Commenting on the release of today’s SATs
results, Kevin Courtney, Joint
General Secretary of the National Education Union, said:
“ claims that the SATs are not
about testing children. Today’s statement gives the lie to that:
it tells us that over a third of 11-year-olds will arrive in
their new secondary school in September knowing that they have
been labelled as ‘below the expected standard’. This
demoralising outcome is the result of policy-makers’ delusion
that to measure the performance of our primary school system it
is necessary to test each individual pupil.
‘Test-driven primary assessment is damaging children’s mental
health and well-being; it intensifies the stress on teachers.
Preparing children for SATs squeezes out other parts of the
curriculum.
‘As the NEU’s latest poll shows, the overwhelming majority of
teachers want to see an end to SATs. They are supported by all
the opposition parties. The tide has turned against high-stakes
testing. Announcements like today’s will soon be a thing of
the past.”
ENDS
Editor’s Note
The indicative ballot by the National Education Union was
conducted from 4 June to 2 July 2019.
Number of papers issued: 141,107
Total papers returned: 54,591 (39%)
An indicative ballot is a way for the union to understand what
members think about an issue and if they feel strongly enough to
take industrial action. The NEU rulebook stipulates that the
union must undertake an indicative ballot before progressing to
an industrial action ballot.
An indicative ballot is not a statutory ballot and therefore is
not bound by any legal process. It does not, therefore, need to
meet the legal ballot thresholds for formal ballots (50% of all
members to vote and 40% of all members to vote yes) to take legal
action.
