of mock exams as well is that at that time

[00:21:43] to the first vaccines were starting to be issued so I think they, the Pfizer vaccine had

[00:21:54] been released at the end of November and the first vaccines were given at the beginning

[00:22:02] of December.

[00:22:03] I think in this country.

[00:22:04] I literally have had.

[00:22:05] Yeah and the whole thing from my outbreak.

[00:22:09] So I remember on the very first day of vaccinations one of our invigilators went and because she

[00:22:17] worked in a care home as well.

[00:22:19] She went and got her back to make sure she was one of your invigilators.

[00:22:22] No, no, no that was good enough reason.

[00:22:25] She was one of the first people to be vaccinated and I remember we were all really, really

[00:22:29] excited.

[00:22:30] And I guess at that point as well we all thought okay maybe we moved forward with this.

[00:22:36] Yeah maybe it's not going to be much longer.

[00:22:38] And I certainly thought at that point I think that the exams would take place summer 2021.

[00:22:46] But then everything changed.

[00:22:49] The Ken variant.

[00:22:50] Bad, there was a bad Christmas.

[00:22:51] That was very bad Christmas.

[00:22:53] Yeah yeah I mean it was I think that was the cancelled Christmas.

[00:22:57] Right yeah.

[00:22:59] So that wasn't great and then around about the fifth or sixth of January Gavin Williamson

[00:23:08] who was the education secretary at that point in time went.

[00:23:13] Oh that's sweet.

[00:23:14] I'm not completely.

[00:23:15] I've blocked that.

[00:23:16] I've blocked that.

[00:23:17] I've completely blocked that.

[00:23:18] Yeah.

[00:23:19] That was about that.

[00:23:20] I've said before that if the science and the advice changed such that keeping schools open

[00:23:30] would no longer be in the best interests of children and teachers that we would act.

[00:23:38] We are now at that stage.

[00:23:43] The spike of a virus is increasing at a faster pace than anticipated.

[00:23:50] It is also clear that schools are increasingly finding it more difficult to continue as normal

[00:23:57] as illness and self isolation impacts on staffing levels and pupil attendance

[00:24:05] for public health benefits of schools remaining open as normal are shifting.

[00:24:13] After schools shut their gates on Friday afternoon they will remain closed until further notice.

[00:24:23] I remember yeah just thinking what and I remember thinking what is it if it's going to happen

[00:24:31] to exams long term at that point.

[00:24:33] Yeah.

[00:24:34] Because it felt like in the summer when they were cancelled.

[00:24:39] I always said you know this is a blip, this is a really you know kind of everyone can recover

[00:24:44] from one sort of season being cancelled but there was something about that that felt

[00:24:51] oh my god this is going to be a full year and two cohorts hugely are factored.

[00:24:59] And I just couldn't see how things were going to go back to normal in any way.

[00:25:05] What did you think?

[00:25:06] Yes and no I think I think I did think at the time wow this is really disruptive.

[00:25:16] In like both senses of the word like this could disrupt like the whole system

[00:25:21] like actually you know completely change it because once people have got used

[00:25:26] to doing something different it's like are you going to go back and do what you were

[00:25:30] doing before but of course at the same time the systems that were being used

[00:25:34] the new systems had huge problems and were creating some pretty distorted outcomes.

[00:25:41] So I think part of me also thought you know like and just anecdotally like from

[00:25:47] conversation I've been having with teachers and things like that there seems to be

[00:25:52] like I want to go back you know we need to get back to what we were doing

[00:25:56] because I think one thing that's underappreciated in this discussion as well

[00:26:01] is the amount of pressure that this put on teachers because all of a sudden

[00:26:05] they were solely responsible really let's be honest for the grades that the students were getting

[00:26:11] and I think probably a lot of them realised how nice it is to have a kind of

[00:26:16] objective independent service that does that for them rather than which is the exam system

[00:26:23] rather than that being a burden and you know again like there were situations in our school

[00:26:30] and I'm sure there were were in lots of schools where pressure was you know

[00:26:36] exerted externally on members of staff you know around the grades that they were

[00:26:42] issuing and things like that and I think that yeah from that reason I didn't

[00:26:48] think I didn't suddenly didn't think that the systems that were being used in place of exams

[00:26:53] would last because I didn't think that they were particularly strong.

