GCSE exam finished early. What can I do?

[CAMHShelp]

DDs GCSE exam was 1 hour and 45 mins. The invigilator asked the kids if they had finished to which DD replied yes, as she had answered all the questions (ASD) but planned to use remain 20 mins to check answers. They immediately took the paper away and ended the exam early as she was the last one to stop writing.
I have made a complaint to the school but they are being dismissive and fobbing me off.
What can I do?

This isn’t an invigilator bashing thread. By the sounds of it, it’s an isolated incident. No my DD did not have extra time, don’t make assumptions. As you work so bloody hard I’m sure you are as shocked as I am that standards have not been upheld and want others in your role to take accountability for that.

School initially denied it but then when I told them my child had arrived home prior to the exam finishing time they accepted then tried putting blame on DD saying she said she’d finished. If I wasn’t WFH that day and knew she was home then they’d have just covered it up.
They’ve said it won’t happen again but still denied it despite CCTV showing it and me being home.

Agree it's not the done thing to have teachers in the room. In Scotland the invigilating team is employed directly by the exam board, not the school. Obviously we work closely with the school staff and if there's an IT failure or some other issue with an exam or a candidate, it's a teacher we call. The last exam I invigilated was History and the candidate was working with a reader/scribe and he was a teacher - but not a History teacher.

Because we are employed on an hourly rate, the usual leaving time for staff is completely irrelevant.

I think the problem @CAMHShelp is that the school are using their own staff to invigilate rather than people who are just invigilators with no other skin in the game. We don't know the kids, we don't know why they have extra time or are not in the hall with everyone else, we just need to make sure the exams are run according to the rules.

I would be questioning why your child's school is using its own support staff as this is clearly not working.

Schools employ specific invigilators these days. My daughter is sitting her GCSE’s and the teachers are not allowed to invigilate. They sit in the class eagerly awaiting the children to go back and tell them what was on the paper.

They are allowed to leave early and can not return. They don’t have to sit there if finished. The issue with the OP is the child didn’t say she was finished. The invigilator seemed to make an assumption and asked if the child was finished (which appears not to actually be allowed) and therefore the child panicked and said they were so they were told to leave. As a parent of an autistic child this questioning can lead the child to thinking they need to be finished and to give the ‘correct’ answer and not saying that actually they aren’t quite finished.

And yes - to invigilate in Scotland you need an enhanced disclosure check. Many candidates have alternative access arrangements for exams, the day of a big English exam there were 20 different rooms for candidates needing extra time, a scribe, a reader, scheduled breaks etc etc etc. and obviously 20 invigilators needed for those 20 rooms. Half the school is off on exam leave but the younger ones are still in for timetabled lessons - using teachers would be a logistical nightmare and also a huge conflict of interest.

It happens in the prelims/mocks, but not the real exams.

There are specific JCQ rules on starting late and leaving the exam early thus reducing the risk of any collusion. Candidates who arrive very late may not have the paper marked although can be allowed to sit the exam.

I am not in UK so rules are probably different but in Ireland there is no way an exam could be finished early like that. Students can hand their paper up and leave if they are finished but papers cannot be taken from anyone until the end or students should not be asked "are they finished" that's mad. My dd is also autistic and that would just confuse her and she would probably just hand her paper back finished or not. Here the state exams happen once the rest of the school have finished for the summer. Teachers are not allowed anywhere near the exam halls it is completely run and managed by Dept. of Education. You often get teachers hanging around after to speak with students and to see what has come up on the paper but the whole things is run externally from the school.
Op I would definitely send in a complaint asap so it is logged especially if you think this may have had an impact on her result

They're not sitting & waiting for the kids to go back, they're usually teaching other classes!

That is poor.

I didn’t quite mean that they sit and do nothing. But they are in their classroom (teaching or free) eagerly awaiting to hear from their students what was on the paper.

Not in the schools where I've invigilated. All pupils stay in the room until the finish time whether there done or not

I think most schools insist the pupils stay until the end otherwise it would be mayhem. 200 kids in a hall, sitting different exams. If they all could leave when they wanted it would be extremely hard to monitor that they’d been there at least an hour and extremely disruptive to other pupils still sitting exams. It’s hard enough monitoring different end times with multiple exams, extra time, rest breaks, late arrivals etc etc.

Haven’t invigilated formal exams for years. All our invigilator team are employed by the school and checked. They work very hard.
I’m sorry this happened OP.

The student didn’t want to leave after the hour was up. If a student finishes early and does not want to check their work any further, the invigilator can collect their script, however the author of the post said their child DID want to check their answers.

No we didn’t get the times wrong. They wrote the start and finish times on the white board and there was a clock in the room. I also double checked the schedule and it was 1hr 45min exam. No extra time.
Unfortunately they didn’t appear to be checking what happened and immediately responded to my email of concern by a blatant lie, denying it, until I explained that DD was in fact home at the expected finish time. To which someone more senior called and attempted to cover it up further rather than accept something had gone wrong and reassure me that they were taking it seriously and would investigate it fully.

Exactly this, DD came home upset because she did want the full amount of time.

It's maladministration and the exam officer/ head teacher should have reported this to the exam board.

You can ask if they have done this.

If you are not convinced they have acted i would contact the exam board for advice.

Is this a big school?

and she was definitely entered into Biology Triple Foundation

because the whole thing is a mess

They can't get away with putting on your daughter, as the invigilator shouldn't have interrupted her to ask her questions.

A school will probably only allow certain named candidates, maybe with ADHD or other issues who can't sit still and won't be finishing the paper anyway, to leave and they will be told to do so.l at a set time. It would be incredibly disruptive if students just got up and walked out willy nilly and might encourage their mates to do the same.

Teachers don't do invigilation, in England at least, it is not part of their contracted duties for one thing. Invigilators are all DRB checked and dont need anyone else in the room.

Allowing students to ask to leave within the rules that clearly state when this allowed per the links above isn't them leaving willy nilly obviously.

I don't know if schools are allowed to override the national rules but since my original post I've had a look at the document and it quite clearly explains at what time candidates can leave an exam.

This is not on OP, I would definitely pursue special consideration.

I hope you can pull together proof of what happened eg any evidence of when your DD arrived home.

Are you in touch with any parents whose children took the same exam, they could corroborate? Indeed they may also wish to complain.