Corporate report

Equalities report 2021 to 2022

Published 18 July 2022

Applies to England

Introduction

This report summarises how Ofqual has fulfilled its equality duties both as a regulator and an employer. The report covers the period from January 2021 to March 2022. Future equalities reports will follow the annual report and accounts reporting period, April to March.

Our previous Equalities report 2021 covered the period January 2020 to December 2020, and we reported on our work to meet our equality duties in Ofqual’s Annual Report and Accounts 2020 to 2021 (covering April 2020 to 31 March 2021).

Ofqual’s equality duties

As a public body, Ofqual is required under the Equality Act 2010 (the Equality Act) to meet the Public Sector Equality Duty (PSED). This means we must give due regard to the need to eliminate discrimination, advance equality of opportunity and foster good relations between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic and persons who do not share it.

Ofqual is required under The Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties and Public Authorities) Regulations 2017 (SI 2017/353) to publish one or more equality objectives at least every 4 years. We also have a duty under the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009 (the ASCL Act) to have regard to the reasonable requirements of students and apprentices who take regulated qualifications and National Assessments, including those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), as well as to the reasonable needs of employers, higher education institutions and the professions. We must consider our equality duties alongside our other statutory objectives, including our objectives to maintain qualification and assessment standards.

In 2019 Ofqual set the following equality objectives as priorities for how we carry out our public functions (as a public authority) and how we treat our staff (as an employer).

Ofqual’s 5 equality objectives for 2019 to 2023 are:

1. To develop, consult on and publish new statutory guidance for awarding organisations on designing valid and manageable qualifications that are as accessible as they can be to all learners who would likely benefit from gaining the qualification
2. To encourage awarding organisations to recognise the relationship between validity and equality
3. To collect more, and more accurate, data on the number and nature of the reasonable adjustments being made for disabled learners taking a wide range of regulated qualifications
4. To evaluate the appropriateness and effectiveness of the most frequently used forms of reasonable adjustment, such as extra time and the use of assistive technology, for learners taking the qualifications we regulate
5. To implement our new diversity and inclusion strategy with the aims of increasing the representation of currently under-represented groups at all levels within Ofqual and strengthening our culture and reputation as a great place to work for everyone

Public authorities are required to publish annually how they demonstrate their compliance with the general PSED. This report sets out the work we have done to achieve our equality objectives, as well as broader work that contributes to Ofqual’s fulfilment of its PSED.

Ofqual’s role

Ofqual is the independent, expert regulator of qualifications and assessments for England. Ofqual regulates on behalf of students of all ages and apprentices to make sure that qualifications, apprenticeship End-Point Assessments (EPA) and National Assessments are good quality. Considering the potential equality impacts of our work is a central part of our approach to policy-making and stakeholder engagement.

Ofqual regulates 205 awarding organisations (as of May 2022). In 2021, these awarding organisations together offered over 11,600 qualifications for which 10.8 million certificates were issued. Qualification types include GCSEs, AS and A levels, apprenticeship End-Point Assessments (EPA) and a broad range of vocational and technical qualifications. We also regulate National Assessments taken by primary school pupils in England.

Ofqual is independent of ministers and is accountable to Parliament. Independence is important to securing confidence in the standards and validity of qualifications for students of all ages, apprentices, and those who use and rely on qualifications. At the same time, we provide government with expertise in assessment and have a key role in enacting government policy in relation to qualifications. We work in partnership with the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (IfATE) on technical qualifications and apprenticeship EPA.

Parliament created Ofqual to:

• secure standards in qualifications and apprenticeship EPA
• promote public confidence in qualifications, apprenticeship EPA and National Assessments
• oversee National Assessments and assure their validity
• improve public awareness and understanding of the range of qualifications available to support clarity of choice in the market
• secure that qualifications are provided efficiently and that their price represents value for money
• raise awareness of benefits of regulated qualifications and of being a regulated awarding organisation

Ofqual regulates to make sure that a qualification gives a reliable indication of a person’s knowledge, skills and/or understanding. This means only a person who has been able to demonstrate the required knowledge, skills and/or understanding for a qualification should be awarded that qualification. For example, if the purpose of a qualification is to attest to a person’s ability safely to build a wall, it should only be awarded to someone who can safely do so. A person, perhaps because of their disability, might not be able to build a wall safely, even with reasonable adjustments, in which case they should not be awarded the qualification. It would not be appropriate for us to intervene to change this because, by doing so, the qualification would not be valid. In this way, we need to balance our statutory objectives with our PSED.

Regulating on behalf of students and apprentices

Ofqual’s powers enable us to act as the guardian of standards and a champion of fairness. In all our work, we have committed that students and apprentices will be our compass – their collective interests will shape the approach we take, our decisions and our focus. We pay close attention to the implications of our decisions for teaching and learning, for equality, and for public confidence in qualifications.