[00:26:58] So yeah did you then think that you were just going to get more time off?

[00:27:04] Well interestingly because I remember if I'm really honest

[00:27:10] that being really kind of panicked by that speech, I did immediately think

[00:27:15] after oh John's going to be around us to help with the kids who are apparently back at school

[00:27:20] but seem to be at home constantly and then that did not happen did it so what happened

[00:27:25] to your role?

[00:27:26] Well actually it was before Christmas I'd been emailed by the head teacher because

[00:27:33] the government had said that when students came back after the Christmas holidays

[00:27:38] they wanted every student to be tested with the new shiny lateral flow

[00:27:45] so they wanted every single student when the came back to school to be tested

[00:27:52] and I think it was three times to be tested within the first couple of weeks

[00:27:57] and I remember getting this email from the head teacher and basically he said to me

[00:28:03] would you be interested basically in being in charge of this

[00:28:07] and would you be able to get some of your own visualation team to help like actually

[00:28:13] Is that what happened with lots of exams because we asked, haven't we?

[00:28:17] I mean yeah I did another little poll

[00:28:21] so I don't know exactly what people were doing

[00:28:26] but about 65% of people who responded to this poll said that they

[00:28:32] during the period of COVID they did both their day job and some kind of COVID related responsibility

[00:28:39] so I think that would have been

[00:28:42] She's got the ready-be team of invigilators who are sort of ready to sort of

[00:28:47] you know pivot and do something different

[00:28:50] I don't know because I don't know where the other schools used their invigilators

[00:28:54] for this like we did but I would also go back to the last episode

[00:28:58] where we talked about the ability of exams officers to do multiple things

[00:29:03] and to be quite self-starting as well

[00:29:06] so I think it's not surprising that they were often asked to do

[00:29:10] to help out

[00:29:12] I was sort of as I was saying before

[00:29:15] you know like the ability to sort of do something new

[00:29:20] like on a temporary basis like you knew it was not going to be forever

[00:29:24] you're not like a fruit test

[00:29:25] a teenager forever

[00:29:27] No but to do something a bit new and a bit different

[00:29:30] was kind of

[00:29:32] you know what there was a kind of fun element to it

[00:29:34] I'm not going to lie

[00:29:35] like it was kind of exciting to

[00:29:39] to try and get something like that off the ground like really quickly

[00:29:42] but I do remember being really a bit like overall by the idea of like

[00:29:47] everyone coming back at the beginning of January

[00:29:49] like I literally got this email I think

[00:29:51] on like the 20th of December

[00:29:53] and it's like we're going back to school on what it would have been like

[00:29:56] I don't know the 7th or 8th of January

[00:29:58] Did you end up basically just running that for months?

[00:30:02] Yes so well what happened was that when Gavin Williamson made the announcement

