News and Blog

A previous blog introduced the context and patterns of early entries to GCSEs in Wales. This blog builds on this to examine the practice of multiple entry and the effect that this has on grades. Using national data of all pupils in Wales who completed Year 11 between 2006 and 2018, we distinguished between pupils…

GCSE entry practices in Wales have meant that many pupils may have sat their GCSE examinations, and thereby certified, before the traditional end-of-Year-11 point of their academic career. Not only have some pupils experienced early entry, some have been entered multiple times in order to maximise the final grade achieved. Influences on the practice of…

By generating high quality research-based evidence, the newly established WISERD Education Data Lab aims to help inform and challenge our understanding of educational processes and outcomes and to support the Wales education sector to meet the aims set out by the Welsh Government in their national mission for 2017-2021. In order to undertake this work,…

Professor John Morgan‘s recent book Civil Society, Social Change, and a New Popular Education in Russia has been nominated by the publisher Routledge for the Alexander Nove Prize 2020 of the British Association of Slavonic and East European Studies. Professor Nove was a famous economic historian of Russia and the Soviet Union. The book is…

      This report provides an overview of our research activity in 2019 – a year that has marked the end of one chapter and the beginning of another, and has strengthened WISERD’s position as an important national research centre. Read more about our latest income profile, the work we’re doing to strengthen our…

WalesOnline, 7th June 2020 Read the full article. Professor Chris Taylor is quoted in the article: “Much of the research on transitions says that it is the familiarisation with high school that is important – knowing where to go, who the teachers are, how work is organised, how much homework there will be, will they get…

Wales is in the process of undertaking a major overhaul of its national curriculum. Until recently, the curriculum largely resembled that put in place by the 1988 Education Reform Act. The new Curriculum for Wales, based on the Successful futures for all review by Graham Donaldson (2015), entails a radical move away from the traditional…

WISERD Director, Professor Sally Power, has won the Learned Society of Wales’ Hugh Owen Medal 2020 for her outstanding educational research. Professor Power is a leading education researcher, with a broad focus on policy and inequality. She plays a significant role in supporting education research throughout Wales. The WISERD Education Multi-Cohort Study (WMCS), directed by…

GCSE exams were due to take place over the next few weeks in Wales, but have been cancelled due to COVID-19. In the second of our blogs about the impact of the pandemic on young people’s education I look at the replacement of formal examinations with teacher assessments. As qualifications bodies will be relying more…

Those of us in WISERD engaged in education research have real worries about the impact of the Coronavirus on the welfare and progress of children and young people. Some are rightly concerned about the impact on young people’s physical and mental health. But here we want to concentrate on the potential effect of the response…