Covid-19 and BTEC course

[SunshineDays2019]

I have read that BTEC grades will be assessed on likely grade had the course been completed and further announcements will be made. My DC is in year 13 and in limbo, especially now it's the Easter holidays. Has anyone else heard what is happening?

Just bumping for you OP

This is the Ofqual announcement: www.gov.uk/government/news/awarding-vocational-and-technical-qualifications-this-summer

I would also look at the website for the awarding body for his specific qualification. It does say on the above link that further guidance will be given after Easter.

I teach BTEC. As with everything, when the government announced school closures and exam cancellation, they forgot about vocational courses. At the moment, all we know is that any external assessments due to be sat this season are cancelled, and that further guidance will be released “after Easter”. In my subject (Performing Arts), Pearson are being as transparent as they can be, but I don’t think they’ve actually decided yet how grades will be calculated. I have told my students not to worry about it. Honestly, I’m not worried - I think they will do their absolute best to ensure that yr 13s are not disadvantaged.

Thanks all for replying. I thinks it a case of watch and wait, and we'll hopefully know more next week after the Easter holidays.

I raised this in ABIU a week ago or so and got not a single response.

BTEC seem to be waiting for an agreement to be reached with OFQUAL. There has been no guidance about BTECs at all other than

a) exams will not take place - my learners did all theirs in January so of no help to them or me.

b)sampling (in order for a centre to be released so grades can be claimed is currently suspended (or they may have used the word postponed - definitely not cancelled)

I, along with thousands of teaching staff, are still plowing through content whilst being unable to carry out any of the practical work via online sessions. Students don't know whether they are coming or going as we are cherry picking random bits of curricula that have a hope of being done remotely. Neither do staff.

I haven't even been able to speak with some due to them having no laptops or internet. Their MH and mine is in a mess and I can do nothing except keep trying to complete complex level 3 assignments (think A Level organic chemistry) with no practicals and very little support as I'm not set up to teach this way although we are doing our best.

We need a definitive plan from the Awarding Organisations urgently so we know what to do.

Thank you wantmorenow and sorry to hear how stressful things are for you right now .

My stress is nothing compared to the learners'. Thank you though. BTEC centres have to pass sampling each year in order to ensure assignment grades are fair and internally assessed work meets standards.

Unfortunately for me I am the nominated person to ensure that happens. Everyone looks to me to have the answers and I have none.

Online teaching starts again Monday and I have no idea what to do as I can't do the practical tasks at all which make up the bread and butter of each unit.

I have 9 years experience and am an External Verifier for BTEC too. If I don't know, no-one does. Fingers crossed something is decided before Monday.

Ofqual priority was GQs (alevel gcse) and they released the info on that last week

Next step is the vqs- btec and other vocational quals. Problem here is that there is such a wide range of qualifications that no one size fits plan will work so they have to create multiple plans

Btecs with university provision are very similar to the alevels therefore it can be assumed that the exam will be predicted grades. General consensus is that the coursework (non examined assessment) will be graded by teachers and then submitted for verification still but logistically i don't know if that will be possible - certainly won't be completed work because the learners finished in March instead of June so there are special consideration applications to interlink here

Within VQs there is also qualifications which give a license to practice (health, animal care, teaching, youth work etc) which would be a worry to complete without enough placement hours and full content and then there is the other extremes of foundation learning and progression qualifications and employment support and offender learning which the btec approach wouldn't work for. They won't want to release for some and not all.

Guidance is expected after Easter and from there the AO's will be in touch with centres to support and guide.

Sorry, you just need to wait a little bit longer.

I know. I don't have a single completed unit due to front loading the exams. There's only a mountain of partially completed bits and bobs compounded by our lab tech leaving.

To be fair the details for A levels & GCSEs was released only a week ago but the general principle was published much earlier. Access AOs have also published their plans. Everyone bar vocational quals has determined that work completed after 20 March is not counted is my understanding. If that was at least confirmed for BTEC then that would be a massive help to know rather than still pressing students for work based on hit and miss teaching.

I can be patient but it creates a lot of work and pressure for both teachers and students especially those with UCAS offers

Thanks again all, very helpful to have this discussion. Hopefully all will become clear soon. In the meantime, my DC will plod on with coursework just in case!

There is updated consultation from ofqual our today - open to all to complete (parents, teachers, learners etc)

Found on the ofqual website