The New A Levels: A Survey of the Experience in English

The story so far The introduction of new A Level specifications in all subjects in 2008 represented the second major re-thinking of A Level in a decade. Major reforms took place in 2000, under the label Curriculum 2000, which were intended to align A Levels more effectively in a context of widening participation and to modernise syllabuses and subject content. There were some successful aspects to this change, but on the whole Curriculum 2000 was considered a disappointment, creating as many problems as it solved, particularly in the area of assessment (see, for instance, Hodgson and Spours, 2003). In English, attempts to modernise the subject were considered half-hearted by some and rashly radical by others, but most agreed that some aspects of the new specifications were problematic, again especially in the area of assessment (Atherton 2003, 2004