SATS cheating - by the Head!

Well I would not have a room with one person in as you’re setting yourself up for a fall.

Maybe the other governors will do it for you 😊

Meaning I have no intention of following your suggestion.

meaning?

Dream on.

Unacceptable.

Whatever anyone else on the thread thinks is morally the right thing to do, if you are unable to be objective due to your prior experience as a HT, you should not be a CoG (or a governor at all)

What else are you applying your own ‘moral compass’ to vs procedurally what should be happening? Bit of harassment but sure they didn’t mean it? Bit of non-compliance on safeguarding but everyone’s busy and it’s a difficult role right?

You are not independent and should step down.

If you want to send it to the Governors, send it to the Chair (you can usually do this via the school office if you don’t know their email address). However, I disagree with the poster who said to keep it very brief. The more details the Chair has, the more it will help him/her decide what to do.

Sending it to the Chair ramps up the seriousness. What he/she will do is up to them. Depending on their integrity and their relationship with the Head, they might just ignore it, though they would probably feel obliged to discuss it with the Head, who might of course assure them that it’s all nonsense. Whether they took it further and reported it would again be up to them.

You could of course address your email to the Head but copy in the CoG; that way you’d be more likely to get a response, but if you don’t want it reported to the STA you’d be running that risk.

Having been a HT I'm now a Chair of Governors and would hate to have to make a decision like that! Personally, tbh I would probably decide not to take it further, in the knowledge that the Head had received a big shock even if they didn’t admit it, though I acknowledge that this might not be the most moral thing to do.

ALL schools cheat on Sat's. ALL OF THEM.

I would report too. Unfair advantage. Headteacher is very well aware of the rules.

Part of my role is to monitor the administration of SATs, unannounced visits, checking against the strict guidance.

I also have a role in investigating maladministration.

@Dilemmaramma report here.

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/how-to-report-maladministration-at-key-stage-1-and-key-stage-2

Sorry but this really made me laugh. My friend and I had the discussion today about how private schools definitely cheat on their results and you seem to be adding a bit of evidence to that!
Morally OP it is wrong I would probably write a letter to the school and left it there

If it's such bollocks then why cheat?

It's such an utterly dreadful example to set children. Mine lost all respect for their headteacher after seeing her cheat like this. And so has a lot of the wider community after hearing about it through their children etc.

Plus my son thinks his (now former) head is extra daft as when she corrected his nearby friends maths question she got the answer wrong (DS is a proper maths nerd and so is his over friend who overheard) . So she's a bit of a joke to our family now.

ALL schools cheat on Sat's. ALL OF THEM.

Mine doesn't.

To some extent yes. But the whole point is it’s utter bollocks. I realise that doesn’t help 100% honest primary schools it also doesn’t help the secondaries who get loads of kids with inflated grades either who then struggle with progress 8 as a result. As the old saying goes - there are lies, damn lies and statistics.

ALL schools cheat on Sat's. ALL OF THEM.

It really shocks me how many teachers behave. I work in the NHS and we have such high standards of probity and governance that we are expected to adhere to. There is no way that I could get away with this low level of ethical behaviour. Yet here so many teachers are actively supporting it. Shocking. Whether SATs are important or not is irrelevant. This is cheating.

You do know not all schools have the same layout/ play areas, don't you?

I think it is disgusting that some schools think it is appropriate to make children cram for the tests during SATs week, and even worse if they are coaching some children just before each test, in full knowledge of the content. Some schools/teachers must be really shit inadequate, and they know it!

ALL schools cheat on Sat's. ALL OF THEM.

The kids in the other years go and play in the infants playground

My daughter was being "coached" all morning until she did her sats. She's very upset about it as she was tired before she even began her tests.

Once the test was over they were all back doing more revision sessions for the next test.

It's grim and I am very cross about it. Even without the cheating by the head (which both my children and some of my friends children have reported) it's a completely over the top approach to these tests

And I'm now correcting this for the fifth time!

The guidance recommends that there is more than one adult per room; it does not necessitate it.

No school I've ever worked at (four schools) has ever had more than one adult to a room- not because anyone was cheating, but because we just couldn't lay our hands on enough adults to do this.

ALL schools cheat on Sat's. ALL OF THEM.

It's appalling behaviour. It's cheating.

I would hope that reporting it would result in procedures being put in place so that this wouldn’t ever happen again.