A disheartened Glasgow schoolgirl has penned a letter to the education secretary to express her disappointment in the SQA's making scheme used for this year's exams.
Drew Skinner's email to John Swinney has demanded that the Scottish Government re-evaluates the marking approach taken by SQA during the coronavirus pandemic.
The East End schoolgirl wrote the letter to Mr Swinney after the Glasgow Times reported on fears that at least 27 schools across Glasgow could have been marked unfairly in this year's SQA grading system - including St Mungo's Academy.
The St Mungo's Academy pupil wrote how she feels discouraged as she was "held accountable for St Mungo's previous historical results" as she called for the system to be based solely around teacher feedback and "hard evidence" such as prelims, folio work and assignments.
Can’t help but feel disheartened after seeing people from privelleged areas achieving straight A’s purely because they live in affluent areas. Here’s a letter I wrote to @JohnSwinney regarding this. Would really appreciate if you took some time to read and rt. pic.twitter.com/l0fdJHic8z
— Drew Skinner (@drwskinner) August 4, 2020
The 17-year-old wrote: "If students are to be presented with grades lower than their potential, this could add to this poverty cycle as studentds may not be able to take their education further due to being unable to meet university or college requirements.
"This could result in them putting themselves in low-skilled employment.
“Students in more affluent areas remain prosperous as they inherit schools’ historic exam results as a safety blanket which we know comes hand-in-hand with low pay."
READ MORE: SQA results: Protest and petition launched after 'classist' grading system
It comes shortly after a petition was launched by outraged pupils who have described the system used by SQA this year as "classist".
Pupils in Glasgow have also announced they will stage a protest this Friday outside the SQA's headquarters amid "postcode lottery" results.
A Scottish Government spokesman said: “We are grateful to Drew for her letter and will be in touch with her shortly to respond to her concerns. We would encourage any young person disappointed by their results to speak to their school and use the free appeals process.
“This year has been exceptionally challenging, and robust processes were developed to allow certification that is fair for all learners.
“There was a rise in pass rates at National 5, Higher and Advanced Higher and the SQA results show a narrowing of the gap between pupils from the most deprived to the least deprived groupings.”
The pupil's petition to the SQA has since received almost 17,000 signatures and can be viewed here.
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel