GCSEs: Why won't they let island see the full picture?
EDUCATIONAL standards in Guernsey have long been respected.
EDUCATIONAL standards in Guernsey have long been respected.
Year after year the department releases GCSE data that shows how the island outperforms England and when approached for comment the minister replies in glowing terms.
It paints a happy picture.
But is everything as it would seem?
Why does the department refuse to release data that would give islanders a more rounded picture?
While statistics will never provide a definitive answer as to whether a child is getting the education they deserve and performing as well as they could - there are so many factors at play - comparative information is a useful guide for parents and policy makers.
In 2010, more than 730 students in Guernsey and Alderney received their GCSE results, in 2009 slightly more than 600.
Education, like its counterpart in Jersey, does not release results based on achieving five A*s to C including English and maths - the benchmark used in the UK - or detailed breakdowns by school.
Surely parents have as much right to know how their schools are performing as people in the UK?
Given all the information, they can make up their own minds about whether our schools are achieving everything they could and apply public pressure accordingly.
Questions by the Guernsey Press failed to prompt the release of data that would be normally available elsewhere - including a breakdown of five A* to C passes including English and maths by each school in 2009 and 2010.
In Jersey, it took a leak and a freedom of information request to elicit detailed exam results, a route not available locally with no FoI regime in place.
After years of secrecy and repeated claims that Jersey consistently outperformed the UK in GCSE results, the Jersey Evening Post revealed in March that, in two of the States schools, fewer than one in five children left with five GCSEs at grades A* to C, including English and maths. The overall UK average is more than 50%.
Perhaps more worryingly, the publication of the data also highlighted large differences in performance between schools.
In May, Jersey's Education and Home Affairs Scrutiny Panel recommended that Education minister James Reed come up with a new publication system, including the grades and comparisons with other jurisdictions.
He has refused.
Educationalists have argued that the publication of full exam results would be counterproductive, lead to league tables and, potentially, to schools narrowing their curriculum.
But first and foremost the debate should focus on the public's right to know and why, at the moment, islanders see part of the picture despite the information being available.
Guernsey's Education Department has meekly tried to justify why full statistics are not released, but will at least review its policies later this year now the latest set of results are out.
No one would argue that exam statistics are the sole guide to performance, but at the moment no other measurable objectives have been released in Guernsey.
UK Education Secretary Michael Gove has said that, by 2015, he expects every secondary school in England to be achieving the current national average of at least 50% of pupils achieving five A*-C grades at GCSE, including English and maths. If not, the school will be regarded as underperforming.
The current threshold to avoid that label is 35% of pupils getting five 'good' GCSEs, including English and maths.
Guernsey has no such published target so what is the measure of success here? What standards are schools held up to?
Education itself has indicated it believes standards can be improved when it announced its controversial plan to introduce formal uniforms at the high schools without ever publicising what the goal would be.
Validation reports on school performance in Guernsey's secondary schools are now historic.
The Grammar School & Sixth Form Centre's dates from 2002, Les Beaucamps Secondary School from 2003, La Mare de Carteret Secondary School from 2006, St Anne's School in Alderney from 2005, St Sampson's Secondary School from 2004.
Much has changed in the meantime, not least the closing of one school and its integration with another on a new site in St Sampson's High.
There should be no qualms in publishing comprehensive and comparable performance data.
Publication of exam results sparked a huge debate in Jersey, one that has not been had in Guernsey.
That Education is willing to publish some comparable data with the UK - the total A* to C figure - but not all of it, is perverse and does a disservice to the public.
If it is content with where island schools are, it should have nothing to fear.
If there is a hidden issue, exposing it could be the ideal prompt for action.
