A NATIONAL scandal over an impossible question in an AS-Level maths examination taken all over the UK, has had an effect on 21 students at Alton College.

The examining board Edexcel caused outrage in the education community at the weekend, when it was discovered that the AS-Level maths paper sat by 2,500 students last Friday contained an error that gave candidates little or no chance of solving one of the questions.

It was then alleged that Edexcel had been fully aware of the error some eight hours before the exam was due to be sat, after it had been warned by exam centres in Hong Kong which had taken the same paper. Regardless of this, Edexcel did not inform exam centres in the UK of the error in advance.

Alton College principal Michael Gray said: ÒThe examination was taken by 21 students at the college. We understand that Edexcel knew about the problem well before the exam was due to take place in this country because it had been spotted by centres in Hong Kong several hours before.

ÒIf this is confirmed, we are very concerned that Edexcel did not let us know in time to make the correction for the candidates.

ÒBecause of a clue in the question, an able candidate could in practice have worked out which two sets of contradictory figures provided by the board was valid. However, even this would obviously have wasted a studentÕs time, as well as undermining his or her confidence in the rest of the paper.Ó

College spokesman Molly Carlsberg said: ÒMr Gray will be meeting with the chairman of Edexcel next week, and this is one of several issues arising from the first yearÕs experiences of the new A-level examinations he intends to raise.Ó

In the days following the scandal, there have been reports of a string of other errors made at the hands of Edexcel, including the loss of coursework and pages missing from an exam that was due to be sat on Tuesday, January 29.

There have been calls from numerous sources for Edexcel to be sacked as a licensed examining board.

In an interview published on the BBC News website, general secretary of the National Association of Headteachers, David Hart, said: ÒIf Edexcel have been as incompetent as they appear to have been, I donÕt see that the government has any option other than to sack them as an examining board.Ó