The current SATS marks scandal is going to have huge knock-on effects. Schools are getting back results with pupils marked as absent who were present, other scripts are being returned unmarked and there is growing evidence that the grading has been—to put it mildly—inconsistent. This means that this year’s school league tables are going to be hugely flawed.
In these circumstances, the government appears to have three options. It can just not publish league tables this year which would be embarrassing and illustrate just how big a cock-up this has been. It can demand that the National Assessment Agency finds the money to have all the papers remarked but the problem with this is that the NAA doesn’t have £20 million spare to pay for this and even if it did it is doubtful that they could be marked before the league tables are due to come out in August.
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