A Level results

[Lord Tyrion]

No they aren't.

Or, was your post ironic due to the poor English? ?

My money is on a cleverly ironic post ?

 

[KenL]

It might make more sense if grades were capped at certain percentages - top 5% get A*, next 10 get A etc, at least they would be comparable year to year.

In Scotland (not sure about rUK), in a normal exam diet, this sort of process is applied by adjusting grade boundaries so that a similar amount of A grades are awarded each year.

 

[Yorkhacker]

As the father of a lad who has just got his A levels results, I could not be prouder of my son. At a state school, studying History, Politics and RE (essentially philosophy), he has got 3 A*s, and is going to a top uni (Glasgow) , to study Law. He worked his nuts off and had to sit an entrance exam to even be given an offer. He had an interview for Oxford which had to be done over the phone and quite frankly was ridiculous. Without any doubt, he earned his grades and would have done just as well in the exams.
Personally I think it is time to get rid of exams at this level, because I don't think they prove anything that relates to working life after school

 

[KenL]

As the father of a lad who has just got his A levels results, I could not be prouder of my son. At a state school, studying History, Politics and RE (essentially philosophy), he has got 3 A*s, and is going to a top uni (Glasgow) , to study Law. He worked his nuts off and had to sit an entrance exam to even be given an offer. He had an interview for Oxford which had to be done over the phone and quite frankly was ridiculous. Without any doubt, he earned his grades and would have done just as well in the exams.
Personally I think it is time to get rid of exams at this level, because I don't think they prove anything that relates to working life after school

Congratulations to your boy, excellent results there. I'm sure he will love his time in Glasgow.

As a teacher, I don't agree with your take on not having exams in school.
The last 2 years have shown that results and standards are not the same.

As to the link to work, I understand what you mean about no direct link to most work beyond school. But, following a course of study in several subjects and preparing for exams shows the ability to learn, apply knowledge, develop problem solving skills and show resilience when working under pressure.

That would not happen on a purely continual assessment basis as teachers would be giving candidates practice assessments (perhaps several) to help them prepare to guarantee everyone passes.

 

[Yorkhacker]

Congratulations to your boy, excellent results there. I'm sure he will love his time in Glasgow.

As a teacher, I don't agree with your take on not having exams in school.
The last 2 years have shown that results and standards are not the same.

As to the link to work, I understand what you mean about no direct link to most work beyond school. But, following a course of study in several subjects and preparing for exams shows the ability to learn, apply knowledge, develop problem solving skills and show resilience when working under pressure.

That would not happen on a purely continual assessment basis as teachers would be giving candidates practice assessments (perhaps several) to help them prepare to guarantee everyone passes.

I totally respect your views, I just feel there needs to be a blend of continual assessment and some final assessment to get balanced grades at the end of the process.

 

[Ethan]

As the father of a lad who has just got his A levels results, I could not be prouder of my son. At a state school, studying History, Politics and RE (essentially philosophy), he has got 3 A*s, and is going to a top uni (Glasgow) , to study Law. He worked his nuts off and had to sit an entrance exam to even be given an offer. He had an interview for Oxford which had to be done over the phone and quite frankly was ridiculous. Without any doubt, he earned his grades and would have done just as well in the exams.
Personally I think it is time to get rid of exams at this level, because I don't think they prove anything that relates to working life after school

Well done to your lad, and I am sure he will do well in Uni.

Unfortunately the debate on grade inflation has been taken by some as denigrating the efforts and achievements of students. I think it may be quite the opposite. When I was a lad, and we used slates and chalk, OK pen and paper, rather than iPads, grades were much lower. I applied for medicine in the late 80s and was offered BBB by a Russell Group Uni, and that was pretty typical outside the Oxbridge set. Now, a bunch of A* and time spent working in a developing country are needed. The change in grades can't be explained by every improving academic achievements by students.

I wonder therefore if some of the best students are getting less recognition because of the numbers of A* available. When I was a lad, an A was a bloody good result and even in a pretty good grammar, no way anywhere near 40% of students got As. Your son may well be in the top very few % of his peer group, but the sheer number of A* around make that impossible to see.

I have a 13 year old at a local state secondary, he is smart and will do well, and I am often pleasantly surprised at some of the stuff he is doing at school - some really interesting science that I didn't do at the same stage, language skills like Mandarin and learning some great techniques for problem solving and reasoning. Still, looks like whatever he chooses to do, he will need a handful of A*s too.

 

[Yorkhacker]

Apart from my sons hard work, I have to pay tribute to the quality of teaching and pastoral care my son has received. I went to a grammar school in the 70's and I hated it. Nearly all the teachers were old 'school' (pardon the pun) and male and generally it was pretty terrible with plenty of verbal and physical 'abuse'. There was no encouragement to 'be yourself' . As a consequence I just kept my head down and did the bare minimum with predictable results.
My son hasn't always been the easiest pupil to deal with, but the school has always had his best interests at heart and has encouraged him to be the best he can be and he has responded positively.
I guess the point I am making is that good schools with good teachers will get good exam results and there are more good schools around and better resources available generally, so it should not be a surprise that exam results are improving.

 

[spongebob59]

Spectator mag speculating that some of the top unis are considering reintroducing entrance examinations.

 

[KenL]

Spectator mag speculating that some of the top unis are considering reintroducing entrance examinations.

They won't be doing that this year hopefully. They will have given offers to people on a conditional basis depending on grades.

Hopefully exams will return next year and levels of A passes will return to normal.

 

[spongebob59]

Should be able to see this as free article, I think

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/when-will-exams-get-back-to-normal-

 

[Ethan]

Should be able to see this as free article, I think

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/when-will-exams-get-back-to-normal-

As much as I hate to say it, the opening part of this Spectator article is right. The problem is that exams are being taken as some sort of absolute measure of a person who their intention has always been comparative, to separate and differentiate, in order to allow University or employer choices to be made. That is impossible if too many get the highest grades.

I am not sure that a switch to 1-9 is a great idea, though, that just introduces an A** and A*** grade. Would it not be better to start a process where the proportion of grades settled to levels where sensible discrimination between them can be done, maybe by allocating them to percentages of students? You can benchmark exams for difficulty, which can vary a bit between years, and set these boundaries accordingly.

 

[IanM]

I am really glad that I was in an exam based system... crikey, if course work had been used I would have had to work harder!

I hope employers don't look at "covid nobbled" grades and say "of course your teacher gave you an A!"

Apart from my sons hard work, I have to pay tribute to the quality of teaching and pastoral care my son has received. I went to a grammar school in the 70's and I hated it. Nearly all the teachers were old 'school' (pardon the pun) and male and generally it was pretty terrible with plenty of verbal and physical 'abuse'. There was no encouragement to 'be yourself' . As a consequence I just kept my head down and did the bare minimum with predictable results.

Sounds sadly familiar.