Sustained advocacy from our union has led to the Queensland Curriculum and Assessment Authority (QCAA) conducting a review into the new Queensland Certificate of Education (QCE) processes.
Late last year, our union and the Queensland Teachers’ Union (QTU) wrote to the QCAA separately calling for a review into the new processes after consistent member feedback from those involved in implementing the new senior schooling curriculum, assessment and examinations.
This came in addition to our union taking members’ significant and widespread concerns to the QCAA throughout 2020.
Members participation key to reforms
Our union encourages all members who are invited to participate in the review to do so to ensure as many teachers’ voices as possible are included.
The first phase of this review will be to convene a series of focus groups with teachers and community members who performed some of the key school coordination and quality assurance roles in the new system.
These include:
- External assessment coordinators
- External assessment invigilators
- Endorsement submitters and approvers
- Confirmation submitters and approvers.
The QCAA said while they intend to commission a full evaluation of the senior assessment and tertiary entrance changes, the current review aims to identify strengths, concerns and opportunities to make immediate improvements to the systems.
IEU Branch Secretary Terry Burke said members should be commended for taking on the new system particularly given the challenges of the last year and congratulated them for providing such robust feedback so far.
“This is a whole new system change, so it will inevitably have issues and complications; however, we are confident the QCAA are working to address these issues in the immediate and longer term,” Mr Burke said.
“It is imperative IEU members take advantage of this review if invited to participate.”
