THE BIGGEST shake-up of school exams for more than 40 years is about to take place, with the government's endorsement of curriculum adviser Sir Ron Dearing's year-long review of 16 to 19 education.

But will the reforms raise standards - when, in essence, the proposals would bring about a merger of the "gold standard" A-level qualification and the less-respected vocational studies certificates?

True, Education Secretary Gillian Shephard pledges to ensure the "rigour" of the A-levels and the General National Vocational Qualifications, which are to be grouped in new National Certificates. And, yes, teaching unions back the plan - though with predictable caveats about resources and staff workloads. But no matter how much the Dearing review, Mrs Shephard's department and educationalists stress the value of the new diploma, it is, just like trading of currencies on the world exchanges, the market that will determine its real worth.

And it must be remembered that the market that weighs the value of exam certificates is quite chary about the strength of the present currency, based on the gold-standard A-level, and suspicious that, since its introduction in 1951, its had been steadily devalued.

For did we not see that only this week when the Institute of Directors hit at too-easy exams and education policies which, it said, had produced a generation of unemployable graduates and school leavers who could not read and write or cope with basic maths? It is the employers, then, and not the world of education, who have to be convinced that this new exam currency is as good as ministers pledge.

Yes, the new 18-plus diploma in which A-levels can be mixed and matched with the vocational courses, will give pupils a broader range of subjects and experience rather than the allegedly too-narrow path which A-level studies - usually confined to two of three subjects - give at present.

But while Mrs Shephard talks of the diploma achieving "parity of esteem" for the A-levels and GNVQs, the risk, we think, is of the gold-standard being regarded as being diluted by its association with less-academic studies - whereas the demand from employers is for the excellence and even elitism that the A-level once stood for. The government must ensure then its pledges to raise standards and retain values with this shake-up are upheld.

For the merger of the old GCE O-level with the second-division CSE to form the GCSE may have resulted in a new generation of children who are better qualified on paper, but who are, arguably, no better educated in the eyes of the employers. This latest merger must not fall under the same suspicion.

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