Teachers' experience of and attitudes toward activities to maximise qualification results in England

Teachers in England are under pressure to maximise their pupils' examination results, both to improve pupils' life chances and to ensure their school performs well on government accountability measures. This article reports the findings of an anonymous, online, voluntary survey of 548 teac...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Oxford review of education 2018-09, Vol.44 (5), p.563-580
Main Authors: Meadows, Michelle, Black, Beth
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Academic standards
Accountability
Assessment
Attitudes
Cheating
College faculty
Educational Practices
Ethical dilemmas
Ethics
Exit Examinations
Foreign Countries
Internet
Life chances
malpractice
Polls & surveys
Qualifications
Respondents
Secondary School Students
Secondary schools
Students
Summative Evaluation
Teacher attitudes
Teachers
Test Preparation
Testing
Wording
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Summary:Teachers in England are under pressure to maximise their pupils' examination results, both to improve pupils' life chances and to ensure their school performs well on government accountability measures. This article reports the findings of an anonymous, online, voluntary survey of 548 teachers from secondary schools and colleges. The survey asked teachers whether they had direct experience of 23 activities aimed at improving results. These activities ranged widely, for example from becoming markers to gain insight into the examination system, removing pupils from the school roll, to providing wording of sections of summative assessment to pupils. Respondents were also given the opportunity to describe other unlisted activities of which they had experience. They rated the acceptability of all the activities. Agreement about the acceptability of the activities varied. Some activities were almost universally condemned, while others were considered more appropriate. Care must be taken in generalising from the experiences and views of this relatively small, volunteer sample of teachers. The survey is, however, unique in providing evidence of the types of activities that some teachers employ and the kinds of ethical dilemmas they face.
ISSN:0305-4985
1465-3915
DOI:10.1080/03054985.2018.1500355