Problems and Recent Developments in Art and Design Examinations in England

National Art Education Association

Problems and Recent Developments in Art and Design Examinations in EnglandAuthor(s): Brian AllisonSource: Art Education, Vol. 30, No. 8 (Dec., 1977), pp. 9-12Published by: National Art Education AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3192201 .

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Problems and Recent Developments in Probe Arsigan *Exmna \oes I p engl snirt

and Design itExarninaions in England Brian Allison

A foreign visitor to English secondary schools between the months of January and July might be somewhat alarmed at the amount of attention, tension, activity, discussion, debate, and dissension generated by the omi- nous and often omnipotent topic of Examinations. The fervor, flurry, pa- perwork, and preparation embroils pupils, teachers, head teachers and, to a somewhat lesser extent because they can only be external observers and critics but with a heavy investment in the topic, the parents of the pupils who are being entered for the examinations. The problems involve everyone; the outcomes affect everyone; and within all of this some of the most significant questions being asked within the field of education as a whole arise with startling clarity. Who is being examined, what is being examined, by whom and for what purposes? Need- less to say, whilst these questions can and do apply across the whole of the school curriculum, there is so much confusion regarding art and design as a societal concept and phenomena that as a school subject art and design education is such a diversified concept as to exacerbate any or all of the problems referred to above.

Before discussing some of the problems and developments in examinations in art and design education, it is necessary to briefly describe what is meant by the English examination system, how it has come to take the form or forms that it does, and why such importance is attached to it. As will be seen, there are a number of anomalies and inconsistencies in the system itself, and these appear to be magnified when applied particularly to that subject we put under the heading of art and design. The reader will appreciate that the necessity for brevity of the description in this article may lead to what some would consid- er to be overgeneralisations.

Principally, the examination system developed from a need to assess certain abilities or capabilities of indi- viduals so as to allow a selection to be made on the basis of which certain educational opportunities could be offered or, as some would have it, reciprocally denied. A second major characteristic is that the instruments devised for that selection, the examinations, have been, until fairly recently, wholly conceived, prepared and marked by institutions or bodies other than the schools, and for this reason the examinations are referred to

as external examinations, or, in other words, they are examinations which have not been the responsibilities of the teachers of the candidates for the examinations. A third major characteristic, which is a logical con- sequence of the second, is that external examinations have to a greater or lesser degree exercised a powerful influence on the curricula of the schools preparing the candidates.

Historically, the point of the educational pyramid has been the university, and the examination system can generally be conceived as being based on a means of filtering out those appar- ently capable of benefitting from a university education. Within this concept, the final selection device is an examination prepared by the university to select students (at about the age of 18 years) from amongst pupils who had earlier shown a potentiality for university entrance. The earlier potentiality of that group of pupils had been deter- mined by an examination, also prepared by the university, taken at about the age of 15 or 16 years, by pupils whose earlier demonstration of academic capability had provided them with a specialised education in designated schools from the age of about 11 years. Selection for thatspeci- alised education at the age of 11 years was made on the basis of per- formances in an examination which, again, owed much to university influence and effort. Figure I illustrates this pattern rather simplistically.

Events, political and educational, over the last thirty or so years have tended to blur the pattern. The selection examination at 11 + has now almost disappeared mainly because the segregation of children into different classes of secondary schools has also almost disappeared, their place having been taken by non-selective, all-ability, comprehensive schools. All children now have to stay at school by law until the age of 16 years but all children can if they wish, although less than half actually do, stay on at school until the age of 18 years. Forms of higher and further education beyond general education other than but including the universities have been developed for those who are capable of benefitting from them. It is in regard to the latter notion that the external examinations still persist as a form of selection in many ways little different from what they have always been.

Initially, the schools' external examinations were devised by the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge. With the later establishment of other

universities they, individually or in collaboration, established their own examination systems, and schools could more or less choose which set of examinations to enter their pupils for. There are now eight Examination Boards based on universities which all provide examinations under the general heading of the General Certifi- cate of Education (GCE)'. The GCE is provided at Ordinary (GCE 'O') level taken generally at 16 years or Advanced (GCE 'A') level taken generally at 18+ years. Results at GCE 'O' level, of course, are used as indicators or prerequisites for entering GCE'A' level courses, and combinations of results at both 'O' and 'A' levels are variously used as prerequisites for entry into further and higher education as well as by a variety of professions, industries, or other vocational routes needing some indication of theirentrants' capabilities.