Equality objective 1: Publish new guidance on designing and developing accessible assessments

Objective 1 is to develop, consult on and publish new statutory guidance for awarding organisations on designing valid and manageable qualifications that are as accessible as they can be to all learners who would likely benefit from gaining the qualification.

What Ofqual has done

Ofqual has consulted on and published new statutory guidance on designing and developing accessible assessments.

As reported in our Equalities Report 2021, in late 2019 and early 2020 we held focus groups with a wide range of awarding organisations and stakeholders to discuss the development of new guidance on designing valid and accessible qualifications. They supported the development of the guidance. Ofqual planned a consultation, which was then delayed after the decision to cancel exams because of the pandemic in summer 2020, as our immediate priority was to implement alternative arrangements for awarding regulated qualifications.

Ofqual ran a public consultation on designing and developing accessible assessments between 1 November 2021 and 24 January 2022. We encouraged input from awarding organisations and stakeholders. We spoke with organisations that engage with students and represent their interests, to encourage students’ input to the proposals. The Autism Education Trust, the Social Mobility Foundation and The Student Room raised awareness of the consultation with students, sought their views and encouraged them to respond.

Ofqual delivered a seminar on the draft guidance at the Federation of Awarding Bodies’ (FAB) conference in November 2021. In January 2022, Ofqual hosted a webinar for all awarding organisations. We presented updates to Ofqual’s Access Consultation Forum (ACF), the Department for Education’s (DfE’s) Assistive Technology engagement group and Ofqual’s Vocational and Technical Qualifications (VTQ) Awarding Organisation Equalities Forum in November 2021 and Stakeholder Equalities Forum in January 2022.

There were 162 responses to the consultation, which was open for 12 weeks. There was strong support for the proposed guidance from respondents, including organisations representing students with SEND and awarding organisations. Following analysis of the responses, we published the consultation outcome, albeit outside period this report covers, in May 2022. We incorporated the new guidance into Condition D in the Ofqual Handbook – General Conditions of Regulation and published a summary of the guidance.

The guidance supports awarding organisations to design assessments to meet Ofqual’s rules on accessibility. The guidance, which focuses on exams or other written assessments, is about making assessments as accessible as possible for students by avoiding unnecessary obstacles. It explains that, when designing and developing exams and assessments, awarding organisations should:

• use accessible and appropriate language
• use clear and consistent layout
• use source material, context, images and colour in ways that do not disadvantage certain groups of students
• consider how reasonable adjustments could be made to an exam or assessment to make sure disabled students are not disadvantaged when taking it

The guidance is based on principles covering different features of assessment. The overarching principle is validity: an assessment task should only measure what it is intended to measure. The guidance is intended to help awarding organisations to recognise and avoid irrelevant features in their assessments that could unfairly disadvantage some students or stop them from showing in the exam or assessment what they know, understand and can do. The other principles are about assessment structure, assessment instructions, language, sentence structure, source text or material, context, images, colour and layout.

The guidance covers alternative formats, assistive technology and awarding organisations’ processes. The guidance sets out that accessible assessment design is not always straightforward and that awarding organisations should think carefully about assessment features and their potential impact on students.

What Ofqual will do

Ofqual expects awarding organisations to be able to show they have had regard to the guidance in the design and development of assessments commissioned 6 months or more after the guidance was published. We will monitor how awarding organisations respond to the guidance and evaluate its impact.

A theme from the consultation feedback was for more guidance on practical, performance-based (including vocational and occupational), digital (delivered on-screen and online) and remote assessments, as well as on the use of assistive technology in assessment. During the next year, we will consider whether further guidance that addresses these aspects of assessment is needed.

Equality objective 2: Encourage awarding organisations to recognise the relationship between validity and equality

What Ofqual has done

The relationship between validity and equality is an important part of Ofqual’s guidance for awarding organisations on designing and developing accessible assessments. We make clear the importance of this relationship in our work with awarding organisations and wider stakeholders.

Ofqual engages with awarding organisations in a variety of ways, including through individual meetings and webinars. Ofqual hosts the ACF and has established a new VTQ Awarding Organisation Equalities Forum and a VTQ Stakeholder Equalities Forum to strengthen our engagement on equalities. There has been positive engagement in the forums to discuss equalities matters. We have used these forums both to increase awareness of the relationship between validity and equality and to explore awarding organisations’ approaches to equalities work, for example their approach to reasonable adjustments.

What Ofqual will do

Ofqual will continue to encourage the awarding organisations we regulate to recognise the relationship between validity and equality. We will do this through our ongoing communications and engagement with them, and as we monitor how they respond to the new guidance on accessibility described here. Ofqual will do further work to consider the relationship between validity and fairness and how that relates to qualification design and regulation.

