ATL on fining schools if students fail GCSEs in maths and English

“While we agree that further education colleges should receive additional funding for helping students pass their re-sits, as Policy Exchange suggests, we do not think schools should have to pay for it. FE colleges have been most affected by students needing to re-sit English and maths, with some colleges having to devote whole buildings to accommodate the huge number of students taking GCSE exams.

“But we also fundamentally disagree with making students keep re-sitting GCSEs in English and maths because it is demoralising, demotivating and does not help them to progress to the precious grade C. Instead, young people who have failed to get Cs in English and maths should take functional skills qualifications in these subjects as they enable them to learn these skills in an applied, meaningful context and motivate and encourage them to achieve.”