What Your Concession Facilitator Wishes You Knew (But Can’t Tell You During Your Exam)

If you or your child uses an accommodation or concession facilitator (Facilitator) during assessments, you already know that accommodations like scribing and reading can make a significant difference. What you might not know is just how much your Facilitator wants to help – and how limited they are in what they’re allowed to say or do once an assessment begins.

That’s exactly why this guide exists. Consider it everything your Facilitator would tell you if they could.

Understanding the Role of a Concession Facilitator

A concession facilitator is there to support a learner who has been granted specific accommodations or concessions by their university, school or examination board. Some exam boards refer to these as access arrangements – it’s the same thing. These accommodations might include having someone write on the learner’s behalf (a scribe), having the paper read aloud (a reader), or a combination of both (an amanuensis).

Here’s the thing: once an assessment starts, your Facilitator’s hands are largely tied. Governing boards set strict rules about what a Facilitator may and may not do – and stepping outside those rules, even with good intentions, could jeopardise the integrity of the assessment. That means your Facilitator won’t be prompting you (unless you have a Prompter concession/accommodation), reminding you of things, or filling in gaps. They’re not being unhelpful; they’re following the rules.

The good news? A lot can be sorted out before you sit down to write. This guide is here to help you do exactly that.

To learn more about Concessions, please check out our Ultimate Guide!

General Tips for Working With Any Concession Facilitator

Communicate Your Needs Early and Clearly

Your Facilitator genuinely wants to support you – but they can only do that if you tell them what you need. Before the assessment begins, share your preferences. Do you like things read back to you slowly? Do you prefer to organise your thoughts before dictating? Is there a particular way you like to work through a paper? Say so upfront. The more your Facilitator knows about how you work best, the more effectively they can support you within the rules.

Book Your Facilitator as Far in Advance as Possible

A good Facilitator is committed to the learners they support and would love to work consistently with the same learner or student over time. That kind of familiarity genuinely helps – they’ll know your preferences, your pace, and your way of working. But that consistency is only possible if you book in advance. Scheduling conflicts are real, and leaving it too late means you might end up with someone who doesn’t know you at all on a high-stakes day.

Your Facilitator Works on Your Instruction – Not Their Initiative

Regardless of what accommodation you’ve been granted, your Facilitator is not allowed to act independently. They will not remind you to answer a question you’ve skipped, point out that you’ve misread something, or suggest a better way to phrase your answer. Everything is driven by you. That’s why it’s so important to know what you want and to say it clearly. If you ask for something that falls outside the rules, your Facilitator will let you know – but they’d always rather you ask than hold back.

Pay Attention to Mark Allocation

This is one of the most practical tips in this entire guide: check how many marks a question is worth before you answer it. A full page of writing for a two-mark question will not earn you extra marks – but it will cost you precious time. Use mark allocation as a guide for how much effort and detail each answer deserves.

Use Reading Time Wisely

If your school or examination board allows reading time before the assessment officially begins, use it strategically. Rather than reading everything from start to finish, prioritise the questions themselves first. Skip lengthy texts, case studies, or comprehension passages on your first pass – come back to those only if time permits. Knowing what’s being asked before you read the source material is a significant advantage.

Working With a Scribe

A scribe writes on your behalf. This is an incredibly useful accommodation, but it works best when you understand exactly what a scribe can and cannot do.

Organise Your Thoughts Before You Dictate

While your Facilitator can’t suggest this to you mid-exam, it’s worth building this habit now: before you start dictating your answer, take a moment to gather your thoughts. Jot down rough ideas, a quick outline, or key words on scrap paper first. This is especially valuable for longer-format questions. It helps you think in a straight line, ensures you don’t forget a good idea before your scribe can capture it, and gives you a chance to spot flaws in your reasoning before they’re committed to the answer book.

Ask your school or examination board how to handle rough work: some will provide scrap paper that gets handed in with the final script, while others will give you an additional answer book where rough work can be crossed out neatly and clearly.

Your Scribe Writes Your Words – Exactly as You Say Them

This is crucial to understand. A scribe is not permitted to interpret your meaning or tidy up your phrasing. They write what you say, word for word. That means the responsibility for accuracy sits entirely with you. Continuously check in – ask your scribe to read back what they’ve written, and make sure it matches what you intended to say.

Be Precise With Commonly Confused Words

Because your scribe captures your words as you say them, you’ll need to be deliberate about words that sound similar but mean different things. A common example is “then” versus “than” – make sure you’re saying the right word clearly. The same applies to apostrophes: if you want one included, say so explicitly. Don’t assume your scribe will infer it.

Give Clear Instructions About Layout and Formatting

Tell your scribe exactly where you want things written. If you want the question number noted at the top of your answer, say so and indicate where on the page. If the exam rules require a margin line to be drawn, or for each new question to start on a fresh page, you need to give those instructions – a scribe is not permitted to apply formatting rules of their own accord, even if they know the rules perfectly well.

You Can Answer in Any Order You Like

You’re generally free to tackle the paper in whatever order suits you. Just make sure you’re very clear about which question you’re answering each time so that your scribe can note the correct question numbers. Jumping around the paper is completely fine – the communication just needs to be explicit.

Working With a Reader

A reader reads the paper aloud to you. Like scribing, this accommodation works best when you take an active role in directing how it’s used.

You’re in Control of What Gets Read – and When

You don’t have to have every single thing read to you. You’re allowed to tell your reader to skip the cover page instructions if you already know them, or to pass over any numbers, formulae, or graphs if you’d rather engage with those visually. If you want to start with the shorter questions at the back of the paper before tackling the longer ones at the front, instruct your reader accordingly. This is your assessment – your reader is there to support your strategy, not set it.

Ask for the Pace That Works for You

There is absolutely no shame in asking your reader to slow down. Everyone processes spoken information differently, and a pace that feels comfortable for one person might be too fast for another. If you need something re-read, ask. If the pace needs adjusting, say so. Your reader is not there to rush you – they’re there to help.

Signal When You’re Ready to Move On

Once you’ve finished answering a question, let your reader know verbally. They’ll take that as their cue to read the next question. Without that signal, there can be unnecessary pauses and confusion. A simple “done” or “next question, please” goes a long way.

A Note for First-Timers

If you’ve never worked with a concession facilitator before, the formal setting of an assessment might not be the best place to figure out how the dynamic works. Consider booking a practice session with your Facilitator before your first real assessment. Use it to get to know each other, establish your preferences, and trial a few approaches without the pressure of marks on the line. Think of it as a warm-up – for both of you.

The Bottom Line

Working effectively with a concession facilitator comes down to one thing: communication. Your Facilitator is in your corner. They want you to do well. But the rules of formal assessment mean they can’t guide you the way they might in any other context.

So guide them instead. Tell them what you need, be clear and specific, and take ownership of how your accommodation is used. The more intentional you are about the partnership, the more value you’ll get from it – not just in one exam, but across every assessment to come.