Equality objective 3: Collect more data on reasonable adjustments

This objective is to collect more, and more accurate, data on the number and nature of reasonable adjustments being made for disabled learners taking a wide range of regulated qualifications.

For the qualifications Ofqual regulates, we define a reasonable adjustment as ‘an adjustment made to an assessment for a qualification so as to enable a disabled Learner to demonstrate their knowledge, skills and understanding to the levels of attainment required by the specification for that qualification.’ Reasonable adjustments are a legal requirement under the Equality Act 2010. Ofqual’s rules require awarding organisations to have in place, and publish, clear arrangements for making reasonable adjustments for disabled students taking their qualifications. Our guidance includes how awarding organisations collect and analyse data on reasonable adjustments. The exam boards that offer general qualifications jointly publish guidance on Access Arrangements and Reasonable Adjustments through the Joint Council for Qualifications (JCQ).

What Ofqual has done

We have been reviewing the data that we collect from awarding organisations to consider how we can improve data quality and whether we should collect additional data.

Ofqual collects data from the exam boards that award GCSEs, AS and A levels about reasonable adjustments made for those assessments. Exam boards submit this data as part of their access arrangements data, which includes both data on reasonable adjustments and some types of special consideration. This data informs Ofqual’s official statistics reports. The latest Access arrangements for GCSE, AS and A level report published in November 2021 provides information about the number of access arrangements (including reasonable adjustments) approved for GCSEs, AS and A levels in England during the 2020 to 2021 academic year. This showed that:

• the number of approved cases was down 2.9% compared to the 2019 to 2020 academic year. The decrease in the number of access arrangement applications was likely to have been due to the cancellation of the summer exams, after the government announced in January 2021 it was no longer fair for GCSE, AS, A level and some VTQ exams to proceed as planned. Instead, students who were due to sit exams received teacher assessed grades that summer. The announcement was made before the deadline for submitting applications for access arrangements and/or reasonable adjustments for the 2021 summer exams.
• 88% of all centres had access arrangements for one or more of their students, compared to 91% of all centres in the 2019 to 2020 academic year.
• among the types of access arrangements, 25% extra time made up 66% of all approved arrangements in the 2020 to 2021 academic year, compared to 65% in the 2019 to 2020 academic year.

In the access arrangements official statistics, we report aggregated data from the exam boards. The data covers reasonable adjustments and access arrangements that are approved by exam boards. Some reasonable adjustments and access arrangements, for example supervised rest breaks, are decided by the student’s centre. Exam boards do not collect data on those centre-delegated arrangements. JCQ sets out in its Access Arrangements and Reasonable Adjustments 2021 to 2022 guidance which types of adjustments need to be approved by the exam board. Ofqual started collecting candidate-level data from the exam boards 2 years ago. This candidate-level data will help us to report more accurate and detailed information about reasonable adjustments. Once we are satisfied with the quality of the data, we will report it in our official statistics publications.

Ofqual has worked with awarding organisations and centres through our VTQ Equalities Forums to better understand current processes for VTQ reasonable adjustments. This will help us to better understand the data they currently hold about reasonable adjustments for VTQs and whether we could collect more data from them. We have identified some challenges with this, including differences in how awarding organisations collect and store the data and that decisions on whether to provide some reasonable adjustments are delegated to centres.

Ofqual collects data on the numbers and types of reasonable adjustments made in the National Reference Test (NRT). The NRT provides additional information to support the awarding of GCSEs in England, specifically in English language and maths. Ofqual has contracted the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) to develop, administer and analyse the NRT. Students who take the NRT may have the same reasonable adjustments as they will have for their forthcoming GCSE exams. We use the data collected by NFER to monitor patterns in the numbers and types of reasonable adjustments provided. Information about the number and types of reasonable adjustments in the NRT gives us insight to trends of reasonable adjustments in the year 11 cohort.

What Ofqual will do

Ofqual will continue to seek to improve the quality of data on reasonable adjustments we receive from awarding organisations. We will follow data quality assurance procedures to ensure the accuracy of the data and to challenge or question it, where necessary.

Equality objective 4: Evaluate the most frequently used reasonable adjustments

This objective is to evaluate the appropriateness and effectiveness of the most frequently used forms of reasonable adjustment, such as extra time and the use of assistive technology, for students taking the qualifications we regulate.

What Ofqual has done

In 2019 and 2020 Ofqual undertook research to better understand how disabled students use assistive technology in their assessments. This work, which involved interviews with students with special educational needs, teachers and Special Educational Needs Coordinators (SENCos), was delayed by the pandemic. In June 2021, we published a report on The use of assistive technologies for assessment. This research informed the development of our accessibility guidance by improving our understanding of current practice and the student and teacher experience. It also helped us to explore the potential barriers to using assistive technology in assessment and how they can be overcome. We discussed the findings of the report with awarding organisations and other stakeholders through ACF and the VTQ Awarding Organisation and Stakeholder Equalities forums, who welcomed this research.

