A former education secretary has “implored” the Department for Education to block the mass rollout of digital exams, warning that a “cascade” of technology could result in handwriting disappearing from schools.
“There should be no rush to move online,” said Damian Hinds in a House of Commons debate today.
He added that, while a digital approach to exams might result in time and cost savings, “there are certainly also risks, some of which are immediate, some of which would only [emerge] over time”.
“If we do move en masse to online exams and away from pen on paper, I promise you we would never go back,” he said. “The cautious approach, I suggest, is what’s required.”
Mr Hinds, who was education secretary in the Conservative government from January 2018 to July 2019 and more recently shadow education secretary for a spell, conceded that there were cases where access arrangements for digital exams would be suitable for students with special educational needs and disabilities.
But he said he would “implore” the government “not to allow exams en masse to go digital”.
The introduction of digital exams
Mr Hinds’ comments follow a warning from an education union leader about “an excess of caution” over the introduction of digital exams.
Pepe Di’Iasio, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, told Tes in May that “the potential benefits [of digital exams] are massive”.
He was speaking after Colin Hughes, CEO of the AQA exam board, said that digital exams may not be ready until 2028, and not for a major subject until at least 2035 - five years later than originally planned.
Mr Di’Iasio highlighted that young people are “now more accustomed to using keyboards in the course of their lives than handwriting, and scripts would be easier for markers to read and could be delivered to them immediately”.
However, Mr Hinds warned that the “safest way to protect the integrity of exams is to have [them] handwritten in exam conditions, with a teacher walking up and down between desks”.
He explained: “Exam boards would like to move entire exams online for all children. In a sense, of course, that would be better, because then it would be equal. There wouldn’t be any difference in the speed at which you can write versus type.
“And you might say, ‘Well, so long as that’s the case, if it’s the same for everybody, and so long as the internet is disabled, the spell check is disabled, the autocorrect is disabled, and everybody’s equal, then what’s wrong with that?’”
Mr Hinds added: “I would suggest there are still security risks, multiple types of security risks.”
‘Threat’ to handwriting
The former education secretary warned that the rollout of digital exams has the potential to “cascade” through all exams and age groups, resulting in an end to handwriting in schools.
“If your GCSE is going to be done online, how are you going to do the mock GCSE? You will do it online. So how will you do the Year 9 exam? Of course, you’re going to do it [online],” he said.
“So it cascades further and further down the age range, until eventually you start to get people questioning, ‘Well, why am I learning to write with a pen?’ Of course, some people already ask that question.”
Mr Hinds spoke of the “important advantages” of handwriting, saying: “There is plenty of evidence that hand-made marks on a page aid visual memory, and handwriting also helps you understand things as you’re writing it down, because you’re synthesising something…There’s even evidence to suggest then people do better in tests and have better recall as a result [of using handwriting].”
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