Page 6 - ELG1709 Agu-Sep Issue 450

NEWS .

Pay and standards fears over

Ielts UK marking shake-up

By M. Butler and C. Civinini
A plan to speed up the marking of
the Ielts writing paper by moving
it online could lower standards
and mean markers do more work
for less money, examiners have
warned.
The new on-screen marking
system (OSM) was rolled out last
year through an initial trial period
dubbed ‘Launch and Learn’.
Promising to ‘transform the way
the British Council delivers and
manages Ielts’, the system requires
examiners to work from home for
a set number of weekdays, up to Ielts marking will be done
a maximum of four work days a remotely
week. This, it says, will ‘improve
their capacity to mark high OSM examiners are paid an consistent supply of work and will mark each task. If examiners took
volumes of scripts at a faster pace’. initial rate of £1.75 per short essay not need to spend time on the an average of 12 minutes per essay,
The new system allows for task, rising to £1.84 after 12 weeks. administration related to handling we calculate the payment would be
agency contracts with holiday Under the old system examiners physical scripts. OSM writing below minimun wage.
pay. This is a shift from the old were paid £8.50 per script, which examiners can work from home, as Is 100 tasks a day achievable?
centre-based examiner role, which involved marking two short essays. they are not expected to travel to a A spokesperson for Ielts told the
provided casual employment One examiner who asked not specific location’, they said. Gazette that data gathered during
usually for full time teachers. to be named told the Gazette, ‘I’m But how can examiners achieve the trial period validates the level
According to the documentation really worried about the pay cut a decent take-home pay? The of take-home pay and working
provided by the British Council, ‘it and the effect the changes could expected output according to the hours, and that marking targets are
is not possible to work as an OSM have on standards.’ job description is 100 tasks a day, in line with fair rate requirements.
examiner in addition to a full-time Commenting on the revised UK giving a daily rate of £175, or ‘The benchmark exercise
job’, and this would exclude many pay rate, a spokesperson for Ielts £40,000 a year pro rata. included a 12-month trial period
of the current examiners, who are said that ‘OSM writing examiners Assuming that examiners work of operation which showed that
employed full time. The rate of will work in a different way to an 8-hour shift with a statutory 100 tasks per day is an achievable
pay – which has effectively been current Ielts writing examiners. 20-minute break, this would leave target for OSM writing examiners’,
halved – has also raised concerns. ‘They will be offered a more them with just 4.6 minutes to they said.

newsinbrief

THE COMPUTER- TOO MUCH ENGLISH THE RECORD FOR THE CENSUS FIGURES THAT SECONDARY SCHOOL
BASED ENGLISH IS BEING SPOKEN HIGHEST NUMBER OF PROMPTED OUTRAGE STUDENTS IN ITALY
test which uses voice in Germany, junior nationalities in an English when they showed could get access to
recognition to grade finance minister Jens language classroom has the proportion of EU-funded Erasmus
candidates’ speaking Spahn has told the been broken in London. Anglophones in Quebec programme exchanges,
abilities is making German press. Organised by English had grown are incorrect, Il Sole 24 Ore reports.
headlines in Australia, He complained about UK London and London Statistics Canada has In an interview with
where some native waiters with minimal Nest, the record attempt said. the newspaper, the
speakers failed to pass German working in saw students from 57 The reported 0.9 Italian education
the oral element. The Berlin – and said that countries taking part in a percentage point ‘spike’ minister Valeria Fedeli
most recent victims this would never happen 30-minute lesson about in the number of English announced plans to
of the Pearson Test of in Paris. Three German phrasal verbs. The class speakers – to 14 per cent extend the Erasmus
English were an Irish MPs recently wrote a was taught by St Giles – was due to a computer programme to
vet who wanted to letter to Angela Merkel teacher Vikki Rowland glitch and numbers are students attending the
renew her visa, and and EU officials to ask and three teaching in fact stable. Prior to last two years of high
a Singapore-born that more space be assistants. Official the correction, French school.
Australian citizen and given to German as a confirmation by the language protectionists ‘I am working hard to
former newsreader who working language of the Guinness Book of World had called the rise ‘a make this formidable
was trying to register as European Union, the Records should arrive disaster’ for Quebec experience part of the
a nurse. BBC reports. later on this year. Francophones. curriculum’, she said.

6 August/September 2017

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