The Reception Baseline Assessment is time-consuming, unreliable, and draining on schools’ budgets. We must continue to fight its use and protect young people from this controversial statutory assessment, says Deborah Lawson


You could be forgiven for thinking that the world has returned to normal. Everywhere you look people are huddling at the bus stop, heading to work, shopping for food, going out, mingling at the school gates.

Add to that the re-introduction of primary assessment and accountability measures, the return of Ofsted inspections, and the brand-new Reception Baseline Assessment (RBA)…

We seem to have conveniently forgotten the unsustainable pressure that schools continue to feel as a result of the pandemic.

The benefits of RBA, such as they are, will not be felt for a number of years. It is planned that RBA will herald a move toward a progress-based accountability system and that key stage 1 assessment will be made non-statutory and a glorious thing of the past.

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