THE Government’s flagship new diplomas are at risk of failing unless ministers scrap A-levels and GCSEs as free-standing qualifications, headteachers warned today.

Mar 8 2008 by Chris Mellor, Huddersfield Daily Examiner

Ministers want diplomas, which combine practical skills with theory, to compete with A-levels to see which courses are the most popular in schools.

But the Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) said teenagers and their parents would be reluctant to make “a leap of faith” and sign up for diplomas that could prove a failure.

ASCL general secretary John Dunford said schools needed to know whether A-levels would survive or be scrapped in favour of diplomas, a decision the Government is not scheduled to take until 2013.

He called on ministers to bring A-levels and GCSEs within diplomas to make the increasingly complex exams system simpler to understand.

Dr Dunford was speaking at the union’s annual conference in Brighton.