Schools desperately short of exam invigilators

[noblegiraffe]

"The National Association of Exam Officers (NAEO) is set to publish advice tomorrow to help schools struggling to recruit enough trained officers. More staff are needed to oversee the first GCSE and A-level exams to be sat in two years, with a snap poll suggesting that 83 per cent of centres are still experiencing a deficiency.
But Jugjit Chima, chief executive officer of the NAEO, has warned that some schools and colleges are "stuck", having already implemented contingency plans, such as staggered starts to exams, but still not having enough staff to oversee next month's exams."

The suggestion is that admin staff and dinner ladies could be asked to invigilate.

Geoff Barton of the ASCL commented that part of the issue is that invigilators don't want to stand in exam halls packed with children who may well have covid (no requirement to isolate) and the government should reinstate free testing for schools, at least for the exam period to provide reassurance.

www.tes.com/magazine/news/general/gcses-2022-schools-desperate-over-exam-invigilator-shortage

There are also serious concerns that desperation will lead to unsuitable candidates being hired, and an increase in exam malpractice.

www.tes.com/magazine/news/secondary/gcses-2022-crisis-fears-over-invigilator-shortage

FWIW, testing wouldn't make any difference. Lots of invigilators have already resigned,you won't get them back now.

They would all have to do refreshed DBS and interviews and the exams start in 7 weeks. No time.

They could drop the ratio of invigilators and the 'roving invigilators' requirement.

“There are several reasons why there is a lack of invigilators.
Firstly, many existing invigilators are reluctant to work in a school environment where they may be more likely to contract COVID-19. As we are aware, a significant number of invigilators are categorised within ‘vulnerable groups’ and, therefore, it is completely understandable that they have such concerns, particularly with pressure from family members urging them not to work in an environment which could introduce risk to their health.
In addition to this, after two summers without exams, many invigilators have moved on to other roles - very often roles which provide better remuneration whilst working less hours. We have been given one example where a local racecourse is paying an additional £2 to serve tea and coffee…
Exams officers have reported poor responses to advertisements and that is partly due to the hourly rate simply not being attractive enough to encourage applications. Unfortunately, due to budgetary pressures, some centres have decided to cut the hourly rate for invigilators – a move which naturally makes it even harder for exams officers to attract new applicants.”

www.thenaeo.org/monthly-message.aspx?nid=49

That’s from the CEO of the National Association of Exam Officers. It’s all very well to assert that ‘covid is over’ and that ‘people are getting on with it’ but when experts on the ground are telling you that isn’t the case, perhaps you should pay attention.

Saying schools should increase pay: where will the money come from?

bungle, I gave two reasons above - more exam concessions = more invigilators needed. GCSEs and A Levels overlapping more = more invigilators needed on any given day.

Also Bungle - where is this money coming from that you speak of?

I often think about going for the role when it’s advertised locally. And then I see it’s not even paid the London Living Wage and think again. I’d be better off doing a cleaning job.

I meant more has there been any systematic method used to explore the reasons with numbers etc.

covid is far from over, it’s the ‘live with it’ phase so it’s everywhere. And millions are getting it each week. Whether that be from school, work, shopping, leisure, hospitality.

Even the job description was enough to put me off @OctopusSay ! Lot of responsibility, including possibly needing to scribe for pupils identified with additional needs, plus as you say keeping in line with all exam regulations. All for minimum wage.

Yes! I was looking at applying, the schools are local to me and the pay is above minimum wage where we are (though not by much). So it would have been very convenient, but the job description was terrifying.

DP's done it before now. With a good place, you can get full days/half days, but often, places will try to just pay for the time of the exam itself and then expect you to go away and come back again or wait in the office for 2.3 hours for the next one. Or things get cancelled/rescheduled at the last minute. Which might be fine if you're financially secure and have your own transport, so are doing it for pin money/something to do, but not when you actually need more than £30 in return for being available/on site for 6-8 hours. To give an example of one very wealthy academy in our area, to get there requires either a car, a three quarter mile walk up an extremely steep hill or a quarter mile one up a dirt track alongside a field. And then it's just for the time in the exam rather than the actual time they will spend working. They might as well ask people to pay for the privilege of being there at those rates.

