Overview
The education system in England seeks to ensure that young people have the knowledge, skills and understanding to develop their talents and fulfil their potential. Schools are under a duty to contribute to the spiritual, moral, mental and physical development of their pupils and recent legislation has stressed the importance of promoting children’s well-being and helping them to become healthy, enterprising and responsible citizens.
School ages
Children must start school in the term after their fifth birthday but in practice most begin at four. The school leaving age is 16 and about two-thirds continue in full-time education until 18. Around four in 10 go on to university.
Four to 11 year olds attend 17,000 primary schools, which are smaller and usually nearer to home than the 3,500 secondary schools to which they transfer. Just over seven per cent attend independent fee-paying schools.
National curriculum
The government influences what is taught through the national curriculum, which covers around 80 per cent of the school day. Overall responsibility for schools rests with the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families, a senior member of the government who oversees the Department for Children, Schools and Families.
School standards are monitored by Ofsted, the school inspectorate. Other influential bodies include the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA), which develops qualifications, draws up and monitors the curriculum and advises the government and the National Assessment Agency (NAA), which is responsible for national curriculum tests.
The school years are divided into five stages with assessments at the end of the first four and external examinations towards the end of the fifth. Children follow programmes of study decided by the government with advice from QCA and their progress is mapped against an eight-level scale. Attainment targets for 7, 11 and 14 year olds are based on what a typical child should know and be able to do at those ages.
Assessment
The first two assessments of children when they are five and seven are carried out by teachers using published material to inform their judgement. As pupils reach the end of key stage 2 - for 7 to 11 year olds - they sit externally set and marked tests in English, maths and science to check they have reached level 4, the standard expected for their age. They sit tests in the same subjects at the end of key stage 3 – for 12 to 14 year olds – by which time they are expected to have reached levels 5 or 6. These end of key stage tests are delivered by the NAA.
In key stage 4 pupils aged 14 to 16 prepare for examinations that lead to national qualifications. The national curriculum still applies and they must continue to study the three core subjects – English, maths and science – plus religious education, PE, information and communication technology, citizenship and work-related learning but can choose between other subjects, such as modern foreign languages, history, geography, drama or art.
Regulators and awarding bodies
England has a market system of qualifications provided by independent bodies. There are three awarding bodies (commonly referred to as examination boards) in England (AQA, Edexcel and OCR), plus WJEC in Wales and CCEA in Northern Ireland, which offer GCSE and GCE qualifications. The five awarding bodies are represented by The Joint Council for Qualifications (JCQ).
Ofqual regulates the exam system in England, approving syllabuses and monitoring standards between awarding bodies, and between years, so the public can be confident that, for example, an A grade in English is of the same standard across the awarding bodies and is of a similar demand to an A grade in pervious years. The same role is carried out by the Department for Children, Education, Lifelong Learning and Skills (DCELLS) in Wales and the Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessments (CCEA) in Northern Ireland.
Qualifications
Schools can choose to take all qualifications or subjects with one awarding body or, more commonly, mix and match between them. Pupils are not required by law to sit exams at 16 but it is expected that they take between 8 and 11 GCSEs. Schools can also enter pupils for a range of vocationally related qualifications in sectors of the economy such as travel and tourism or engineering.
The A level is the most common qualification taken by 18 year olds. Students usually take examinations for an AS award after the first year, commonly in three or four subjects, and then choose to study all or some of them for another year to obtain the full A level. A small number of schools offer the International Baccalaureate Diploma for which students continue with a wider range of subjects.
There are over 6,000 nationally accredited qualifications in England that are regulated by Ofqual. These qualifications are offered by over 120 recognised awarding bodies and are studied by millions of young and adult learners, often within a workplace setting. Sector skills councils representing the different employment areas identify, define and update employment-based standards for national vocational qualifications which are approved and regulated by Ofqual.
Qualifications frameworks
To help universities and employers evaluate the different examinations, a National Qualifications Framework (NQF) places them on levels according to the amount of work involved and its difficulty. GCSE is a level 2 qualification, for example, while A levels and the Baccalaureate Diploma are at level 3.
A new Qualifications and Credit Framework (QCF) is being developed, which recognises high quality in-house training by employers, placing it alongside existing qualifications of the same standard. The new credit-based approach will allow learners to build up qualifications from the building blocks of recognised chunks of learning at their own pace and throughout their lives.