Consultation: teacher involvement in the development of confidential assessment materials

This consultation relates to our review of the risks and benefits of the long-established practice whereby some teachers who write or contribute to exam papers also teach the qualification.

We started our review following well-publicised incidents during summer 2017 when two teachers who were involved in writing examinations for Pre-U qualifications (an alternative to A levels) were found by the awarding organisations to have inappropriately disclosed or used information about the contents of forthcoming exams. While the 2017 issues occurred in general qualifications, teachers develop assessments in some other regulated qualifications too. We have, therefore, considered the risks associated with this practice in all types of regulated qualification.

We believe there are clear benefits of allowing teachers to be involved in the assessment process, and we require awarding organisations to take all reasonable steps to mitigate the risks of teachers inappropriately using information about forthcoming assessments. Our current rules are already demanding, but we believe there is room to strengthen them further. We are consulting now on our proposed amendments to the current rules and on the form of the extra statutory guidance we propose to put in place. Our consultation questions can be answered either online or in hard copy. We look forward to hearing from you.