Wednesday, September 12, 2012
A matter of culpability
Over at Freedom Central, Welsh Liberal Democrats Education Spokesperson, Aled Roberts says that all parties in the GCSE exams row should step back from the war of words and sit down to work together for the best interests of Welsh students. He says that Welsh students are not best served by this sort of twitter-based policy making and it is no way to reach a calm and moderate conclusion.
The Welsh Education Minister is undoubtedly right to intervene to protect the interests of Welsh students but as his Conservative shadow points out in today's Western Mail, he is not exactly in the clear when it came to creating this mess in the first place.
She says that the Welsh Government had been a party to the 'compromise' between regulators that had been made prior to last month's grade boundary revelations. The report commissioned by the Minister says that 'Regulatory officials in Wales continued to express strong reservations about the methodology, but at this late stage, recognising the need to reach agreement, as this option produced the least damaging impact on outcomes for Wales, Welsh Government Officials reluctantly agreed to accept this amendment.'
Now the Welsh Labour Government are saying that the outcomes are damaging, so much so that the Minister has felt the need to issue a direction to the WJEC to re-mark all the English GCSE papers. We should not forget this when Welsh Labour seek to point the finger at the UK Government. The Welsh Government were culpable in the creation of this problem as well.
The Welsh Education Minister is undoubtedly right to intervene to protect the interests of Welsh students but as his Conservative shadow points out in today's Western Mail, he is not exactly in the clear when it came to creating this mess in the first place.
She says that the Welsh Government had been a party to the 'compromise' between regulators that had been made prior to last month's grade boundary revelations. The report commissioned by the Minister says that 'Regulatory officials in Wales continued to express strong reservations about the methodology, but at this late stage, recognising the need to reach agreement, as this option produced the least damaging impact on outcomes for Wales, Welsh Government Officials reluctantly agreed to accept this amendment.'
Now the Welsh Labour Government are saying that the outcomes are damaging, so much so that the Minister has felt the need to issue a direction to the WJEC to re-mark all the English GCSE papers. We should not forget this when Welsh Labour seek to point the finger at the UK Government. The Welsh Government were culpable in the creation of this problem as well.
