31.01.12
League table recognition axed for vocational courses
Vocational GCSE equivalents are to be ‘downgraded’ from school league tables to weed out less valuable courses and prevent schools encouraging pupils to take up less rigorous subjects to boost their own figures.
Education Secretary Michael Gove said: “For too long the system has been devalued by attempts to pretend that all qualifications are intrinsically the same. Young people have taken courses that have led nowhere.”
From 2014, only 70 such courses will still be recognised as of equal value to traditional GSCEs.
The courses being cut from the league tables include fish husbandry and nail technology services. Courses that remain equivalent include BTecs in performing arts, health & social care and engineering.
Gove wants only qualifications that demonstrate rigour and have proven track records of helping young people to gain good jobs or to go on to university to be recognised by school league tables.
This follows last year’s review of vocational qualifications for the Government by Professor Alison Wolf, who said: “People were doing lots of qualifications which were getting league points for their schools but which, when they went out into the labour market or when they went to college, they found actually nobody valued.
“So we were essentially lying to kids and that’s a terrible thing to do.”
Gove said: “The weaknesses in our current system were laid bare by Prof Wolf's incisive and far-reaching review. The changes we are making will take time, but will transform the lives of young people.”
However, some argue that this devaluation will make schools less likely to offer vocational courses altogether and have a negative impact on young people encouraged by such subjects.
Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said: “It should not be up to the Government to decide which exams are of more merit than others. This is something which should be assessed by major stakeholders such as the teaching profession and awarding bodies.
“Vocational education has often suffered from being viewed unfavourably. These reforms are likely to exacerbate the vocational/academic divide.”
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