On exam results day, it’s not uncommon to hear the phrase “exam results don’t define you” to comfort those who didn’t do as well as they’d hoped. Following revelations that a quarter of teacher estimates were changed by the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA), today’s Scottish exam results are a state-sanctioned exercise to show the opposite.

Due to the coronavirus crisis, this year’s exam schedule was cancelled and assessment for the awards would instead be formative. Teachers would use their knowledge of the pupils’ ability and their performance throughout the course so far to predict a result, which was then submitted to the SQA for moderation.

According to journalist and teacher James McEnaney, the SQA refused to release their moderation methodology until today. Teachers and academics warned the Scottish government that the process of moderation would directly impact pupils from lower-income backgrounds if it was not open and transparent – but this, unfortunately, went unheeded.

Today, McEnaney has been proven correct and thousands of pupils across Scotland have been opening results today that were not a reflection of the work they put into their studies. The SQA’s moderation methodology was based on centres’ historical performance and a rank order system of candidates derived from a study that is over twenty years old. It did not use any coursework that had been completed in order to assess candidates.

Instead, the SQA provided historical data from the previous three years’ estimates and results in order to understand if teachers had been accurate, lenient or severe in predicting pupils’ grades. Headteachers also had access to this data before they signed off their teachers’ predictions and an online course was provided to help navigate the system. Centres – supplied with this information and support from the SQA – went on to make estimates using their guidelines. But, for the SQA, this wasn’t good enough. 

A quarter of teachers’ estimates were changed. Of these, 93.1% of estimates were downgraded from what teachers predicted and the remaining 6.9% of estimates were upgraded. Most shockingly, the SQA have presided over an entrenchment of educational inequality by basing individual pupil’s results on what their school historically achieved. This means that a pupil attending a school in the affluent area of East Renfrewshire, just outside of Glasgow, who was predicted an A for Higher English would have been more likely to achieve that in the final dispensation.

By contrast, just down the road in Govan, on the south side of the city, a pupil set to achieve an A for Higher English might have been downgraded to a B or a C because of the school’s historic performance – and, particularly, because it is situated in a deprived area. The real scandal of today’s results is that pupils from deprived areas have seen their Higher pass rate reduced by 15.2% – in the richest areas, it was reduced by just 6.9%. 

We cannot view these results in Scotland in a political vacuum. The SQA is sponsored (corporate talk for funded) by the Scottish government’s ‘Learning Directorate.’ Its board of directors is subject to approval by Scottish government ministers. The closeness between the SQA and the government was clear in the response given by the First Minister and her Deputy, who is also education secretary, earlier today. Nicola Sturgeon admitted that pupils from poorer backgrounds do not do as well but, shockingly, she went on to say: 

“The thing to be very clear about though is that this system of moderation that has been required this year is not what is causing that attainment gap. So let me put this another way: if we hadn’t had that system of moderation, we’d be standing here today… I would be saying that 85% of young people in our most deprived areas had passed Highers this year, compared to around 65% last year and you would be saying to me that that 20% increase is unprecedented and therefore, not credible.”

In other words, educational disparity is recognised by the Scottish government, it accepts that students from poorer backgrounds are punished by the education system through no fault of their own – but it won’t countenance that apple cart being upturned by those students’ teachers, who it has undermined and shown contempt for.

The Scottish government’s response to the scandal shows just how deeply the idea that young people from working-class backgrounds should not do as well as their more affluent peers has become ingrained in the psyche of our society. Pupils at schools in working-class areas have to work twice as hard in order to achieve the results they need to progress in life. Even during this pandemic, their education has been disproportionately impacted – with wealthier children more able to afford the equipment or tutoring needed for schooling at home. But still, when the new system improves their results, it is shot down by the authorities.

Nicola Sturgeon said she wants to be judged on her record when it comes to education. This is perhaps the biggest scandal in Scottish education since devolution. It is crucial that Scotland’s biggest teaching union, the EIS, defends its members and their professionalism and that an inquiry is commissioned into how these events unfolded. Unless we want yet another generation to be written off because of where they went to school, we owe it to the young people whose lives have been turned upside down today to ensure they get the results they deserve.