The secondary school performance tables for 2015-16 are due to be
published tomorrow (Thursday 19 January 2017), using a new set of
headline measures, including Progress 8 which aims to capture the
progress a pupil makes from the end of Key Stage 2 to the end of
Key Stage 4.
Malcolm Trobe, Interim General Secretary of the Association
of School and College Leaders, said: “Congratulations to schools
and pupils on these results, which have been achieved against a
national backdrop of a funding and recruitment crisis.
“Progress 8 is a fairer measure of school performance than
the old measure of the proportion of pupils achieving at least
five A* to C grades at GCSE including English and maths. It
better reflects the fact that children start their secondary
school education at different levels of academic ability and it
aims to judge schools on the progress that all their pupils make,
rather than an arbitrary measure of GCSE attainment.
“However, Progress 8 has teething problems, and must be
treated with some caution. Its biggest weakness is that the score
of a school is disproportionately affected by as few as one or
two pupils recording anomalous results. We are aware of cases
where Progress 8 scores have been badly affected by the fact that
a very small number of vulnerable children have missed exams as a
result of illnesses or other personal crises.
“We are concerned that schools are being judged on
circumstances outside of their control. We are pressing the
government to address this flaw in the Progress 8 system as a
matter of urgency.
“Our message to parents is that no system of measuring school
performance is perfect. It is their judgement which is most
important and they should base that judgement on the whole
picture of the school’s curriculum and culture and whether it is
the best fit for their child.”
