ABSTRACT
Indeed, a national education system costing over £13 billion, having as its central purpose the education of the people of England and Wales, that was not subject to review, evaluation and assessment is unthinkable. In one way or another, of course, a great deal of assessment and evaluation takes place all the time, nationally, at LEA level and in schools and classrooms. Some of this-public examinations for example-is carried out across the whole country. Whereas much of the rest is local (LEA screening
programmes, for example), or confined to individual schools or even to particular parts of a school.
