Tim Collins: Radical plan to limit top grades

It would mean that students might reach the top standard but, if there were many bright students in their year, they would not get the top grade.

The controversial idea involves reverting to the system that existed until the early 1980s.

Head teachers say it would condemn many students to a grade that did not reflect their achievements.

Differentiation

The Tories say it would end the problem of so-called grade inflation - with students apparently doing better each year.

The party leader, Michael Howard, intends to include the proposal in an eight-point education action plan he will outline in a speech on Monday - following the final report of the Tomlinson working party on 14 to 19 learning.

But his education spokesman, Tim Collins, revealed the plan in an interview on BBC One's Breakfast with Frost.

He said the Conservatives were "broadly in agreement" with Tomlinson's proposals to have tougher questions and higher grades to differentiate between the brightest students at advanced level.

"We have actually got a proposal which is slightly different from the Tomlinson one but has the same objective," he said.

"That is to say we should go back to the system as it was 20 years ago, whereby you only got the top grade in an A-level if you were in the top five to ten per cent by ability in your age group."

'Lesser evil'

Educationalists know this as "norm referencing". It was replaced in the English examination system - by a Conservative government - by "criterion referencing".

This seeks to assess how well students have performed against fixed criteria.

In theory, if they all meet the highest standard, they all get an A grade.

Critics argue that this has led to the inexorable creeping up of the proportion getting top grades.

A Conservative party spokesman confirmed the plan, arguing that having students who did well miss the top grade was better than grade inflation.

He said their actual marks would be published, as well as their grades, so that people could see how well they had performed.

But Mr Collins' comments were immediately denounced by the general secretary of the Secondary Heads Association, John Dunford.

"This would be an incredibly backward step to a system which condemned many young people to an examination grade which failed to reflect their real achievements," he told BBC News Online.

He said various committees had compared examinations over time and had found no evidence of grade inflation.

"Why cannot the Conservatives and other critics accept that teachers and pupils are doing better nowadays? This is a matter for congratulation, not for turning the clock back."

External exams

Tim Collins did acknowledge that pupils and teachers were working harder.

But, he said, "we need to be very, very clear that when people have an A-level they have achieved a gold standard".

His party said comparative studies of first-year university students over the years showed those who achieved high A level grades in recent years would have received lower grades in the past.

He also advocated scrapping AS-levels and multiple re-sits, and reducing the amount of coursework.

And he said he would keep external exams at the age of 16, instead of placing a greater reliance on internal assessment by teachers.

He said there had to be something more sophisticated when a young person presented their qualifications to an employer than "I've got a piece of paper saying my teacher says I'm doing very well".

He also said that if schools in England wanted to offer O-levels - still set and marked by English exam boards, but for students overseas - they should be allowed to.

And his party intends to reform the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA), the exams watchdog, "to ensure that standards are rigorously policed".