Ofqual began research into the use of extra time in exams in autumn 2019, including through some interviews with students and SENCos. We were unable to complete this research project because exams in summer 2020 were cancelled, and schools and colleges were closed to most students because of the pandemic.

We discussed the use of reasonable adjustments, particularly line spacing in exam papers and extra time, at the ACF in November 2021. The UK Association for Accessible formats (UKAAF) subsequently set up a ‘Dyslexia in Examinations’ project group to consider the experience of students with dyslexia taking external examinations. Ofqual attends this group as an observer.

What Ofqual will do

Ofqual will resume research into extra time as a reasonable adjustment. This will include work to better understand the experiences and perceptions of students. Ofqual will continue to seek the views and experiences of stakeholders about the use of reasonable adjustments for disabled candidates taking exams and other assessments, including through discussion at ACF and the VTQ Stakeholder and VTQ Awarding Organisation Equalities Forums.

Equality objective 5: Implement our diversity and inclusion strategy

This objective is to implement our diversity and inclusion strategy with the aims of increasing the representation of currently under-represented groups at all levels within Ofqual and strengthening our culture and reputation as a great place to work for everyone.

What Ofqual has done

Ofqual committed to a range of actions in our 2020 to 2022 diversity and inclusion strategy to create and maintain an inclusive working environment that provides equality of opportunity for all, while recognising and valuing our individual differences. Most of the actions have been completed and the outstanding actions (Disability Confident Level 3 and monitoring of socio-economic backgrounds in line with Civil Service Guidance) will be addressed through our 2022 to 2025 People Strategy. Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) is a core theme of our People Strategy.

Ofqual’s staff take part in the annual Civil Service People Survey, which asks a range of questions about being treated fairly at work, feeling valued for the work undertaken and respecting individual differences. Our inclusion and fair treatment score in the annual People Survey 2021 increased from 81% to 85% against the Civil Service benchmark of 82%. The percentage of staff reporting discrimination fell by 7 percentage points to 4%. The percentage of staff reporting bullying and harassment fell by 4 percentage points to 3%. Results for both of these areas are below the Civil Service benchmarks of 7%.

Ofqual has introduced and appointed an EDI and Wellbeing specialist role to support our People and EDI strategy, and a senior manager to lead our work on EDI across Ofqual. As part of our work to bring more ethnic diversity to the organisation, we recruited and appointed a positive action early career intern to join the Standards Advisory Group, which reports to the Ofqual Board.

During the reporting period Ofqual has also:

• established an EDI Steering Committee, chaired by our EDI Executive Sponsor and supported by colleagues from across Ofqual to help steer our work in this area and to provide challenge and support
• introduced an Ethnic Minority Sponsorship Programme, designed to help tackle the underrepresentation of ethnic diversity in senior posts by raising colleagues’ knowledge, confidence and profile within Ofqual
• updated the delivery and content of our mandatory EDI e-learning module
• reviewed and updated information for our staff so that they are well informed about EDI and can access tools and support
• published the Ofqual gender pay gap report 2021
• launched an EDI Advocate scheme. Ofqual’s EDI Advocates are staff volunteers who provide voice and visibility from all levels of the organisation. They contribute to EDI initiatives across Ofqual. EDI Advocates have launched new staff networks, including a Race & Faith Network, a Women’s Network and a Disability Network.

Recruitment

Ofqual has continued to advertise and promote jobs across a range of platforms to encourage as diverse a range of applicants as possible. We have strengthened our EDI statement within our job adverts and introduced a positive action statement to be included within roles where there is under-representation.

Our equality monitoring data shows an increase across the application and interview stages of the recruitment process in relation to the attraction and selection of ethnically diverse candidates.

Between January 2021 and March 2022, 38% of all applicants to roles at Ofqual came from an ethnic minority background, with 6% of overall applicants declaring a disability. A third (34%) of candidates interviewed were from ethnic minority backgrounds, with 8% of overall applicants interviewed declaring a disability. Eighteen per cent of offers of employment made were to candidates from an ethnic minority background, with 5% of overall offers of employment to candidates declaring a disability. Recruitment data is monitored on a monthly basis to analyse trends and review campaign success in relation to equality to ensure we are reaching and attracting diverse audiences and under-represented groups.

