PPTC - Transfer 2022

Statement from PPTC in relation to the 2021-22 Entrance Assessment

Background

Over the past weeks and months PPTC has engaged with parents, primary school principals, its own members, its test provider GL Assessment, AQE and other stakeholders to help shape and finalise plans for the 2021-22 Entrance Assessment.

Parents and primary school principals were very strongly of the view that a 2021-22 Entrance Assessment should:

be held after the Halloween break and before Christmas 2021 – a January 2022 Assessment was not favoured;
Include a contingency plan – in the event that the Assessment could not take place on the planned date;
Be based on English and Mathematics as in all previous years;
Include mitigations to take account of the disruption to formal schooling experienced by pupils who will sit the Assessment.

Parents and primary school principals suggested a number of ways that the traditional Entrance Assessment could be adapted to suit the 2021-22 situation.

PPTC was made aware that many parents would prefer the Assessments to be held in the pupils’ own primary schools; however, there was an equally clearly articulated view from many of the primary principals and from a Teaching Union that the Entrance Assessment must continue to be held in PPTC schools.

Key Decisions in relation to the 2021-22 Entrance Assessment

The Entrance Assessment will be held on Saturday 13th November 2021.
In the event that it is not possible to hold the Assessment on 13th November, a contingency date of 11th December 2021 will be used.
The Assessment will be based on English and Mathematics with Gaeilge versions available as in all past years.
Both the English and the Mathematics papers will be significantly modified to take account of the disruption to formal education experienced by pupils and the desire of parents and teachers that the Assessment be held in November rather than later in the school year.
To ensure that all pupils have the same experience, the Entrance Assessment will be held in PPTC Centres, with all appropriate Covid safeguards in place.
The registration period for the Entrance Assessment will open on Tuesday 1st June 2021.
As far as possible, pupils from the same primary school class bubbles will be registered to sit the Assessment in the same PPTC Centre.
Specification guides will be available in the week beginning 17th May 2021. For English these will set out specific steps that have been taken to reduce the overall demand of the Assessment - for example, by reducing the number of comprehension passages from 3 to 2. For Mathematics the specification will show that the overall demand of the Assessment has also been reduced – for example, by limiting the topic areas which will be assessed and the content within some of these topic areas.
A full practice English paper and a full practice Mathematics paper (+ Gaeilge versions) will be available, at no cost, at the start of the P7 school year