The range of subjects which can be taken in the GCE 'O' and 'A' level examination is extremely wide, and the choice of which subjects and how many will be taken by any one individual pupil is very much influenced bythe school, the teachers, the pupils, and, to some extent by the pupils' parents. Nevertheless, the syllabuses for the examinations, the examination papers, and the marking and awarding grades remains the responsibility of the Exam- ination Boards. Whilst the GCE 'O' and 'A' level examinations, for all the reasons indicated above, have achieved fairly widespread recog- nition and acceptance as indicators of academic achievement and capability, it can be recognised as being almost self evident that the system has been felt to be more than a little uncomforta- ble when applied, for instance, to art and design as a subject, the majority of teachers of which invest themselves with ideas of individuality and idiosyn- cracy as if they were virtues, as well as by the fact that almost the whole of the education system does not regard art and design as being "academic" any- way. As the historical development of art in schools has been almost singu- larly based upon what has been thought to be how real artists behave2, the GCE external examinations and their progenitors have been thought to be a straight jacket which has lead to narrow and stultified work. Typical GCE three-hour examination periods in which candidates are required to "Draw a still-life group of everyday objects set up as in the sketch provided by the examination board"; "Paint a pictorial composition based on the

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subject 'Fire at Sea' "; or "Design a curtain fabric for a kitchen based on the theme of vegetables"; etc., could hardly be considered as being inspirational even if they were not to be carried out under examination conditions. What is perhaps surprising is that some astonishingly good work has been produced under these conditions, and the standards, whatever they were intended to represent, have generally been high. The examiners, however, have only been in a position to assess the work as simply "art products" and not take into account the nature or range of learning acquired during the course other than that evidenced in the products submit- ted. When completed, the examination products are sent usually by parcel post to the appointed examiners, and, in due course, the candidates are informed of the results, which are often surprising to both the candidates and their teachers. At GCE 'A' level, the majority of the Examina- tion Boards include a compulsory written paper on Art History as part of the Art Examination paper, but whilst giving a choice of periods and topics from which choice can be made do not require that any relationship need be made to the work carried out in the "practical" part of the examination, upon which, of course, the greatest weighting of marks is placed. It should be pointed out that most GCE Boards offer schools the opportunity to put forward their own examination syllabuses, but this is extremely rarely done.

Because of what may be described as the genetic origins of the GCE examinations and the purposes to which they were applied, only about 20 percent of the school population are considered academically capable of being entered and for whom it would be an appropriate terminal qualification for their period of general education. For a variety of reasons, including that of providing some kind of motivation to the broadening secondary school population as well as establishing some measure of achievement of a wider band of ability, a new examination was introduced in 1965 with the title, the Certificate of Secondary Education3, or "CSE" as it is more familiarly known. Simply described, the CSE is orga- nised and administered by fourteen CSE Boards regionally distributed throughout England, and a major dis- tinction between the CSE and the GCE is that the Boards are majorly made up of teachers from within the region. The matter of teacher involvement arose primarily out of a dual concern which, on the one hand recognised the wide and more generalised range and nature of studies undertaken by what might be described as the bottom 80 per cent of the ability range of pupils, and, on the other, the increasing demand for

teacher participation, involvement, and, latterly, accountability in schools curricula and assessment as part of re- cognition as being responsible members of a profession. The CSE provided a challenge to art teachers, many of whom had claimed for a long time that "art" could not and, therefore, should not be examined. The examination, of necessity, drew together art teachers to form subject panels, and many art teachers found out, often for the first time, that they had more in common with each other than the prev- alent, but to my mind, misconceived notion of themselves as individual "artist-teachers"4 had led them to believe. The third, and perhaps, most significant and difficult matter con- fronting the art teachers was the requirement to become articulate regarding their purposes, practices, and most importantly, priorities when it came to assessment of candidates. As the teachers themselves were to act as examiners for each other and as moderators, the onus was firmly placed upon them to resolve internal conflicts. it also, and perhaps most emphatically, made clear that which should have been most obvious from the earliest days of structured examinations: that examinations and curricula are directly interrelated5. Rather than the tail wagging the dog, as the GCE examinations had appeared to the teachers trying to devise curricula based on them, CSE made clear that tail- wagging is a joint function of insepera- ble dog and tail.

