A Level results.

[Top of the JES]

Someone enlighten me as to why they are downgrading people?

So the idea originally was for teachers to grade their pupils. Then decided it would be done externally taking into account teachers gradings then to make it "fair" Mock A level results and teachers grades would be used to come to a final grading.

It's a shambles though because lots of A & A* pupils are being down graded. They are apparently using Algorythyms to determine final grades, it's not working very well from what we can see.

Algorithm- yeah right! I bet its a civil servant with a spreadsheet.

And I suspect you are spot on.

[EastDerehamO]

I feel for all impacted in this, and in fairness to the governments and education authorities there are no perfect answers.

One thing which struck me though, is that if they went with the predicted grades, then the overall average would have shot up by an unrealistic amount, so the grades awarded would effectively be devalued, and there would be a lot of students from the previous year feeling like they’d been unfairly treated by comparison. Guess it doesn’t say much for the teacher’s abilities to predict grades.

[Ornchurch]

Someone enlighten me as to why they are downgrading people?

So the idea originally was for teachers to grade their pupils. Then decided it would be done externally taking into account teachers gradings then to make it "fair" Mock A level results and teachers grades would be used to come to a final grading.

It's a shambles though because lots of A & A* pupils are being down graded. They are apparently using Algorythyms to determine final grades, it's not working very well from what we can see.

Let's be honest, there are teachers out there who will over grade pupils to get them a more favourable grade but I cannot see how an A* teachers grade alongside an A* mock result equals a revised B.

[Dohnut]

Due out on Thursday, a massive day for anyone with children waiting results at the best of times.

Throughout the last two years my daughter has worked really hard and had been consistantly predicted to get A,A,A* in the Three subjects she needs to go to Uni in September - she needs 3 A's to get her place. It was a blow to her and her friends when A level exams were cancelled (understandibly) because of lockdown, but we were reassured that results would be based on coursework and teachers evaluations. Now we are told that many results have been marked down in England as they were in Scotland as thet are unrepresentative of previous years.

I would be gutted for my daughter or any of her friends if they are denied the chance to go to Uni because someone who has never met them decides that her teachers judgement isn't correct or the school they attend hasn't performed well enough in the past for their reccomended grades to stand, which it seems is the criteria.

I hope that my daughter and her friends will be OK and that everyone out there who has worked so hard are not penalised by the goverment for not being able to take their final exams. It's a really stressfull time for them at the moment......not to mention the parents!

I can understand your concern. I wish your daughter well. Good luck.

[Give it to Jabo]

Of course, appeals cost money. How can one make an appeal if there is not an examination paper to remark? Who makes the profit? Exam Boards. Yes, I know that exam boards are subject to government pressure. This will no doubt be repeated next week when the GCSE grades are released. Check your postcodes.

[RientO]

I'm glad it didnt happen to me at GCSE and A Level. think my mocks and predicted grades were all about 3 grades under what I actually ended up getting. Exams are easy.

Ditto. Used to be bottom in all the internal exams as I never bothered with them, yet ended up with best A level results in my school. Wasn’t too shabby at O level either, but I did flunk French. Got UU in that! Ironically, ended up working in Paris and learnt French there.

[RientO]

I feel for all impacted in this, and in fairness to the governments and education authorities there are no perfect answers.

The answer was not to cancel exams. Moment my daughter found that out she downed tools. And has done nothing since. Unfortunately she takes after me and didn’t bother with internal exams so I suspect her GCSEs will be 2 or 3 grades below what she could have achieved, especially in maths. Just hoping she gets good enough grades for college.

[tuffers#1]

I feel for all impacted in this, and in fairness to the governments and education authorities there are no perfect answers.

The answer was not to cancel exams. Moment my daughter found that out she downed tools. And has done nothing since. Unfortunately she takes after me and didn’t bother with internal exams so I suspect her GCSEs will be 2 or 3 grades below what she could have achieved, especially in maths. Just hoping she gets good enough grades for college.

A year in F.E college to bring grades up & then jump straight into HE

[RientO]

I feel for all impacted in this, and in fairness to the governments and education authorities there are no perfect answers.

The answer was not to cancel exams. Moment my daughter found that out she downed tools. And has done nothing since. Unfortunately she takes after me and didn’t bother with internal exams so I suspect her GCSEs will be 2 or 3 grades below what she could have achieved, especially in maths. Just hoping she gets good enough grades for college.

A year in F.E college to bring grades up & then jump straight into HE

Doesn’t work like that these days. If you fail at 16, they send you back to the same school for another 2 years. She needs to leave her school.

