AS-levels to be regraded as chaos spreads

Thousands of students who sat AS-level exams this summer are to have their papers regraded, Mike Tomlinson, chairman of the independent inquiry into the A-level marking fiasco, admitted last night.

Mr Tomlinson, who on Friday announced that A2 exams (which form the second part of the full A-level) in around 12 subjects will have to be regraded, yesterday added that AS-level papers are likely to have been just as badly affected.

The admission means that thousands of students, now in the upper sixth, who received unexpectedly poor AS-level grades this summer could be spared the extra pressure of having to retake the exam.

Mr Tomlinson plans to announce a definitive list of exams and the number of candidates affected by downgrading on Tuesday but said it would include candidates who were in both upper and lower sixth forms this summer.

He said: "I am not ignoring the problems raised about this summer's AS-levels. I received evidence regarding both AS and A2 exams and will be following up on both in the same way."

Headteachers from both private and state schools had presented Mr Tomlinson's inquiry with a dossier of evidence of AS-level grade fixing after the concerns over this summer's AS papers were revealed in The Independent on Sunday last week.

They claimed that the exam boards had attempted to rig 2003's A-level results by systematically raising the grade boundaries for this summer's AS-level candidates to ensure a lower overall pass rate. The London Oratory, where Euan Blair, the Prime Minister's eldest son, took his A-levels this summer, has already lodged queries over results awarded to its students by the examining board at the centre of the downgrading dispute, OCR.

A number of headteachers, including those of the London Oratory and Radley College in Oxfordshire, were among educationalists who rejected the Government's shift towards the division of A-levels into six pass-as-you-go modules, preferring to stick with exams taken at the end of two years' study.

John Dunford, general secretary of the Secondary Heads Association, said: "It is important to right the wrong done to these students as quickly as possible."

Euan Blair missed out on place at Oxford after being awarded a C in French. Instead he is due to begin a degree in ancient history at Bristol University tomorrow.

Meanwhile, Sir William Stubbs, the sacked chairman of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority, stepped up his attacks on education ministers, accusing them of "an amazing inability to turn abstract educational ideas into policies". He cited an attempt by a private company to take over the exam board Edexcel as evidence, saying ministers failed to give a lead on what would be a significant change to the system.

Sir William, who was sacked by Estelle Morris, the Secretary of State for Education, on Friday, said he wrote to her about Edexcel's future but had received no reply.

Edexcel confirmed it has had talks with more than one private company and said it was keeping open its options.

Sir William was fired after the Tomlinson inquiry found no evidence he put pressure on exam boards to keep the pass rate down.