AP: We invest heavily in ensuring our invigilators are the best they can be. At the moment they’re based pretty strongly in the UK. But with new technology there’s no reason why they have to be. One in seven schools in New Zealand take our qualifications, but teachers there didn’t realise they could be invigilators too. So we’re looking to ensure that wherever there are highly skilled teachers we can work with them.

The PIE: How many do you need?

AP: Each year we work with between 8,000 and 10,000 examiners and openings for new examiners don’t appear that frequently. But of course with growth new opportunities arrive. So we’re not working on the basis of a particular target, but we want to get to a position where schools overseas who want to understand what it’s like to be an examiner with us actually get an opportunity to experience that.

“Teachers overseas didn’t realise they could be CIE invigilators too”

The PIE: Can you tell me about your work developing syllabuses in Egypt? That must be very interesting right now.

AP: A few years ago we were asked to work on the development of academies in Egypt, where the government wanted to develop new model schools that would act as a catalyst for change. We developed a curriculum, teacher resources, assessment material, and it’s been very positively evaluated in Egypt. They now want to build another ten schools. So it’s been a story of success in a context of amazing political change.

The PIE: Has the political situation there been hard to work around?

AP: Egypt has a massive demographic of young people, and educational reform was deemed to be important even before the large scale political changes. But the events made it difficult at points to operate. During the most extreme period last January we were in daily contact with our staff in Cairo about safety issues.

But Cambridge has worked in many difficult places over the history of the group, and when we’re working on educationally significant developments we tend to be there come what may. We’ve delivered exams through two world wars!

“I think technology gives us the chance to be much closer to learning”

The PIE: Where do you see the exams market going? Are there any changes that lie ahead?

AP: I think technology gives us the chance to be much closer to learning through integrated curriculum and assessment models. At the moment the model we have is that kids learn, then there comes some fateful day when that learning is assessed in a formal examination. If you’ve been able to build a profile of student achievement throughout a course, you can be much more sensitive to the way in which someone is achieving.