The Scottish Government will not step in to help students affected by ‘unfair’ marking in the Higher History exam, The Herald can reveal.

The Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) is facing accusations from teachers – including current exam markers – that changes to marking practices seriously disadvantaged students and led to a more than 25 percent drop in performance in one part of the exam paper. The overall pass rate for Higher History also fell from 78.7% in 2023 to just 65.7% this year.

The Herald approached the Scottish Government to ask if the Education Secretary – herself a former modern studies teachers – would take any action in order to address the concerns of whistleblowers and protect young people who have been adversely affected. In response, a spokesperson said that the processes would be evaluated by the SQA itself.

According to a number of teachers with experience of marking for the SQA, students had to be much more specific when answering questions than has been the case in previous years. However, teachers themselves had not been made aware of this change prior to the exam, meaning that they had no opportunity to inform students that their answers would require more detail.

Discussing the events that took place this year, one teacher and marker (who spoke to The Herald on condition of anonymity) said: “It was a sh*t show.”

“New principal assessor and marking team. The standard seems to be all over the place.”

On the decision to require more detailed and specific responses from students, they added: “They were looking for so much information for one mark. One of the examples had five different bits of info to get the one mark.”

An individual who has held senior positions with the SQA said that the steep fall in average scores and pass rates “is honestly criminal”. They argued that it is “very clear that there has been a big change in the standard required this year, especially in the Scottish paper.”

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Since publishing our original report, The Herald has been contacted by numerous teachers, including several exam markers, raising concerns about both this year’s Higher History marking and the overall approach of senior figures in the SQA.

One wrote: “It is so hard to teach higher history when you don’t know the standards from one year to the next; it’s so hard to be part of the marking team with the culture as it is.”

A former head of History and senior SQA appointee told us that the organisation is poorly-managed and is not “mindful of its responsibilities to teachers and their students”, adding: “nothing surprises me about what is going on.”

Another called on the SQA to release pupil exam papers – as is happening in a small range of subjects as part of a trial – in order to “ensure transparency.”

More than one individual referred to the SQA response to teachers’ complaints as “gaslighting”, while another described the organisation’s explanations for falling results as “patent nonsense” and “beyond credibility”.

Despite this, a spokesperson for the Scottish Government said that exam marking is an “operational matter for the SQA in its independent role as an examination body.”

They continued:

“As in previous years, SQA will be undertaking an evaluation of their awarding approaches.

“We are reforming our education bodies to ensure they better meet the needs of learners. Legislation has been introduced to create a new national qualifications body, Qualifications Scotland, which will put the knowledge and experience of pupils and teachers at the heart of decisions around qualifications and assessment.”

The SQA was approached for further comment but advised that they have nothing to add to their previous statement. The organisation has, however, published a statement on its website in which it declares "full confidence in our Higher History team."