There’s been high drama recently featuring the big five awarding organisations and the services they offer. Ofqual is now faced with the challenge of whether to outlaw the AO seminars for teachers which caused all the problems. Also there’s the discussion on whether to levy a fine on an AO if – or when – things go badly wrong and disadvantage candidates. A challenge for regulation is that it has become more difficult to regulate successfully now major international and commercial organisations play a major role in the operation of a qualifications system. Previously the system had been dominated by small and medium sized bodies often established on a charitable or voluntary basis.
In earlier blogs I highlighted the dangers in allowing major global companies to acquire a dominant position with regard to the qualifications market. Last month in the TES, John Wood (chair of the Independent Schools Association) has argued that ‘aggressive commercialism’ has seriously undermined the integrity of the examinations system. I have much sympathy to his call to stop awarding organisations endorsing/publishing textbooks and running seminars designed to help teachers ‘play the system’.
Some people argued that the entry into the market of such major players might bring much needed investment and innovation into what had been described as a “19th century cottage industry trying to deliver 21st century expectations” (QCA, 2003). That may be so but it also brings with it dangers. Back then regulatory principles were based on the goals of social regulation. However, as the dual challenges of commercialism and globalisation have grown the issue of economic regulation has come to the fore, designed to address issues such as value for money and competition.
Yet, Ofqual have only begun to scratch the surface when it comes to economic regulation and the problem is that the supply of qualifications does not function like a market for utilities or for consumer goods. One critical feature of the qualifications ‘quasi-market’ is that the income earned by AOs comes mainly from the taxpayer through the fees paid for examination entry. This is very different from a market where informed customers are paying personally for products and services.
Qualifications are now so focused on ‘accountability’ measures and the functioning of league tables for schools. The use of qualifications for this purpose is entirely legitimate but questions have to be asked when the whole system is distorted in order to focus almost exclusively on this end. The purpose of a qualification as a ‘personal goal’ for a young person and a ‘public mark’ of their knowledge and competence seem to have been forgotten.
It is astonishing and perhaps depressing that 100 years after the recommendation to establish an ‘Examinations Council’ as the first qualifications regulator, the same issues of lack of clarity, uncertainty over standards and the question of the degree of control by the state remain major concerns. The high stakes nature of qualifications, their dominant role in education and training, the explosion in the number of awarding organisations and the rapidly increasing cost to the tax payer all make the effective regulation of qualifications an on-going matter of public debate.
It is clear that the year ahead is going to offer many challenges to the qualifications sector. Aspire Squared and our associates would like to wish everyone success and happiness in 2012.
