Pressure mounts on John Swinney for exam results U-turn
Nicola Sturgeon 'sorry' over Scottish exam results
(about 2 hours later)
Pressure is increasing on Education Secretary John Swinney to do a U-turn on this year's exam results.
Nicola Sturgeon has apologised after accepting her government "did not get it right" over Scottish exam results.
Scottish Labour says the deputy first minister should return grades to teachers' predictions.
With no exams sat this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) ran a system based on teacher assessments.
And the Children's and Young People's Commissioner Scotland (CYPCS) wants the Scottish government to apologise.
However, officials then applied a moderation technique which led to about 125,000 estimates being downgraded.
Mr Swinney is due to make a statement at Holyrood on Tuesday after admitting he had "heard the anger of students" over downgraded qualifications.
The first minister said this approach was too focused on the "overall system" not enough on individual pupils.
He faces a no-confidence vote tabled by Labour in the Scottish Parliament when it resumes this week.
Education Secretary John Swinney will set out the government's plan to fix the issue on Tuesday, with Ms Sturgeon saying the onus would not be on students to submit appeals.
The Conservatives say they will support it and the Scottish Greens have indicated they would consider backing the motion.
Opposition parties are pushing for a vote of no confidence in the education secretary, but Ms Sturgeon said she had faith in Mr Swinney.
Scottish Labour's education spokesman Iain Gray told BBC Radio's Good Morning Scotland programme that the "simplest and fairest" way would be to return grades to what teachers originally projected. "Anything else will fall short" he added.
Scotland's exams were cancelled for the first time in history due to the pandemic, leading to the use of a system based on teacher assessments.
The veteran MSP said Mr Swinney had only acted because he was facing a vote of no confidence in Holyrood so still had to go.
This was moderated at a national level by the SQA, leading to thousands of pupils complaining that they had received lower grades then originally estimated.
He added: "Both John Swinney and the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) were told as far back as April that if they used this type of moderation this is what would happen."
There was particular criticism after Higher pass rates for pupils in the most deprived data zones were reduced by 15.2%, in comparison with 6.9% for pupils from the most affluent backgrounds.
SNP MSP Alex Neil said: "We have to resolve this and resolve it quickly.
The Scottish children's commissioner's office said pupils from more deprived areas had been downgraded based on the historic performance of their school rather than their performance.
"A very sensible suggestion would be not to have any of those downgrades and have what was recommended by the teachers, the teachers know the pupils best.
Ms Sturgeon said young people in more deprived areas might be concluding that "the system is stacked against them", and that she was "not prepared to have that outcome".
"Nobody downgraded below what they got in their prelims would be fair."
Mr Swinney had signalled a u-turn on Sunday, saying he had "heard the anger of students" over the row.
'Change the methodology'
At her daily coronavirus briefing, Ms Sturgeon said steps would be taken to "address concerns" and "ensure that every young person gets a grade that recognises the work they have done".
Mr Neil said the "SQA has a lot to answer for" but added that Mr Swinney should not resign.
She said ministers had taken "decisions we thought were the right ones" in unprecedented circumstances, but now accepted they were not right.
The CYPCS has called on the Scottish government to apologise and to change the methodology for calculating grades.
She said: "Our concern, which was to make sure the grades young people got were as valid as in any other year, perhaps led us to think too much about the overall system and not enough about the individual pupil.
With no exams sat this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, the SQA applied a methodology that saw grades estimated by teachers downgraded.
"That has meant too many students feel they have lost out on grades they should have had, and that that has happened not as a result of anything they have done but a statistical model or algorithm.
Pass rates for pupils in the most deprived data zones were reduced by 15.2% in comparison with 6.9% for pupils from the most affluent backgrounds.
"Despite our best intentions I do acknowledge that we did not get this right and I am sorry for that."
The commissioner's office said children from more deprived areas had been downgraded based on the historic performance of their school rather than their performance.
Ms Sturgeon said her government would not "dig our heels in and defend a position that in our hearts we know we didn't get right".
In a letter to the SQA and the Scottish government, the CYPCS laid out a series of steps to make the appeal process for pupils fairer.
Mr Swinney will set out plans for how to address the issue at Holyrood on Tuesday, but the first minister said "we will not expect every student who has been downgraded to appeal".
It includes allowing young people to disagree with the grade estimated by their school, and grades being awarded based solely on the evidence presented and not "statistical modelling or moderation".
She added: "This is not the fault of students, and it should not be on students to fix it - that's on us, and we will set out tomorrow how we intend to do that."
'Anxiety and stress'
The education secretary could also face a no-confidence vote tabled by Labour in the Scottish Parliament when it returns from recess this week.
"If this results in significantly higher pass marks compared to previous years, no further adjustment will be made to grades to seek to bring them into line with those historic statistics," the CYPCS argues.
The Conservatives say they will support the motion and the Scottish Greens have indicated they would consider backing it if no changes are made.
Nick Hobbs, CYPCS head of advice and investigations, criticised the SQA's "refusal to discuss its proposed methodology in advance" and said young people were now "experiencing significant anxiety and distress".
Scottish Labour's education spokesman Iain Gray told BBC Radio's Good Morning Scotland programme that the "simplest and fairest" way would be to return grades to what teachers originally projected, saying that "anything else would fall short".
He added: "This situation has placed process before people, and in endeavouring to protect the system has delivered results to individual students that are simply unfair.
The Tories, meanwhile, have called for pupils to either be given a grade based on their prelim score or to be allowed to sit an exam in the autumn.
"It appears that too many young people have not received the results they deserve and they are due an apology as well as redress.
"The unfairness of this approach is obvious and it should make the government scrutinise in much more detail the way in which we assess young people's performance and potential."
Mr Swinney said on Sunday that he had "heard the anger of students who feel their hard work has been taken away" and said he was "determined to address it".
"These are unprecedented times and as we have said throughout this pandemic, we will not get everything right first time," he said.
"Every student deserves a grade that reflects the work they have done, and that is what I want to achieve.
"I have been engaged in detailed discussions over the way forward and I know that we need to act and act quickly to give certainty to our young people."
Schools in Scotland are to resume this week for the first time since March.
