Welsh Education Minister Kirsty Williams has announced that A levels and GCSEs will now be based on teachers’ assessed grades.
In a statement release this afternoon Kirsty Williams said: “Working with Qualifications Wales and WJEC we have sought an approach which provides fairness and balances out differences in the standards applied to judgments in schools.
“Given decisions elsewhere, the balance of fairness now lies with awarding Centre Assessment grades to students, despite the strengths of the system in Wales.
“I am taking this decision now ahead of results being released this week, so that there is time for the necessary work to take place.
“For grades issued last week, I have decided that all awards in Wales, will also be made on the basis of teacher assessment.
“For those young people, for whom our system produced higher grades than those predicted by teachers, the higher grades will stand.
“Maintaining standards is not new for 2020, it is a feature of awarding qualifications every year in Wales, and across the UK.
“However, it is clear that maintaining confidence in our qualifications whilst being fair to students requires this difficult decision.
“These have been exceptional circumstances, and in due course I will be making a further statement on an independent review of events following the cancellation of this year’s exams.
“Other Awarding Bodies across the UK are involved in the determining the approach to vocational qualifications. This continues to be the case but it is important that I give assurance to GCSE, AS and A level student at the earliest opportunity.”
Responding to the annoucement from Welsh Government, Plaid Cymru Shadow Education Minister Sian Gwenllian MS said: “This is a very welcome if not a seriously overdue announcement.
“Pressure from Plaid Cymru, students, teachers and parents will now mean that our young people will have the grades they should have been awarded all along. The real victory belongs to the young people of Wales who have demonstrated better leadership and decorum than their government.
“Whilst it is regretful that this U-turn didn’t come last week instead of putting students through so much unnecessary uncertainty and anxiety, I offer my congratulations to the young people who have led this campaign so ably.
“There should be a full investigation into this debacle and the Welsh Government should apologise to students, teachers and schools for what they’ve put them through over the past few weeks.
“Never again should the professionalism and integrity of our teachers and the hard work of our students be called into question. For today, let us celebrate that justice has prevailed.
