SATs markers were this week scrambling to get through tens of thousands of questions after an already-extended deadline passed, prompting calls for the assessment series to be nationalised. Contractor Pearson called on maths markers to help get through the outstanding grammar, punctuation and spelling (GPS) tests, in what has been described as an “omnishambles”. It follows weeks of technical glitches on the new ModMark marking platform created by the exams giant, which took over the £180 million SATs contract from outsourcer Capita this year. Union officials are calling for a public sector organisation to run SATs, as the government signals an “ambition to end the era of outsourcing by default”. Last week markers were granted four extra days – until Sunday – to finish questions ahead of results day on 7 July. ‘Buggy’ system But on Monday, Pearson asked all markers to help mark GPS questions. Marking was still underway when Schools Week went to press on Thursday. Schools Week spoke to a marker who was only allocated their first SATs marking at the end of last week – just days before the already extended deadline. They were allocated 30,000 questions initially, but by Tuesday this had doubled to 60,000. Pearson told the marker they had allocated this many “so nobody runs out of scripts”, the marker said. In the email to markers, Pearson said they increased allocations across “all items which means your progress against target may appear lower than before. “This was just so we could keep marking available for those who wanted to take on additional work.” But because of the issues accessing the “buggy” system, with questions taking 20 minutes to load at times, the marker only got through a couple of thousand by Monday. “It appears the online platform has not been able to cope with the demand therefore the amount we can mark has been way less than if the platform actually worked properly. “A lot of us are wasting time waiting for things to load. It’s an omnishambles.” ‘One final push’ On Thursday, Pearson asked GPS markers for “one final push” to clear all marking for a question. They offered double the marking day fee for working five or more hours to clear the marking. The marker praised the helpline which had tried to help them as much as possible with queries. Another marker confirmed to Schools Week they were still marking on Thursday. They was contacted by Pearson asking if they would continue and upped the allocation to 20,000. “It has been a shambles on every level,” they said. They had “never known marking to go so late” and usually finished before 10 June. Markers also posted on the social network Reddit about the issues they had faced. One posted on Tuesday they had received “a phone call from Pearson begging me to do 5 hours of GPS marking. I’m maths specialist! If I did 5 hours they would double the hourly rate. I don’t have 5 hours as I have a full time job and tutor!” Other posters reported logging on at one point to find there were no questions left to mark, only to be told later there were many available. In the Pearson email, they apologised for issues with ModMark, saying they were “continuing to make updates to the system and are working to resolve these as quickly as possible”. Improvements were being made on “an ongoing basis”, they said. Nationalisation calls The first year of Capita’s SATs contract was also plagued with problems. Schools Week investigations found that in 2022 thousands of papers went missing, markers were locked out of training and there were excessive helpline waiting times. An Ofqual report from 2023 also found that there were technical issues with marking and results, but not to the same extent as the previous year. Pearson had been responsible for marking SATs before Capita took over the contract. This years’ issues have prompted renewed calls for the assessments to be brought into the public sector. Darren Northcott, national official for education for teachers’ union NASUWT, said: “We would be very concerned by any failures in the system of administrating these tests. “They are high-stakes assessments for schools under the current school accountability regime and there have been similar failures in the past. “We have always been clear that if the government wishes to conduct these assessments, they should be seen as a core function of the state and carried out by an organisation located within the public sector.” It comes after the government published new guidance on reducing outsourcing. Central government departments with more than £100 million in annual contract spend will create five-year road maps to “rebuild their in-house capabilities”. When existing contracts end, officials will also check if those services should be run directly by the public sector instead of automatically hiring private companies. A Pearson spokesperson said: “Marking is now in its final stages and we are progressing through planned closing activities. “We would like to thank markers for all their hard work, professionalism, and patience throughout the process. “We are sorry for the issues some markers experienced with the online system during the marking period. We continue to expect results to be returned as planned on 7 July.”