In what is being described as a policy u-turn (and a relief for kids across England and Wales) Minister for Children, Schools and Families Ed Balls today announced the government would be scrapping SATs tests for 14-year-olds.
Tests for 11-year-olds will remain, at least until the Key Stage 2 tests have been evaluated as part of a new review process that will investigate the KS3 tests’ replacements. These SATs tests might be replaced by New York-style quality report cards – the BBC news site has a short introduction to the New York reports here.
This summer’s marking fiasco has made many understandably wary of SATs, and it seems Balls’ response will prove popular with teachers and students alike. As Donald MacLeod, on the Guardian Mortarboard blog, writes:
That sounds rather as if the days of all Sats are numbered in England – they have already gone in Wales and never existed in Scotland – in favour of testing when the teacher thinks the child is ready. This system is already being piloted. Good news all round?