Performance bandings for primary schools in Wales have been delayed until September 2014, the Welsh Government has announced.
Education Minister Leighton Andrews said the delay was to allow for the introduction of new tests.
The system of ranking primary schools in bands according to performance was to be introduced this Easter after a similar system for secondary schools was published in December 2011.
In a statement the Minister said: “I have also listened to similar concerns expressed by local authority officials and teachers.
“On the basis of all this evidence I do not feel we currently have sufficiently robust data to be used in the calculation of bands for primary schools. We need to wait until we have data which are based on more consistently standardised, and therefore, more robust data.
“We are in the process of introducing new reading and numeracy tests. These will all be in place in all schools on a statutory basis from 2013. These tests will be subject to a more stringent level of quality assurance and standardisation and will therefore provide data which is more reliable for the calculation of bands. I shall therefore be delaying the introduction of bands for primary schools until September 2014, when we can use the data from the new tests.”
“I am, however, still committed to ensuring that that we consider the whole passage of children through the education system and ensuring that we have quality provision at an early age which remains consistently high for all pupils until they leave education. This was a manifesto commitment of the incoming Government and it will be implemented.
“We are not going to wait until we produce bands for primary schools to begin the process of developing a more consistent national approach to assessing their performance and support needs. The regional consortia of local authorities inform me that there are already examples of efficient and well-developed systems in place for undertaking this work. I have asked officials in the School Standards Unit to explore these approaches with the consortia with a view to sharing good practice nationally to ensure efficient and high quality approaches are in place across the whole of Wales.”