Although the CSE was to function alongside of and, in a sense, be an alternative to the GCE, some estimate of comparability had to be arrived at not only for the schools' and pupils' sakes but also for whosoever wanted to use an examination result for whatever purposes they do, such as for entry to college, profession, university, and so on. GCE is a pass/fail examination, although schools have access to the range of grades awarded in each subject which are based on the A to E continuum. CSE does award grades 1 to 5 in each subject, and a CSE grade 1 pass in a subject is considered as equivalent to a GCE pass at Ordinary ('O') level, which could, of course, be an E level pass. Despite all that is claimed for the CSE, it is generally recognised that whatever failings the GCE might have as an examination, anyone who has a GCE pass in Art may be considered "better," whatever that might mean, than anyone with a CSE grade in art less than grade 1. The principles described at the beginning of this paper can, therefore, still be seen to apply. From its inception the CSE recognised some of the teachers' perceptions of short falls in the GCE pattern and therefore gave the teachers the opportunity of entering candidates in what were termed three modes of the

10 Art ducaion, December 1977 10 Art Education, December 1977

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examination. Mode I. Examinations conducted by

the examining board on syllabuses set and published by the board.

Mode II. Examinations conducted by the examining board on syllabuses devised by individual schools or groups of schools and approved bythe board.

Mode III Examinations set and marked internally by the individual school or groups of schools but moder- ated by the board6.

The opportunity was provided by these alternative modes, particularly Modes II and IIl, for art teachers not only to determine for themselves, either individually or in collaboration, what the aims, objectives, and activities for art education were to be but also the means and criteria by which achievement and performance were to be assessed. It is of utmost significance that eighty percent of candidates are entered for the CSE Mode I examinations, that is within syllabuses prescribed by the examining board. There are reasons for this which will be discussed later, and it is hoped will shed some light on current dilemmas in art education.

As against the "single-performance-on-a-particular day" characteristic of the GCE examination, the art and design teacher contributing to the formulation of CSE syllabuses felt that work carried out during the "course," usually identified as being the two years previous to the examination date, should contribute to the assessable work. It was also felt that by involving teachers in the assessment, particularly in relation to course work, some credit could be given to a candidate's demonstration of interest, persever- ance, willingness, and other less defi- nable qualities during the course but which clearly could be taken account of in assessing a candidate's capability. Invariably, therefore, the CSE examination actually consists of an exhibition of the candidate's work which includes a selection of "course work" and a "test piece," for which certain conditions are prescribed. As most of these "exhibitions" are assessed within the schools in which the work has been carried, the scale and amount of work is much greater than it could have been had it had to be sent to an examiner as was so with the GCE referred to earlier. Considerable debate has gone on as to the weighting given to each, but in terms of percent- ages it varies from between 60/40 to 80/20 depending on the feelings of the subject panel at the time. It is not surprising that the vast majority of schools opt for Mode I examinations, as the syllabuses are couched in such general terms as to admit almost any- thing the teacher wants to teach in almost whatever quantity, although most syllabuses hope that both two-

and three-dimensional work will be carried out.

When it comes to the assessment of the exhibitions constituting the examination, the following description is not untypical

The following qualities will be looked for: Imaginative expression, originality of vision, a sense of design, pro- portion and fitness for purpose, and the ability to communicate these. Work may be in any traditional or experimental medium.

Agreement trials are held by most CSE Boards with the teachers in the roles of examiners to arrive at some consensus of grades with a moderator appointed by the Board to assist and resolve discrepancies.

A survey carried out in 1969 showed that over the 14 CSE Boards an average of 60 percent of the marks awarded were on the criterion of "creativity or originality."

What is characteristic about the CSE examination is that an art teacher can literally teach whatever he wants to teach, and the assessment is based on criteria which are expressed ephemer- ally and subject to idiosyncratic inter- pretation. Conditions vary from school to school and from teacher to teacher, and often it is difficult to determine what role a candidate has had in pro- ducing the work exhibited, from what source the imagery has been derived, or exactly what the candidate has learned.

These dilemmas all fall within the parameters of the "artist" concept of art education and the particular "artist- studio" notion in which it is carried out7. The emphatic wish of the majority of art teachers not to be solely responsible for assessing their pupils' work is also based on the belief that to actually act as the "assessor" may spoil the personal relationships which they, albeit temporarily, feel they develop with their pupils. Many feel more com- fortable that the "good" or "bad" news regarding assessment should come from "anonymous authority."

At the present time a sharp and critical look is being taken at the examination system in England. Proposals are being put forward for a common examination system at 16+8 and for a more realistic examination at 18+, although the futures of both are very uncertain. Principal questions relate to what schools are or should be preparing the pupils for, and acceptance is being given to the fact that examinations do form the bases for determining curricula. If a critical look is directed at art and design in schools, there is irrefutable evidence that few children choose to study art after the age of 14 years when choice of subject is given (less bright children are, however, often channeled into art because it is widely conceived that art in schools as practiced does not

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demand high levels of thought); even fewer choose to study the subject at GCE '0' level; fewer still at GCE 'A' level; and only 2 in every 10,000 of an age group find their way onto a degree course in art and design9. It is worth noting at this point that colleges of art and design attribute little value to GCE 'O' or 'A' level results in art.

