The English Examining Boards: Their route from independence to government outsourcing agencies

46

accounts as inevitably coloured by their source - assisted, I hope, by my identifying
them with reference to their organisational origin.

Conducting the interviews

I carried out the central set of interviews between October 2003 and March 2004. I
have also included some data from interviews carried out in 2000 for previous
research. Although none of the interviewees requested anonymity, I have anonymised
all interviewees but two: Lord Dearing and Professor Peter Gosden. Both Lord
Dearing and Professor Gosden were speaking as informed individuals, whereas all the
other subjects were speaking as holders of a professional role rather than in an
individual capacity. [See Appendix for a list of the interviewees]

The timing of the interviews was not opportunistic, but rather an important factor in
the methodology. I wanted to approach the interviews in possession of a body of
evidence which the interviews would either support or dispute. In this way I hoped to
achieve that triangulation of evidence which Robson suggests “A particularly
valuable in the analysis of qualitative data where the trustworthiness of the data is
always a worry" (Robson 1993: 383).

Once I had completed the background research on the 1990s, I drew up the interview
schedule with the objective of obtaining interviews with the Chief Executives of the
three unitary awarding bodies and at least one high-level official from the regulatory
body, and one of similar status at the Department for Education and Skills. In each
case I wrote to request an interview, explained the nature of my research, and offered

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