Dear Mr Balls

I write to express in the strongest terms the anger and frustration that I am hearing from head teachers in Buckinghamshire at the failure of the SATs marking process this year.

You are well aware of the problems being experienced. They have been widely reported in the media – papers and results not returned or returned to the wrong school, unlikely grades being awarded, inaccurate and inconsistent marking and much more. In Buckinghamshire at least 30% of our schools have been affected in one way or another.

I wonder, however, whether you fully understand the impact of these failures on teachers, parents and pupils. The additional work in locating missing papers, challenging inappropriate and inaccurate returns and explaining to pupils and parents is costly both in financial terms and in terms of additional time and stress for teachers at an already extremely busy time of the academic year. Pupils have been badly let down by the failure to deliver results of tests for which they have worked so hard, and, because SATs results feature so heavily in league tables, parents will have less information on which to judge the performance of their local schools.

Four things must now happen:

•The SATs results for 2008 should be declared null and void. It is impossible to have any confidence in them and publication will give misleading information to schools, parents and local authorities.
•The contract with ETS must be terminated forthwith. There should be no cost to the taxpayer, as they have clearly failed to deliver the quality of service which must have been specified in the contract.
•The SATs testing regime must be re-evaluated to determine the value of these tests. Teachers know their pupils and consideration must be given to returning to relying on their professional expertise and judgement to assess pupils' ability, with an appropriate moderation process to ensure consistency nationally.
•Schools must be reimbursed and compensated for the additional costs and pressures in resolving issues for their pupils.

I look forward to your reply.

Yours sincerely




Marion Clayton
Cabinet Member, Achievement and Learning

What do you think of Cllr Clayton's letter?