Headteacher at Eye Primary School explains why SATs papers were annulled

The Peterborough Telegraph contacted Jason Webster this week about the papers after discovering that an investigation had concluded they had been altered after the exams had finished.

The PT asked Mr Webster, who declined to speak to the paper about this issue 12 months ago, if he would explain how the papers had been altered.

Mr Webster replied that following an investigation, a “small number of the spelling papers were judged to have marks on them. This raised alarms as it appeared that a change had been made, which then indented onto the exam paper below.

“We do not know the exact details of the changes that were made, but we were informed by the STA that on a small number of exam papers there was an indentation. Because of the link between the spelling paper and the grammar paper, it was decided to annul the grammar test as a whole.”

Asked if himself/the senior leadership team were aware of what was going on, he said: “No they were not. The first the headteacher and senior leadership were aware was in January 2018 when the STA (Standards and Testing Agency) made us aware that a complaint had been made.”

Asked if anyone been disciplined, he replied: “Investigations were conducted by the school, the local authority and the STA and as part of these investigations the headteacher and all staff members involved in the test administration were interviewed.

“Unfortunately, it was impossible to conclude how these changes to the exam paper occurred.”

Eye was the top performing primary school in Peterborough in 2017, with 94 per cent of its pupils meeting the expected standard for reading, writing and maths - 14 percentage points higher than the next best schools in the city.

In comparison, that figure was 67 per cent the year before and 68 per cent the year after.

Mr Webster said: “All schools have very robust procedures in place to monitor and track the progress of children so that predictions of attainment can be made. The outcomes for the children were all in line with predictions for the last three years based on teacher judgements and their summative assessments.”

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