I’m one of the signatories on this letter to sixth form heads in Cambridgeshire.

Dear Cambridgeshire Sixth Form Head,

We have been horrified by the scandal of marked down grades for A level pupils, and the astonishing reinforcement of educational inequality which the system chosen by the government has produced.

We know you share this horror at the downgrading of many of your students.

We are deeply concerned that a similar impact will be felt by many GCSE students, who will be receiving their grades this coming week. 

We are writing to ask that you do everything in your power to take students on the basis of the Centre Assessed Grades, rather than those they are allocated by the government’s algorithm. 

We know this may prove difficult in some cases, as some sixth forms are over subscribed.  We would ask that in these cases you work together to try to ensure that every Cambridgeshire student is given a suitable place, with as many as possible offered their first choice, and where this is not possible that judgements are made in consultation with schools, rather than in using the flawed grades produced by the OFQUAL algorithm. 

We recognise that the chaos caused by the government’s exam results are not your responsibility, and wish we did not have to write to you asking for your help to fix the problems it will cause for many students:  that should lie with the government. We also know the great strain that has been placed on schools over the last few months and the extreme challenges you are facing in preparing to re-open in September. We offer our thanks to you and all of your staff for the incredible work you have done, and wish we did not need to ask more of you at this time.  We will do all we can to support you with the practicalities of making this offer and are writing to the Cambridgeshire MPs in the hope they will offer the same.

Yours sincerely,

Aidan Van de Weyer
Liberal Democrat Candidate for Mayor of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough

Lucy Nethsingha
Leader of the Liberal Democrat group on Cambridgeshire County Council

Cheney Payne
Teacher and Deputy Leader of the Liberal Democrat group on Cambridge City Council

Ian Sollom
Liberal Democrat Parliamentary Spokesperson for South Cambridgeshire

Pippa Heylings
Liberal Democrat Parliamentary Spokesperson for South East Cambridgeshire

Lorna Dupré
Deputy Leader of the Liberal Democrat group on Cambridgeshire County Council