Lib Dems call for action as ‘hardest exam ever’ leaves students in tears

The Welsh Liberal Democrats have called on the WJEC examinations board to provide urgent clarification after parents, teachers and students made numerous complaints about the AS level maths exam students sat yesterday.

Some students were in tears after taking the paper, which one teacher described it as “the hardest exam ever” .

There were widespread complaints that the exam contained multiple questions which had not been in the course syllabus.

Utterly dreadful situation to put these students in. Am appalled. Hoping all the schools make it clear how awful this was for students. And how utterly ridiculous!

— Jenan Girardi (@Jenancyberspace) May 19, 2022

Welsh Liberal Democrat Leader Jane Dodds MS said: “WJEC must provide an urgent statement clarifying whether or not this exam contained questions that were not on the course syllabus and if it did what they intend to do to rectify the situation.

“Many students, who had already had their education badly affected by Covid are now feeling extremely anxious and teachers have also expressed their concern.

“The Education Minister also needs to ensure absolute clarity is being provided to schools and pupils in order to minimise any disruption for students who have already had an extremely difficult time.”

Challenging

A spokesperson for the WJEC said: “We can confirm that all of the questions within the AS chemistry and mathematics examinations were from the subject content and did not rely on knowledge and understanding of any topics removed from assessment in 2022.

“Examinations always include a range of questions, some of which are more challenging than others, so that we can effectively differentiate across the whole grade range and award a fair grade to each student.

“We also consider past assessments when writing papers to ensure that each year’s examinations are comparable.

“When all the examinations are marked, senior examiners carefully consider students’ responses and set grade boundaries accordingly. If we find, for example, that one year’s paper was slightly more demanding than a previous year, the grade boundaries we set will take account of that.

“In addition, Qualifications Wales has announced that qualifications will be awarded more generously in 2022 than in 2019 (the last full examination series), to mitigate the disruption experienced by students due to the pandemic.”

The board also said it would investigate all complaints.