HOLDING a postponed, single transfer exam would have widened educational inequalities between wealthy and poor children, academics have claimed.
The number of 11-plus-style tests for current P7s had been cut from the usual five held over four Saturdays to just one.
The Association for Quality Education (AQE) intended to hold its assessment on February 27. It reversed this decision last night.
Children usually would sit three AQE papers with the best two scores counting to allow for an `off day'.
Prior to the cancellation, academics from the Centre for Research in Educational Underachievement (CREU) at Stranmillis University College had been looking at the issue.
They said due to the closure of schools and cancellation of GCSE and A-levels "the wisdom of conducting the transfer tests for the 2021 post-primary intake has been widely questioned".
Preliminary studies from across Britain and Northern Ireland, they said, indicated that a lockdown learning gap had appeared between the wealthy and poor.
Children were experiencing widely different educational outcomes due to access to technology, parental availability and competence, access to quiet space, and school resources.
"Furthermore, it is likely that a focus on test preparation in the already pressured context of remote learning, transitioning back to on-site schooling, and constant disruption due to Covid-19 transmission within schools has further impacted P7 pupils," they added.
The report noted that transfer tests were originally postponed until January following a judicial review last September to allow P7 children a period of preparation time in schools - "a decision that the education minister argued would benefit children from disadvantaged backgrounds".
"The transfer tests due to take place in January have been cancelled, and whilst the PPTC have no plans to implement any new transfer test, at the time of writing the AQE have replaced their cancelled tests with a ‘single paper’.
"Whilst this move has been clearly rationalised by a defence of the principle of academic selection, it is now more likely than ever to widen educational inequalities between wealthy and poor for the current P7 cohort, with long-lasting effects.
"We know that distance learning has been least effective in low-income homes and the homes of key workers. We know that wealthy families are able to best prepare their children for the transfer tests either because of their own high levels of education or by paying for private tutoring. We know that any single test could give an inaccurate reflection of a child's ability, either due to how they perform on the day, or how their paper is marked."