Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, when she plans formally to consult on plans to reform (a) primary assessment and (b) baseline assessment.

The Secretary of State set out, in her statement to Parliament about primary assessment of 19 October 2016, our intention to launch a public consultation on the future of primary assessment in England. That statement made it clear that the consultation exercise, which will commence in the near future, will consider the best starting point to measure the progress that children make in primary school.

Separate to future policy considerations, the Department is in contract with those providers it approved to offer an optional reception baseline assessment to schools in the 2015/16 and 2016/17 academic years. As contract managers, Departmental officials are in regular contact with these providers regarding the operation of these optional baseline assessments. In such meetings, the Department does not discuss future policy, or the design of any new baseline assessment.

Robert Coe, Director of the Centre for Evaluation and Monitoring, Durham University (one of the current reception baseline providers) does advise the Department on general assessment policy issues as an expert in the field. He was a member of the Commission on Assessment Without Levels set up by the Department in 2015, at which point he made a formal declaration of interests. Mr Coe attended a meeting, among other experts, on 10 May 2016, with myself and Departmental officials, to discuss primary assessment. This included discussion of how best to measure progress in primary schools. In meeting educational experts, and in all its work, the Department is mindful of the need to manage appropriately any potential conflict of interest.