Dear Parents of S7 Students, dear Students,

The ‘BAC 2023 season’ is now underway and we wish all the candidates great success.

Immense efforts are made each year regarding the quality assurance of the examination papers and to ensure that all goes smoothly. Considering the number of papers and students involved, problems with the exams are rare. Nevertheless, if you like to be prepared ‘just in case’, your school’s Parents’ Association and INTERPARENTS, are ready to help:

Possible actions in the next 2-3 weeks and before the announcement of the results

If your child comes home following an examination with a concern about it, please take time to understand the nature of the problem. Should you conclude that your child encountered a problem, which was possibly due to a mistake in the paper (such as vague wording or incorrect translation) or in how the examination was run, then it could be worth raising your concern with the Chairperson of the Examining Board (Article 13 of Regulations for the European Baccalaureate) and with the Baccalaureate Unit responsible for management of the overall examination.

If there has been a ‘procedural irregularity’ (i.e., any infringement of the rules governing the Baccalaureate and its implementation), which may have been ‘prejudicial’ to a candidate’s performance, then remedial action at the level of the Examining Board and of the Baccalaureate Unit may be taken by the supervising authorities before the proclamation of the Baccalaureate results, without anybody having to file thereafter an official complaint on such irregularity. A range of compensatory measures are in fact available to the subject inspector and to the Chair of the Examining Board.

However, it is generally worth parents and/or their representatives or students sitting for the BAC alerting these authorities informally to any potential procedural irregularity, in case it has not been picked up already. Such procedural irregularities range from a specific examination question being faulty in some way, to some kind of incident occurring in the exam room resulting, for instance, in the examination being delayed or halted. The concept of ‘procedural irregularity’ does not cover, though, local situations, for example where a teacher seems not to have covered the syllabus in class or the school bus was delayed, causing a candidate to be late for an exam. However, in such cases, the Director of the Examination Centre may take note and take action where appropriate.

In the context of this informal channel of notification of potential irregularities, INTERPARENTS may be able to help clarify the situation with the Baccalaureate Unit (in the Office of the Secretary-General) before the announcement of the results. INTERPARENTS, as co-ordinator for all the Parents’ Associations, has an open channel to the Baccalaureate Unit. We will collate all feedback via our e-platform, cross-check the situation in other European Schools, analyse the crucial facts with a view to identifying potential errors, consult with experts in the field and then decide on the appropriate way forward (action at the level of the Chair of the Examining Board, of the Head of the Baccalaureate Unit, and of the Secretary-General, as and when necessary). It goes without saying that all persons involved, either at local or at central support level, will be guaranteed confidentiality and anonymity in any follow up.

It is important to note that INTERPARENTS plays no part in any official process of internal investigation, possible remediation or appeal. We have no authority to defend personal interests in an official way, only to help in raising issues and awareness and request constructive and fair approaches by all the authorities involved.

Your Parents’ Association and INTERPARENTS representatives will work closely together on any issues arising during the Baccalaureate Season and will keep you informed of relevant progress. Our aim is for any corrective action deemed necessary to be taken prior to the results being published. These informal options for raising concerns should therefore be concluded by the time the Baccalaureate results are published.

Please consider that we are just a few volunteer parents who need to react quickly to possible concerns raised by you. In order to build strong cases, we need your active support! In particular, if you need to raise a concern, we would ask you to:

• consult with other parents and students, if the concern is shared;
• obtain informal feedback from the educational advisors and teachers
• detail the problem as much and as clearly as possible by providing facts and circumstances, along with any important background information, including any feedback that you have already obtained and
• Place a ticket on our dedicated support platform.
  Finally, if you are a specialist in an academic field corresponding to one of the Baccalaureate subjects, or in one of the languages in which exams are conducted, could you spare some time, if needed, to help us analyse any problems which may arise? If so, we would like to hear from you and ask that you send us an e-mail to info@interparents.eu

With all our best wishes for a smooth BAC season,

Interparents

Your local School coordinators (contact form):
Selene Dall’Olio
Floriana Grimaldi
Rosa Montanti