Staff profile

Ofqual is committed to recruiting and retaining expert, engaged people and we are working towards having a more diverse workforce to reflect the communities we serve. Since the successful launch of our EDI Strategy in 2020, in which we committed to focus on 2 key areas, ethnicity and disability, all staff are asked to update their personal details. Almost all staff have declared their ethnic background. A small proportion (3%) of staff exercised the right to answer, “prefer not to say”. Seventy-five per cent of staff have declared their status in relation to disability with 4% of staff exercising the right to “prefer not to say”. We will continue to work to increase the declaration rates of all protected characteristics by requesting that staff ensure their personal details remain up to date for us to accurately understand diversity across the organisation.

At the start of the reporting period, our employee headcount was 253, of which 15.0% of employees were from an ethnic minority background, 59.5% were female, 8.7% had a declared disability and 3.8% identified as Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Other (LGBO).

By March 2022, our headcount had increased to 290 and the proportion of our staff in 3 out of the 4 equality monitoring categories also increased. Just under a fifth (18.6%) of staff were from an ethnic minority background, 61.4% of staff were female, 10.7% had a declared disability and 2.8% identified as LGBO, The median age of our workforce was 43.

By March 2022, staff declaring an ethnic minority background rose by 4 percentage points, female representation increased by 2 percentage points and employees declaring a disability increased by 2 percentage points.

Ofqual tracks inclusion and diversity data monthly and benchmarks against the 2011 Census data categories for England and Wales. We will update this information when the 2021 Census data is available.

What Ofqual will do

We have incorporated EDI into our People Strategy 2022 to 2025 which will be underpinned by 3 priority objectives and reaffirms our commitment to be a diverse and inclusive employer. Our priority objectives for EDI are to:

• be data driven, evidence-led and take action to increase the diversity of our senior leaders, with a particular focus on grade 6 and above
• support the 2022 to 2025 Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy in its aim of promoting fairness and performance
• work to make Ofqual an even more inclusive organisation where colleagues feel valued and respected

Other equalities work

This section explains other equalities work that contributes to our general duty to give due regard to the need to eliminate discrimination, advance equality of opportunity and foster good relations between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic and persons who do not share it.

Enquiries and complaints

We have improved the accessibility of our customer contact services during the reporting period and continue to make further improvements. We have developed online service access for people who want to raise queries or concerns through our complaints handling service. We are now working to improve the online accessibility of our general enquiries service. This reflects our commitment to reviewing and updating our services to meet public sector accessibility requirements.

We encourage people to contact us by whichever communication method is appropriate for them and are mindful of any support needs they may have. We have a range of communication channels, including online, by phone, or by letter. If people are unable to use web pages or other services due to their accessibility, our accessibility statement explains how we will support them to resolve this. Our staff are trained to identify and support vulnerable people’s needs, engage with advocates who support vulnerable people, and flexibly respond to individual needs. When responding, we aim to use plain, accessible language.

We have designed our services to capture and share intelligence about the enquiries we receive. Our online complaints system captures a range of data that we use to identify trends, for example about the use of reasonable adjustments or special consideration.

Between 1 April 2021 and 31 March 2022, 281 of the 6,047 public enquiries we received (around 5%) were logged as relating primarily to reasonable adjustments, special consideration, access arrangements or protected characteristics.

Between 1 January 2021 and 31 March 2022, 55 of the 863 complaints we received (around 6%) related primarily to arrangements for reasonable adjustments, special consideration, or concerns over potential bias or discrimination by centres.

Website accessibility

During the reporting period, we continued to improve the accessibility of information published on our website for disabled people as described in Ofqual’s accessibility statement. The majority (82%) of pages published on our website within the period had accessible versions available, based on a sample of 50% of published pages.

This means more of our information is available to people who are, for example, dyslexic, visually impaired or navigate using screen readers. This work includes providing information directly on webpages by default. HTML format is the preferred default publishing format on GOV.UK as it provides more flexibility for those with access needs to be able to use the content. Documents that need to be downloaded are harder for screen-reading software to access and translate into useful information, so we provide these in addition to accessible formats, where required.

We run accessibility checks on all information before publication to ensure, as far as possible, that the formatting of data, tables and images is compliant with recommended government standards. We are working to complete these checks earlier in the document creation process so that accessibility is an integral part of how we produce information.

Communicating with students and parents

It is important that students of all ages, apprentices and their parents have access to information about the regulated qualifications that they take so that they can feel confident that the standards are set appropriately and they can be trusted. We have continued to provide information for students and their parents about the arrangements for regulated qualifications. This included a student guide to awarding for summer 2021. We produced the main guide in both PDF and HTML formats, as well as easy read and British Sign Language versions.

As in other years, we directed students seeking information and support after receiving their qualification results to the Exam Results Helpline run by the National Careers Service. We briefed the helpline team about the exceptional assessment arrangements in place due to the cancellation of exams so they could provide information and support for students. Within the student guide, we signposted students who had concerns about possible discrimination to the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS). We briefed the EASS about the assessment arrangements for 2021 so that they could support any students who contacted them.

