Decision

Regulated Qualifications Framework: transitional arrangements

Formal legal notices which confirm when our rules about describing the level and size of regulated qualifications come into force

From:
Ofqual
Published
7 November 2017

Applies to England

Documents

Notice in respect of Conditions E3.6 and E7.6

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Details

Following our earlier consultation on the Regulated Qualifications Framework we decided to introduce our new rules about describing the level and size of regulated qualifications in phases.

We have previously published a notice which brought these rules into force on 30 June 2016 for certain qualifications used either in DfE’s school performance measures, or by UCAS

The attached notice confirms our decision to bring all of these rules into force on 1 January 2018 for all remaining regulated qualifications except:

  • legacy (pre-reform) GCSEs, AS and A levels, and certain qualifications undergoing withdrawal. We have decided to permanently exempt these qualifications from the RQF requirements, so they will continue unchanged until they are withdrawn.
  • reformed GCSEs, AS and A levels, for apprenticeship end-point assessments, where we will only introduce our rules about qualification levels on 1 January 2018. We are carrying out further work to inform decisions on whether and how to introduce our rules about qualification size for these qualifications

Reasons for our decisions

We wrote to all awarding organisations on 1 August 2017 explaining - and seeking comments on - our proposed approach.

We received no responses. As a result, and for the reasons set out in that letter, we remain of the view that:

  • To avoid confusing users or imposing unnecessary regulatory burden, we should exempt legacy GCSEs, AS and A levels, as well as certain qualifications undergoing withdrawal from the RQF requirements.
  • To allow us to carry out further work, we should defer the implementation of rules related to total qualification time for reformed GCSEs, AS and A levels, and for apprenticeship end-point assessments.

We have made some minor changes to improve clarity, but have otherwise decided to confirm those proposals unchanged.

Published 7 November 2017

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