The "artist" concept as the basis for art education is being strongly chal- lenged, and attention is being given to the multiplicity of relationships children and ultimately citizens can and could have with art and design. Impor- tance of the fundamental experience of being involved in making art is still strongly recognised but only if provided within appropriate contexts.9 External examinations, whatever their shortcomings, do have an important and influential effect on what goes on in schools throughout the whole of formal general education, particularly when teachers in schools are involved in their development. Despite their involvement at the inter face of educational endeavor, however, teachers alone cannot provide the perspectives from which meaningful curricula can be developed, and realisation of this will bring about the most positive developments in English art and design education. A report of a working party commissioned by the Schools Coun- cil11 to put forward examination proposals summarised the aims of art and

design studies as follows: 1. The development of a broad

understanding of the meaning, significance and contributions of art, craft and design in contem- porary culture;

2. The development of perceptual skills leading to sensitivity to vis- ual and tactile qualities, together with an enhancement of experience in art, craft and design;

3. The development of bases for informed aesthetic judgement, personal and community;

4. The ability to value and meaning- fully experience the cultural heritage of this and other socie- ties, past and present;

5. The ability to be able to hold, articulate and communicate ideas, opinions and feelings about art, craft and design.

A Th,L, i,lr.1,m,nf 6 .f nr.rt;, t Ilor U. I nt U VIUfJ.ilup llrt U

individual subjects aa interests, but not ex production and expre

The activities implicit ir could be taken to inclu looking at, thinking ab about, feeling about, knc and responding to, art, design. The achievement c would be dependent on tt of a range of fundameni regarding the nature of a design.

FIGURE 1

5 years

A SELECTIVE MODEL OF EDUCATION BASED ON EXAMINATION

The examination proposals based on the achievement of these aims were intended as a framework which required involvement of the art and design teachers in resolving the critical questions posited earlier, and equally importantly not only laid guide- lines by which art and design would leave its present status on the periphery of general education as a frill subject and become recognised as an essential contributor to the quality of human life and experience, but also the means by which it could be identified and assessed as doing so. Needless to say, there is much to be achieved before that state is reached.12

Brian Allison is professor of education, Leicester Polytechnic, England.

REFERENCES

t .JaILIELJlal 1 A brief description of the G.C.E. ex- otitudes and amination, its Boards and subject can clusively, in be found in Schools Council (1973), .assion. ~ssion. G.C.E. and C.S.E. A guide to sec- 7 these aims ondary-school examinations for lde making, teachers, pupils, parents and employ- out, talking ers, London: Evans/Methuen Educa- )wing about tional.

,craft and 2 This idea and its origins are dis- )f these aims cussed in Allison, B. (1972), Art Educa- te formation tion and the teaching about the art of tal concepts Africa, Asia and Latin America..., irt, craft and London: V.C.O.A.D.

3 See 1 above. 4 See 2 above and also Allison, B.

(1974). Professional Art Education, Journal of N.S.A.E., 1, 1. 3-9, Extract published in NAEA Studies in Art Edu- cation (1975), 16, 3, 39.

5 The matter in relation to G.C.E. and C.S.E. is perceptively discussed in Dines, P. and Booth, R. (1977), Curric-

UNIVERSITY ulum and Examinations: how should they interact?, Dialogue. Schools Council Newsletter, No. 24, 5.

6 See 1 above p. 9. 7 See 2 above. 8 Schools Council (1971), A common

system of Examining at 16+ Examina- tions Bulletin 23, London: Evans/Me- thuen Education.

9 See Allison, B. (1973), Sequential SECONDARY Programming in Art Education: A

revaluation of objectives in Piper, D.W. (Ed.), Readings in Art and Design Education. Vol. 1. After Hornsey, Lon- don Davis Poynter.

10 See 4 above. 11 Schools Council (1976), 18+

Research Programme Report of the Crafts Commissioned group based on the National Society for Art Education.

PRIMARY 12 See 10 above pp 8-9.

*The term "pupil" in England generally refers to the individual child or adolescent in schools of general education, whilst the term "student" identifies the learner in further or higher education such as in college, polytechnic, or university.

12 Art Education, December 1977

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Problems and Recent Developments in Art and Design Examinations in England

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