Listening to the views of students is important to us. We continue to seek students’ views, through consultations, visits to schools and colleges and by working with organisations such as The Student Room. During the past year, we have sought to hear a broader range of student views about regulated qualifications, including through work with the Social Mobility Foundation and the Autism Education Trust.

Working with stakeholders

Ofqual collaborates with stakeholders with an interest in equalities to help us understand the equality impact of our work and to inform our regulatory approach. During 2021 we spoke with a range of stakeholders, including:

• groups that represent the interests of, or teach, disabled students
• colleagues in other government departments about areas of mutual interest that concern the accessibility of qualifications and assessments to students
• · centres, teachers and students to understand their perspective on the impact of the pandemic on qualifications, including specific equality impacts
• · organisations with a particular interest in equalities

We provided opportunities to discuss our consultations on the proposed arrangements for the assessment and awarding of general qualifications and VTQs, particularly the equality impact assessments of those arrangements. We also encouraged stakeholders to respond formally to our consultations.

In January 2021 we briefed equalities stakeholders, and invited their views, on our (then) forthcoming joint consultations with the DfE on alternative arrangements for awarding in summer 2021. In March 2021 we spoke with equalities organisations and ACF attendees about two documents:

• information for heads of centre on the submission of teacher assessed grades (applicable to general qualifications only)
• information for centres about making objective judgements (applicable to general qualifications and VTQs)

We also held stakeholder briefings on equalities related publications, for example Ofqual’s Learning during the pandemic research and Summer 2021 student-level equalities analysis – GCSE and A level.

We considered the views of our stakeholders, including equalities organisations, before finalising these documents and publishing them alongside our consultation decisions.

We continue to engage with a range of organisations with an interest in equalities, and have established relationships with the Centre for Research in Autism and Education Black Leadership Group during the reporting period.

Access Consultation Forum

Ofqual organises and hosts the ACF to bring together organisations that represent the interests of disabled students with awarding organisations and other qualifications regulators. The forum discusses issues that affect the accessibility of the qualifications and assessments we regulate. The focus is primarily, although not exclusively, on the accessibility of general qualifications for disabled students. ACF also considers accessibility issues relating to VTQs and national assessments and can consider issues affecting students with other protected characteristics. We have developed additional forums with a specific focus on VTQs where equalities issues relating to those qualifications can be considered in more detail.

We make meetings of the ACF as inclusive as possible. These include inviting attendees to inform us of any access needs, and scheduling in rest breaks where a palantypist may need to attend.

During the reporting period, we have briefed ACF on the publication of our Equalities report 2021, our ongoing work to develop new accessibility guidance for awarding organisations, and changes to assessment arrangements for 2022. We have considered the relationship between validity, equality and fairness in assessment. We have discussed reasonable adjustments, in particular line spacing in exam papers and the evidence of need required by exam boards for applications for extra time in exams.

An ACF member, Communicate-ed, shared findings of its centre survey The Impact of the Pandemic on Access Arrangements. This also indicated an increase in requests for reasonable requests, as well as some changes in the types of requests received, with many respondents identifying that the change was due to the impact of the pandemic. In response to its survey, Communicate-ed planned to produce resources for centres, students and parents.

VTQ Awarding Organisation and Stakeholder Equalities Forums 

Ofqual established a VTQ Awarding Organisation Equalities Forum to give us and awarding organisations an opportunity to share current practice, ask questions or raise concerns relating to equalities in VTQs. It also provides opportunities to discuss data and research, and gather feedback from attendees about Ofqual VTQ programmes of work or consultations.

Ofqual also set up a VTQ Stakeholder Equalities Forum, to help us better understand centres’ experience of equalities issues, such as the provision of reasonable adjustments. This is mainly attended by centres with an interest in equalities, including training providers, colleges and alternative provision or hospital schools.

The forums have provided a useful platform to discuss equalities issues. This has included highlighting work on the link between equality and validity, sharing our research on the use of assistive technologies, and our work on the accessibility guidance.

Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC)

Ofqual has continued to work with the EHRC to inform them about changes to the arrangements for the awarding of regulated qualifications. The EHRC responded to Ofqual’s consultations on the proposed arrangements for awarding qualifications in 2020 and 2021, guidance in relation to appeals under the General Qualifications Alternative Awarding Framework, and contingency arrangements for the award of GCSE, AS, A level, Project and Advanced Extension Award (AEA) qualifications in 2022. We value the EHRC’s contributions to our consultations and took into account all feedback on our proposals, including comments on potential equalities impacts.