[00:30:06] about students not coming back to school

[00:30:08] they didn't then in the end come back until March the 8th

[00:30:11] but we obviously then had

[00:30:13] I've been so long

[00:30:14] Yeah it was a long period

[00:30:15] It felt like a long time didn't it right in the middle of winter

[00:30:18] but we then had a period of time

[00:30:21] to get this thing up and running

[00:30:23] So I would be going into work pretty much every day

[00:30:28] my team of invigilators were coming in as well

[00:30:31] and we would be testing

[00:30:32] we started off just with testing each other

[00:30:34] and then we started testing staff

[00:30:37] and also the students who were

[00:30:38] because obviously vulnerable students were coming in as well

[00:30:41] and the children of key workers

[00:30:43] so we would be starting to test them as well

[00:30:45] and just trying to understand how the system worked

[00:30:49] learning how to do everything properly

[00:30:52] it was really interesting

[00:30:57] and kind of sort of fulfilling experience actually

[00:31:03] and from the point of view of my team

[00:31:05] of my invigilators

[00:31:06] it's been one of the best things that has ever happened

[00:31:09] or in terms of what, just bonding

[00:31:12] to get this thing up

[00:31:13] I think you know like

[00:31:14] you know like in back in there

[00:31:16] sort of when we started working

[00:31:18] like when we were like about 20 years ago

[00:31:21] my life's into just be filled constantly

[00:31:24] with going on like team building exercises

[00:31:27] you know those rubbish things

[00:31:28] where they're like

[00:31:29] you have to build a canoe

[00:31:31] 20-7 instead of twin geo

[00:31:33] I don't think that people do that anymore

[00:31:35] because it's really happy

[00:31:36] I'm happy with that

[00:31:38] but this was like a really good real life exercise in that I think

[00:31:45] because we didn't do ice breakers

[00:31:47] there were no ice breakers

[00:31:48] but there was like we just got to do this thing

[00:31:50] we got to do it quickly

[00:31:52] and it's really important

[00:31:54] like it will make the difference between whether or not kids can come back to school

[00:31:58] and I guess the invigilators must have felt really valued

[00:32:00] as well being asked to come

[00:32:02] at the time of years

[00:32:04] that was great from Jim my head teacher

[00:32:06] I think that was great and he's carried that on since

[00:32:09] so this notion that our invigilators are very much part of our school

[00:32:13] and part of our staff has now become really ingrained in a way

[00:32:16] that I think it wasn't before

[00:32:18] so that has really helped me obviously

[00:32:21] and just the bonding that went on between

[00:32:25] Did it help retention of the same invigilators?

[00:32:28] did you see?

[00:32:29] Yeah I mean I haven't I've had I used to have quite

[00:32:32] heavy turnover and I haven't I haven't over the last few years

[00:32:36] which is great

[00:32:38] the only thing that I was

[00:32:40] I guess obviously a lot of my invigilators are retired so they're over a certain age

[00:32:45] so there was a real nervousness

[00:32:47] yeah I remember being nervous about asking people

[00:32:49] and obviously there were a few who are at the older end

[00:32:52] who were just like do you know what now I'm not going to do that

[00:32:55] and obviously completely understood that

[00:32:57] but most people were actually they wanted to do something

[00:33:02] and if it was going to help

[00:33:03] and if it was going to further the cause of us being able to get things

[00:33:07] back to a kind of relative normality

[00:33:09] then they were just really up for that

[00:33:12] and yeah it was it was a really really great experience

[00:33:18] you know by the time we we'd done it for the last time which I think

[00:33:22] was the the beginning of the next academic year

[00:33:24] we had to test all the students again

[00:33:26] by that stage I think I'd add enough of it

[00:33:30] but for that short into an period it was it was it was great

[00:33:35] and just also going back to that

[00:33:37] the poll that I did with the exams officers

[00:33:40] it was interesting because there were some other things that people

[00:33:43] were doing as well and the one that really seemed to stand out

[00:33:47] was that quite a lot of exams officers were asked to look after

[00:33:50] the students who were coming in

[00:33:52] so yeah as I said before you know

[00:33:55] the students were who were vulnerable

[00:33:58] um SCN or who were the children of key workers

[00:34:02] would still be coming to school and so there was still quite a lot

[00:34:05] but obviously a lot of teachers needed to be at home

[00:34:07] because they needed to be delivering their online lessons

[00:34:10] and so it seems like quite a few exams officers were involved in that work

[00:34:14] which obviously really valuable as well

[00:34:16] of taking care of those kids making sure that they were getting a decent day

[00:34:20] you know with some learning and also you know just being looked after as well

[00:34:24] so for that space right

[00:34:27] the difference in in work that one was doing

[00:34:29] yeah yeah but again you know like we said to like I think it is

[00:34:33] you know kind of indicative of the people who do it

[00:34:36] problems of us

[00:34:37] yeah problems of us definitely

[00:34:46] so just to finish off the story about

[00:34:49] um exams um in 2021 the exams got cancelled again

[00:34:53] because obviously students hadn't been in school very much

[00:34:57] um but it was slightly different in 2021 so what was done differently

[00:35:01] was that this time rather than having center assessed grades

[00:35:04] which were based on how we thought the students would have done an exams

