Ken Boston says vocational education broadens the curriculum

Ken Boston, head of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA), issued a statement amid concerns about the validity of the school "league tables".

Schools are judged on how many pupils get five good GCSEs - with a GNVQ vocational award counting as four.

Dr Boston seems to question this "equivalence" - while defending the importance of vocational studies.

Replaced

Nationally, the percentage of teenagers gaining five or more good GCSEs this year was 51%, rising to 54% when GNVQs are taken into account and to the headline rate of 55.7% when other qualifications are included.

It cannot be said that a GNVQ in manufacturing is 'equivalent' to four GCSEs in French, maths, history and English Dr Ken Boston

The government is changing the benchmark from 2007, to include English and maths GCSEs.

On that basis, the national figure this year was 44.1%.

In the school attainment tables, a pass in an Intermediate GNVQ (General National Vocational Qualification) is counted as "equivalent" to four higher grade GCSEs.

There is a perception that it requires less teaching time, and the pass rate, at 79%, is far higher than for equivalent GCSE grades.

Dr Boston says: "It is true that the GNVQ is an imperfect qualification" - which was why it was being replaced by vocational GCSEs and other qualifications.

He adds: "It also appears to be true - given their admissions in the press - that some schools have exploited the current imperfections."

Incentive

The larger part of his statement is a defence of the importance of vocational qualifications.

He rejects "common opinion" that they should not attract the same number of points as an academic qualification because of "innate inferiority".

But he says it is the school, not the pupil, that accrues the points that flow from the official "equivalences" - drawn up by the QCA itself.

"A young person with a GNVQ cannot properly claim to have four GCSEs, nor vice-versa," Dr Boston says.

"The incentive is for the school to broaden its curriculum: despite some reported abuse, it is not intended to be an incentive for an individual to take health and social care rather than maths.

"Further, it cannot be said that a GNVQ in manufacturing is 'equivalent' to four GCSEs in French, maths, history and English, any more than it can be said that four pounds of sugar is equivalent to four single-pound packets of salt, pepper, mustard and chives."

Withdrawal

The Department for Education and Skills had no comment to make.

GNVQs are being withdrawn, to be replaced by vocational GCSEs and a range of other qualifications.

Some schools have appealed for a reprieve, but to no avail.

Paul Steer of the OCR exam board said that the debate about school league tables should not be used "to justify a plan to deny access to these qualifications to future learners who would most benefit from them".

"The breadth and depth of learning required to achieve an OCR GNVQ is one of the closest we have to matching the skill set so frequently demanded by employers," he said.

"GNVQs are well-established qualifications that are valued by pupils, parents and teachers alike.

"They provide demanding and stretching programmes that can engage a wide variety of learners, including the most talented.

"It is most unfortunate that the government has set a timetable to withdraw GNVQs well ahead of their proposed replacements - the specialised diplomas - which will not be fully available until 2010 at the earliest."

In correspondence on the issue between the QCA and the department, seen by the BBC News website, Dr Boston told Schools Minister Jacqui Smith: "There has been some continued lobbying to slow the pace of implementation [of the withdrawal].

But he added: "In our view, suitable alternatives to GNVQ now exist."