We have also raised with EHRC concerns shared with us by stakeholders about some exam centres charging disabled private candidates for reasonable adjustments. Ofqual regulates awarding organisations (not centres) and we regulate in the interests of students. It is important that centres understand their legal responsibilities so that no students are disadvantaged. We wrote to awarding organisations confirming that it is unlawful under the Equality Act 2010 to charge disabled students for providing or arranging reasonable adjustments. We have discussed with EHRC their forthcoming guidance on the relative responsibilities of exam centres and exam boards to meet the costs of reasonable adjustments for exams and assessments. We welcome their forthcoming consultation on guidance in this area.

In August 2021, we spoke with the EHRC about our (then) forthcoming equalities analyses of GCSE and A level results, and grades awarded for vocational and technical qualifications, in spring and summer 2021. We explained our methodology ahead of results and spoke again after results to explain the findings.

Research and analysis

GRADE project

We have worked with the DfE and UCAS to launch the GRADE (Grading and Admissions Data for England) project. This will allow accredited external researchers access to a rich dataset which covers the years 2017 to 2020. The project is designed to encourage independent research that will enhance the quality of the qualifications system, potentially shedding light on equalities related issues.

Evaluation of centre assessment grades (CAGs) 2020

CAGs in 2020 were, on average, around half a grade higher than grades from previous years for both GCSE and A levels. However, reassuringly, analysis indicated that the majority of relationships between grades and other features studied had not substantially changed compared to previous years once normal variation between years had been accounted for. This suggests that although teacher grades were higher than previous years’ grades, they did not introduce any substantial bias or different patterns of grading.

In July 2021, we published 2 research reports about the awarding of centre assessment grades (CAGs) in England for summer 2020 GCSE, AS and A level qualifications. The reports investigate whether candidates with specific characteristics were more likely to be affected by discrepancies in grades between their centre assessment grades (CAGs) and calculated grades.

Learning during the pandemic

In the run-up to summer 2021, Ofqual closely monitored other research about learning during the pandemic. We used this evidence to support policy-making and published our work as a series of literature reviews. Our objective for this work was to understand the impact of the pandemic on levels of learning that were likely to be achieved by summer 2021, providing a context for understanding qualification results in summer 2021. The literature reviews covered a range of topics relating to the effect of the pandemic on learning.

A key conclusion from this project was that socioeconomically disadvantaged students seemed, on average, to have lost relatively more learning than their more advantaged peers.

We also noted that there will have been many exceptions to this general conclusion, as many advantaged students will also have been extremely seriously affected and many disadvantaged students will not have been, as each student’s experience of the pandemic was unique.

Given the conceptual distinction between teacher prediction of prospective performance (centre assessment grades in summer 2020) and teacher assessment of current attainment (teacher-assessed grades in summer 2021), we carried out a further literature review on systematic divergence between results from teacher and test-based assessments, to raise awareness of potential risks to the dependability of assessment results which are based entirely on teacher judgements.

Our review reached several conclusions. We found evidence that:

• gender bias was mixed – but a slight bias in favour of girls (or against boys) was a common finding
• ethnicity bias was mixed – there were findings of bias against as well as in favour of each minority group (relative to the majority group) as well as findings of no bias
• disadvantage bias was less mixed – bias against the more disadvantaged (or in favour of the less disadvantaged) was a common finding
• SEN bias was less mixed – bias against pupils with special educational needs (or in favour of those without) was a common finding

The literature that we drew upon was fairly limited in size, and it is possible that it might have been skewed to some extent by publication bias, whereby evidence of an effect occurring is more likely to get published than evidence of no effect. As such, we did not assume that teacher-assessed grades would be biased in these ways in 2021, and (as explained later in this report) we found little evidence of this.

2021 equalities analyses

In summer 2021, we published separate equalities analyses for GCSE and A level and for VTQs. The details of our analyses are included in our technical reports, Analysis of results: A levels and GCSEs, summer 2021 and Equalities analysis of grades awarded for VTQs in spring and summer 2021. These analyses considered whether the gaps between the average results of different groups of students, which are observed when exams and assessments were taken as usual, changed in 2021 when exams and assessments did not take place as usual because of the pandemic.

For GCSE and A level, analyses considered gender, ethnicity, and special educational needs and disability (SEND). They also considered additional issues of fairness by looking at free school meal eligibility (FSM), English as an additional language (EAL) and socioeconomic status (SES). We compared the extent to which the relationship between results and student background variables in 2019 and 2020 were similar in the 2021 outcomes. In doing so, our analysis accounted for the prior attainment of the students as well as other factors.

The analyses suggested that there was general stability in the differences in outcomes for students with different protected characteristics compared to 2019 and 2020 and increases in outcomes for many groups. There were some small, relative changes in overall outcomes, which may reflect the uneven impact of the pandemic.

Similarly, for VTQs, analyses considered learner characteristics that included ethnicity, gender, SEND, FSM, and prior attainment. In the majority of cases we found no notable changes over time in the relative probabilities of achieving top grades between different groups of learners.