The other thing is that the pay doesn't reflect what they could need to handle on their own - if students decide to play up, disrupt or otherwise misbehave, they have no backup. They need technical skills. They need to be able to control a group of students to an extent that rarely happens in a normal classroom environment - getting them all to hand over their phones without argument is a massive achievement (adults in testing centres are even worse, some will completely lose the plot when asked to lock them and smart watches away in a locker, by the way). They could be in a room with an extremely volatile student who is already under stress but have no idea what the actual risks are. They need to know how to recognise medical emergencies, such as a child having a diabetic hypo and then hopefully have a means of getting in touch with somebody to arrange for help.

And yes, they have to adhere to strict rules because if they don't, the entire cohort could end up without qualifications.

Worst idea of all is getting teachers/other staff to do it instead, though. They find it hard to resist the urge to help, as it's what they do every day for the rest of their career. Kids expect teachers to help and get stressed when they can't. Some of the kids with poorer behaviour for staff behave far better for invigilators as it confirms to them that it's independent. It has to be seen and proven to be independent to maintain the integrity of the qualifications. And SLT aren't keen on paying the equivalent of £50k for somebody to do something they get away with paying NMW/LLW for.

Essentially, it used to be an OK thing to do for a few pounds extra, but these days, it's expecting a whole lot more for next to nothing in terms of payments.

I teach in an independent school and we have to invigilate them ourselves. However I don't blame people not wanting to be exposed to a hall containing kids who possibly have covid.

I am really amazed independent schools do this .It is against the rules.

@42isthemeaning but teachers are not allowed to invigilate ? We can only see the paper after the exam is over ? I'd keep it v quiet if that's what is happening as OFQUAL will be visiting otherwise.

As a teacher you're not allowed to invigilate your own subject, but you can invigilate otherwise.
Unless something has changed that I've not heard about?
I did notice that MFL staff can no longer invigilate listening exams. It always used to be the MFL teacher who had to do this in case of a tape breakdown and the teacher would have to read out the transcript!

Not it's not. See my message to Mumsneedwine

This is what I thought re LFTs. Covid is everywhere, as it also was before the end of restrictions thanks to the Omicron strain. In any large gathering of people, some of them will have covid. It's that prevalent. Free LFT tests aren't going to and indeed didn't prevent that, because Omicron. Of course individuals who feel vulnerable to covid aren't going to take work that innately involves being around lots of other people if they can help it. They've got the sense to realise that being in gatherings means covid exposure.

Teachers invigilate at our (state) school too. They can't cover their own subjects but they can do others.

We've given up trying to recruit externally and it's all done by teachers, TAs, pastoral and office staff. You need people who are free for the best bit of the summer and prepared to pick up a few hours here and there for practically no money.

I'm sure it's got worse since Covid as people have found other work or decided they don't need/want the work, but it wasn't an easy role to recruit for before

We have repeatedly been told it is against rules.

That aside, it breaks 'rarely cover' agreements.

It's so boring

It has to be voluntary because its outside teaching agreements, but there's nothing in the exam regs to prevent it.

Independent schools are not protected by 'rarely cover' nor are they bound by the teachers' pay and conditions document. Unfortunately!!
Does anyone know if academies are in the same boat?

But how do teaching staff have the time ? Unless they only teach KS4 & 5. Exams go over several periods of a school day and so how does that work for cover ? Or do you all swap over at end of each period during the exams ?
I do agree it's only your own subject you can't invigilate, but not sure it works with gained time tasks either.

Afraid we'd all say no !

My Dd19 did invigilating last year, during her gap year before heading off to uni. (She was asked by the lead invigilator after being the only student at her school to sit a levels in the autumn)
She had a one day online training session and a one day shadowing session. She ended up training others how to upload to the computer systems last year.
She is doing it again from the start of June, when she finishes first year.

Would be advertising for gap year kids and uni students if I were them. She loves the extra money, and the "teamwork" addition to her cv.

We swap over staff at the end of an hour. We have a small roll, so only one invigilator needed in the room for most exams. It does work well, but with the increasing amount of kids needing readers, scribes, separate rooms, etc, it is becoming more and more challenging to find enough staff. Just glad I'm not the one organising the invigilation timetable!

@42isthemeaning that sounds tough. Do you not get gained time tasks ? We do all our curriculum planning then.
We have 300 year 11s and 250 year 13s so need a few more invigilators at our place 😊

Yes, I know that about independent schools. I am just surprised re malpractice risks. DH works in one and I know he does invigilation. Don't think it's right .