By Hannah Richardson Education and social affairs reporter
The Welsh exams regulator is recommending GCSE exams be scrapped in favour of assessments next summer, while some A-level papers would remain.
Qualifications Wales said this was the best way of ensuring fairness to pupils, while offering certainty over what will happen in uncertain times.
The Scottish government took a similar move, only keeping exams for Highers - its A-level equivalent.
In England, the government is insisting all national exams will go ahead.
But its exams regulator, Ofqual, is consulting on how GCSE and A-level exams can be modified so they are held fairly next summer.
The Westminster government has already said exams will go ahead, but three weeks later than usual and over a condensed period of three weeks. However, further changes and contingency plans for exams are expected to be announced within weeks.
Missed learning
Wales's education minister Kirsty Williams will now consider the issue and is set to announce a decision on 10 November.
Pupils across the UK have lost months of learning due to the school shutdown in the last academic year, and many have missed periods of schooling this term because of Covid-related reasons.
Teachers' unions and head teachers have called for the Westminster government to draw up a "plan B", in case exams cannot take place.
A report from the Education Policy Institute highlighted the varying attendance rates across the UK during the pandemic.
It said rising Covid-19 infection rates had created challenges for schools since they reopened, with hundreds of thousands of pupils and staff being sent home following outbreaks of the virus.
The think tank's analysis shows that in areas with the highest rates of the virus in the UK, such as the north-west of England, as many as four in 10 secondary pupils were unable to attend school during October.
In contrast, other areas have seen almost all of their pupils attend school in person.
The research also suggests that in the first half of the autumn term, the most deprived areas in the UK were more likely to have seen lower pupil attendance.
It finds a clear link in Scotland between pupils with higher levels of deprivation and low school attendance levels.
There are indications this pattern is repeated in other parts of the UK, it says, with poorer pupils more likely to miss out on formal schooling during the first term back.
Lower attendance rates
At a local authority level, England has significant variation in pupil attendance, with attendance levels in secondary schools as low as 61% in Knowsley.
Other areas with high infection rates, also saw low levels of secondary school attendance in October, such as Liverpool, 67%, and Rochdale, 70%.
However, there were also a number of areas with lower virus rates that have very low secondary school attendance rates, including Calderdale, 64%, Kingston-upon-Thames, 68%, and Bracknell Forest, 72%.
In contrast, attendance in secondary schools in October was as high as 94% in Kensington and Chelsea, West Berkshire, and Bath and North East Somerset.
Comparing Scotland with Wales, attendance levels in Scotland range from 81% in the Outer Hebrides and 87% in Glasgow to 95% in Aberdeenshire, Orkney Islands and Shetland Islands.
In Wales, they vary from 81% in Merthyr Tydfil and Denbighshire, to 93% in Ceredigion and 94% in Monmouthshire.
Under the Qualifications Wales proposal, grades for GCSEs and AS Levels would be awarded on the basis of coursework and a set of common assessments taken during the year.
'Stop shilly-shallying'
There would be flexibility about when schools and colleges arrange and run the assessments.
While for A levels, learners would need to sit one exam paper per subject in addition to coursework and set tasks.
And pupils who are ill or self-isolating would have a back-up opportunity to sit the exam instead.
The aim is to also provide consistency across schools and colleges and offer learners and exam centres a clear basis on which to appeal results.
Association of School and College Leaders' general secretary Geoff Barton said the statistics in the EPI report should "ring alarm bells" for ministers.
It showed the widely differing impact of Covid disruption on pupils, he said, many of whom will be taking exams next year.
"There is no way that it can be business as normal if a third of pupils were unable to attend school in some areas of the country, while in other areas attendance is over 90%.
"If the government wants to save next year's exams series, and stop it falling into complete disarray, it has to stop shilly-shallying and get a grip of this matter.
"Students have to be given more choice in exam papers over the topics on which they can answer questions to account for varying levels of lost learning time, robust contingency plans must be put in place."
A Department for Education spokesman said it was engaging widely with the education sector but that exams were the fairest way of judging a student's performance.
He added: "Over the coming weeks we will jointly identify any risks to exams and the measures needed to address potential disruption, with fairness to students continuing to be our priority,"
from Via PakapNews