In autumn 2022 we plan to repeat the equalities analyses for summer 2022 GCSE, A level and VTQs.

Teacher-assessed grades in summer 2021

In January 2021, following the government announcement that exams could not go ahead as planned, Ofqual jointly consulted with DfE on how GCSEs, AS and A level grades should be awarded in 2021. The consultation ran between 15 and 29 January 2021 and received over 100,000 responses. We published our analysis of those responses and our decisions following consultation; this included our equality impact assessment.

The arrangements required centres to give their students teacher-assessed grades (TAGs). We provided information for heads of centre, heads of department, subject leads and teachers about how to generate these grades and the evidence that should be considered. Exam boards provided a package of support materials to help teachers make these judgements and provided advice on how centres should collect and submit evidence.

The grades submitted to exam boards had to reflect a fair, reasonable and carefully considered judgement of the student’s performance across a range of evidence, on the curriculum content that they had been taught (or, for private candidates who undertook self-study, the content that they had studied).

We refreshed our information for centres about making objective judgements, which was designed to help teachers make judgements as objectively as possible, to promote fairness and minimise bias. It applied equally to judgements relating to students based at centres and those who were private candidates, including home-educated students. The information document confirmed that reasonable adjustments for disabled students and access arrangements should have been in place when evidence was generated. Where they were not, centres were advised that they should take that into account when coming to their judgement. The document also reminded centres of their obligations under the Equality Act 2010.

GCSE British Sign Language

Ofqual has continued to engage with the DfE during development of subject content for a new GCSE in British Sign Language. We have also engaged with stakeholders including the National Deaf Children’s Society (NDCS) and the British Association of Teachers of the Deaf (BATOD) as we consider how best to communicate with deaf people (including professional bodies) during forthcoming consultations on the regulatory arrangements for these new qualifications.

National Reference Test (NRT)

In 2021 we asked NFER (the organisation contracted by Ofqual to develop and deliver the test) to revise some NRT items and developed new items to increase the diversity representation in scenarios and questions, and to use source texts from non-white authors.

Equality impact assessments

Equality impact assessments (EIAs) are important for our policy development process. Ofqual undertakes them when we consider options before we consult as well as when we take decisions following consultation. In our EIAs we set out the potential equality impacts we have considered as we have developed our proposals and the impacts that might arise, either positive or negative, due to the approach we propose to put in place or the options available. EIAs help us to determine any likely positive or negative impacts of a policy position, including on people who share a particular protected characteristic.

EIAs help us to consider how we can mitigate or eliminate any negative impacts, promote opportunities for ensuring equality, and decide what future action to take. To make sure we have considered as many of these impacts as possible, we ask respondents to our consultations whether there are any impacts we have not identified, and whether they have suggestions for how any negative equalities impacts could be removed or reduced.

Between 1 January 2021 and 31 March 2022, Ofqual published 17 new consultations, plus decisions on 17 consultations that had closed between July 2019 and January 2022. We included EIAs of both our consultation proposals and our consultation decisions. The EIAs are all published on our website. EIAs contained our initial assessment of potential equality impacts (on which we invited respondents’ views), and the EIAs of our consultation decisions took into account respondents’ feedback on potential equality impacts.

Before Ofqual finalises any policy decision, we consider the potential equality impacts, including any new impacts raised by respondents that we might not previously have identified, to decide whether there are steps we can take to reduce any potential negative impacts. Where we can, we may reconsider proposals in response to issues raised or gather further information to help assess the impact. On occasion, we might decide that such impacts are unavoidable.

When Ofqual publishes consultations and consultation decisions, we include our EIA. We identified potential equality impacts in 12 of the 17 consultations published in this reporting period. These included our consultations on arrangements for awarding in summer and autumn 2021, contingency arrangements, regulating academic and technical qualifications at level 3, arrangements for non-exam assessment for qualifications in 2022, designing and developing accessible assessments, and regulating Digital Functional Skills qualifications.

Where a negative impact cannot be mitigated, we set out clearly and transparently the reason why this is the case. Further information on the impacts, actions and decisions we have taken is available as part of the EIA in the relevant consultations.

Business planning

Ofqual’s corporate plan 2022 to 2025 introduces our 4 new strategic priorities:

• quality and fairness for students and apprentices
• clarity, effectiveness, and efficiency in the qualifications market
• shaping the future of assessment and qualifications
• developing Ofqual as an effective, expert regulator, and inclusive employer

Ofqual has worked across the organisation through the business planning process to identify equalities-related work relating to those strategic objectives. We have also reviewed the way in which teams across Ofqual plan and share their equalities related work, to increase collaboration and raise awareness within the organisation.

During the coming months we will develop our new equality objectives from 2023 to 2027.