PUPILS whose education was disrupted by the concrete crisis which closed hundreds of school buildings have been refused consideration for any effects it may have had on their A-level exams.
Hundreds of thousands of students in England, Wales and Northern Ireland are due to receive their results on Thursday.
But days before the current academic year started in September last year, many schools had to shut buildings because reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete — Raac — had been used in their construction. It was found to crumble and be prone to collapse.
Department for Education figures said 234 educational buildings in England were found to contain the risky concrete, including 94 secondary schools and 11 post-16 colleges.
Many schools organised remote learning for students because of dangers.
Headteachers’ union the Association of School & College Leaders (ASCL) said the disruption could have affected students’ exam performances.
ASCL general secretary Pepe Di’Iasio said: “Schools and colleges affected by Raac have worked extremely hard to support students whose studies have been disrupted by this issue and they deserve an enormous amount of credit for all they have done.
“We don’t feel that they were adequately supported by the previous government in this task and we are concerned about the potential impact on exam performance.”
But Sir Ian Bauckham, head of England’s exams regulator Ofqal, said it would be difficult to allow a special uplift to pupils’ results in schools affected by the concrete and not make adjustments for other factors such as teacher shortages and inadequate facilities.
Sir Ian said: “It’s very difficult to know how you would draw a line and maintain fairness if you were going to say that it would be right, for example, to give a 10 per cent uplift to one set of circumstances but not to a range of other circumstances that other people might argue have impacted the quality of education in the schools that they’re running, or they’re working in, or attending.
“There are lots of unfortunately difficult problems that affect schools — I’ve dealt with many of these myself over the years — and inadequate facilities, teacher shortages and so on are among the problems that schools face.”
