Provider-level qualification achievement rates (QARs) will include only some courses in 2020/21, the Education and Skills Funding Agency has announced.
Only those that are subject to normal assessment will be included, but qualifications that receive teacher-assessed grades will be left out.
The QARs will then be shared with individual providers as well as Ofsted for inspection purposes and deciding which colleges and training providers to visit.
QAR data, which is used to measure providers’ performance and hold them to account, was not produced for the 2019/20 academic year following the Covid-19 outbreak. Providers were not sent the data nor was it shared with the inspectorate.
The ESFA had said earlier this academic year that the data would again not be published in 2020/21, but that it would be shared with providers and Ofsted.
Announcing the decision to exclude teacher-assessed qualifications again, the agency said: “Recognising the ongoing impact of the pandemic and published guidance on the awarding of qualifications for summer 2021, those qualifications confirmed as subject to normal assessment (category A) will be included in institution level QARs and shared with Ofsted and providers.
“Those qualifications confirmed as teacher-assessed (category B1) and those which may be subject to a teacher-assessed grade if they cannot safely access an assessment (category B2 and Access to HE courses regulated by QAA) will not be included in institution level QARs or shared with Ofsted or providers for 2020 to 2021.”
Ofqual has split the awarding of vocational and technical qualifications (VTQs) for this year into three broad groups.
Those that are most like GCSEs and A-levels, such as most BTECs, will receive teacher-assessed grades. VTQs that are used for direct entry into employment and demonstrate occupational or professional competence will see their assessments go ahead as planned.
And assessments for VTQs that are unlike GCSEs and A-levels but are still used for progression, such as functional skills and English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL), should still go ahead. But if this is not possible, they can receive teacher-assessed grades.
The QARs are the percentage of enrolments that are successfully completed and passed in each academic year by providers.
They are produced for apprenticeships, adult education and 16 to 18 programmes.
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