[00:35:07] we they switched it over to something called teacher assessed grades

[00:35:11] which were all about teachers assessing

[00:35:14] what students had done so far and giving them a grade based on that

[00:35:19] and this time we were asked to submit work as well to demonstrate

[00:35:24] you know that we'd come to our judgments in the proper way

[00:35:28] so there was a bit more scrutiny of the process this time

[00:35:32] and the results again were a lot higher than you would expect in a normal exam year

[00:35:38] and there was a little bit of controversy with the results that year as well

[00:35:42] because although grades went up for all students

[00:35:46] well they found was that the grades went up top grades went up more

[00:35:51] for students in private schools so there was this sense of a kind of inequality as well

[00:35:57] from the 2021 results

[00:36:01] so yeah and then after that obviously we've gone back to

[00:36:07] yeah I mean how much has changed for years on because

[00:36:12] from what I can see it seems to have gone pretty much back to what it was before

[00:36:18] is that true on the ground?

[00:36:21] yeah I think that's true

[00:36:22] obviously you know the effect of Covid on education has been huge

[00:36:28] I mean it's very well documented we're not going to go into it

[00:36:32] and then TZL here I mean in particular in terms of attendance and things like that

[00:36:36] obviously does have some knock on effect on exams

[00:36:39] because when students aren't don't sit exams then there's you know stuff we have to do

[00:36:46] to try and explain why and hope that there is a route to them gaining a qualification

[00:36:53] but on the whole yeah the system has gone back to where it was

[00:36:59] I think there was probably a point in time where there was you know where grades were being issued

[00:37:05] in a different way where there was some discussion about whether or not the system should change

[00:37:09] I think the Covid experience did obviously expose some frailties in the existing system

[00:37:16] so the fact that you know that there was no backup

[00:37:20] there was no way of producing qualification results for students

[00:37:26] in a way that you know was fair and even handed

[00:37:30] I guess kind of demonstrates that the system is quite fragile you know to an event like that happening

[00:37:37] you know what would you do next time that kind of thing

[00:37:39] so there have been some things put in place since then you know I think all schools are much more conscious now

[00:37:44] of collecting good evidence

[00:37:46] us really good isn't it that's a beautiful step

[00:37:49] yeah so collecting good evidence collecting mock exams

[00:37:52] you know storing mock exams not getting rid of them and things like that

[00:37:56] so there's been a bit more of that but there was you know I think some discussion about

[00:38:03] you know whether or not you know exams this sort of focus on students always being assessed by exams

[00:38:10] was a good thing or not

[00:38:13] but it's been interesting what I found interesting about it is I think there was quite a lot of discussion

[00:38:18] about oh maybe we should move to a system that's more kind of like a kind of course work based system

[00:38:24] you know which is effectively what we were doing in 2021 where you know teachers are making judgements about students

[00:38:31] and but what is interesting is that since then that's kind of collided with technology

[00:38:37] so yeah of course

[00:38:39] with the advent of things like chat GPT

[00:38:42] it's meant that course work and things that aren't done in a controlled exam environment

[00:38:48] are now much much harder to regulate than they were before

[00:38:52] and that's obviously not something that people necessarily were talking about during the past

[00:38:56] no that is a change has happened so quickly but also during that period

[00:38:59] yeah so it's an interesting time isn't it?

[00:39:02] yeah so that's a big that's like a big challenge I think for assessment in general

[00:39:08] is the is new technology

[00:39:12] I mean personally I can't see any way now of assessing a student's capacities

[00:39:17] other than them doing it in a controlled kind of testing environment

[00:39:23] I mean it might be that the way your testing changes and it may be in the future

[00:39:29] even that you know that kind of students are using AI tools within their assessment

[00:39:35] but the idea that there needs to be someone present seeing what's going on

[00:39:43] I think is now more relevant than it's been ever before because of the tools

[00:39:49] the sophistication of the tools that are available kind of outside of that environment

[00:40:00] thanks very much everyone for tuning in again we really appreciate your support

[00:40:04] remember that you can get the exam man on all the major podcasting platforms

[00:40:08] have a fantastic week and we'll see you again soon

[00:40:38] you