If you are a parent, living in Northern Ireland, and like me have a child born in 2007, there’s an acronym that at the moment will likely be forming the basis of many a family conversation: AQE — the Northern Ireland post-primary transfer test system. It is this system that I believe is discriminatory, meritocratic, reductionist and is based on an outdated and antiquarian get-ready-for-the-factory educational system the fundamental structure of which has changed little in the last century – it should be abolished. 

It is discriminatory against pupils who come from an economically disadvantaged background. It is meritocratic and reductionist inasmuch as it reduces the broad range of possibilities that make up a student’s abilities down to two core subjects: maths and English. It then unfairly ranks student’s intellect based on the results of a written exam; a mode of assessment that does not suit the broad range of learning styles that students have.

This is my personal opinion. It is my personal opinion based on experience. I have five children, two of which have gone through the transfer test system and one child who, this academic year, will probably take the test. While this is my personal opinion based on the experience of putting two children through the system — and likely, the long and not for now story of my own negative experiences of secondary level education — it is also an opinion based on recent evidence from a 2016 Northern Ireland Assembly Research and Information Service Briefing Note titled Academic selection: a brief overview. Before I lay out some of the headlines of that report I’ll give some context in the form of a brief history of the transfer test system.

In 1947 academic selection was introduced; in 1997, the Labour government commissioned research into the effects of the system. Then Minister for Education, the late Martin McGuinness MLA, established a Post-Primary Review Body which was chaired by Gerry Burns. The purpose of the board was to consider potential options. The review body recommended ending transfer tests; instead prioritising parental choice; and the development of a pupil profiling system to provide information on progress and help inform parental choice.

In April 2003 – in the absence of a functioning executive – Jane Kennedy MP set up another review which made similar recommendations: ending transfer tests, with transfers instead based on a pupil profile. As part of the St Andrews Agreement, Tony Blair delegated the decision on academic selection to the NI assembly – recommendations were made to abolish the system but no change happened.

In 2009 the Department of Education published the following guidance that, “schools must admit applicants to all available places (statutory duty); decisions on admissions should not relate to academic ability; recommendations include giving priority to pupils entitled to free school meals, with other criteria relating to applicants with a sibling at the school, applicants coming from a named primary schools and applicants residing in a defined catchment area; and primary schools must not depart from their statutory obligations to deliver the curriculum, and should not facilitate unregulated tests in any way.” On the 7th September 2016 the Minister for Education, Peter Weir MLA reversed this decision. Since then an unregulated system of academic selection has been in place.

2015/16 figures show that of students transferring from post-primary education, 13,235 (60%) attended a non-grammar, while 8,964 (40%) attended a grammar. In non-grammar schools these figures also show that there is a “greater concentration of disadvantage students . . . using free school meal (FSM) entitlement . . . In 2015/16, 17% of all Year 8 pupils entitled to FSM attended a grammar, compared to 79% of their counterparts who attended a non-grammar.” 

Data from the Department of Education also shows that “around 95% of students at grammar schools achieve the GCSE threshold measure of five GCSEs at grades A* – C including English and maths, and that this has remained relatively static over the past seven years.” The same data also shows that “in 2014/15 at non-grammars, less than half (45%) of students achieved this measure, representing an increase of 11.4% since 2008.”

The 2016 Northern Ireland Assembly report concludes that “the evidence indicates that the higher concentrations of disadvantaged students in non-grammars have a significant impact on academic outcomes, as well as on other contributing factors such as school attendance” and that “In addition, the high results among the top performers in Northern Ireland mask a long tail of underachievement. The OECD notes that the selective system presents “clear structural challenges to equality.”

The transfer test system is discriminatory and, along with the grammar school system, should be abolished. It should be replaced by a system where pupils are given a broad ranging academic portfolio, not as a meritocratic means of assessment but as a way of identifying their skills, interests and stronger subject areas. Schools should then be required to take an equal amount of students from each ‘strength area’. This would mean that a student who shows a high level of ability in art or music but not maths will be given the same opportunity as someone who has a high mathematical skill level, thus ending the current maths/english subject-discrimination.

The data is clear: the current meritocratic system serves a minority. It serves those from advantaged backgrounds. Those from disadvantaged backgrounds are discriminated against. It reduces the broad range of skills and talents present in all pupils and in addition penalises those who don’t perform well in an exam environment. This is particularly challenging for pupils with additional needs who the current system discriminates against. This is an antiquated system. It is a system that serves the few and not the many. There are better options.