[tuffers#1]

The answer was not to cancel exams. Moment my daughter found that out she downed tools. And has done nothing since. Unfortunately she takes after me and didn’t bother with internal exams so I suspect her GCSEs will be 2 or 3 grades below what she could have achieved, especially in maths. Just hoping she gets good enough grades for college.

A year in F.E college to bring grades up & then jump straight into HE

Doesn’t work like that these days. If you fail at 16, they send you back to the same school for another 2 years. She needs to leave her school.

Seriously ?

When did they stop.that ?

[RientO]

https://www.gov.uk/know-when-you-can-leave-school

England
You can leave school on the last Friday in June if you’ll be 16 by the end of the summer holidays.

You must then do one of the following until you’re 18:

stay in full-time education, for example at a college
start an apprenticeship or traineeship
spend 20 hours or more a week working or volunteering, while in part-time education or training

Default option, you go back to the school you were at.

[Millennial Snowflake]

Surprise surprise that incompetence reigns at every level in this country.

Although, I'd personally console all of the people crying with the fact that grades and even uni degrees dont really stop you doing anything if you really want to do it in life.

I agree with the sentiment! But not sure its so true anymore. These kids are entering a terribly difficult workforce and very few places accept unsolicited applications or non-application form CV's, handed in etc. Now it's all 'go online and fill in the form' and if a big chunk of that is vacant or deemed poor in education by some recruiter they get ignored. I do agree with you in general though, but think it's more appropriate for our generations, not so much the kids now. Bless em. I worked with a company recently looking for a designer with a first from at least one of the top 10 art/illustration Uni's in the country, plus 3 years work experience...18k p.a. It's so tough for them.

Great stuff Top of. You must be super proud.

Yeah, I think you are right. My sister just finished uni and cant get anything without experience.

But i'm not convinced it was much different 15 years ago when i started my career. I was so frustrated that everywhere was looking for experience and i didnt have any. I think ultimately, you just need someone to give you a chance and then build on that with hard work.

I think where I'm mainly coming from is that the work people do is so diverse compared to even 10 years ago. There's also many more ways of learning the skills you need than a degree. For example, I know many employers dont even look at qualifications for certain techy jobs, it's all just the skill base. Data scientists is where a lot of people think the need will be in the coming years. So people are doing online courses, coding at home, doing their own analysis and building things like machine learning tools off of free software. Ultimately, if you spend 3 years doing that and can demonstrate that I dont think people necessarily care about your qualifications.

Spot on.

Unless it’s in a STEM field or law, a uni degree means pretty much f*** all. My degree can get me a job for under £35k pa but not a career. I spent years moving between jobs not getting anywhere before taking an online certification in web development. Since then I’ve more than doubled my salary and now run my own company, in less time than my whole degree took.

It’s only benefit is helping you find a first job out of uni which (unnecessary) lists a degree as a requirement, but chances are it’ll be a sh*t job putting numbers into a spreadsheet anyway. And most graduates I’ve met can’t even do that properly, or type 50WPM LOL

[Rich Tea Wellin]

Got any jobs?

[Long slender neck]

Why have they felt the need to 'rank the order of pupils' or take into account a schools past results?

[JamesdixonO]

My sons predicted grades were A* A B
The grades he got were A B D

[Disoriented]

Following on from my original post at the top of this thread.

Results can't be picked up until later but my daughter received an email from her Uni at one minute past Eight this morning congratulating her on her results and directing her to a welcome site, double checked with UCAS and her place at Her Uni of choice is secured

Very relieved and happy that her hard work has been rewarded, feel for kids who might be affected by results being down graded.

Glad to hear it. It is a big relief for her and the rest of the family no doubt.

Good luck to her with her uni studies.

[Ronnie Hotdogs]

Why have they felt the need to 'rank the order of pupils' or take into account a schools past results?

To make sure the plebs grades arent too high.

[NuneatonO's]

Ofqual suspends A-level appeal criteria hours after announcing them
The exams regulator for England has dramatically suspended its criteria for students hoping to challenge their A-level grades on the basis of their results in mock exams.
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2 ... ncing-them

A-level results thrown into fresh chaos as appeals guidance suddenly withdrawn
With students having been unable to sit exams due to coronavirus, the marking process has been thrown into further disarray after the criteria for appealing was suspended just hours after being published
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/ ... a-22529056

We truly are being governed by incompetent, clueless, Tory

[RientO]

Total joke. How can an individual be judged on the overall school performance? Don't understand why exams had to be cancelled when schools mostly closed in mid-March less than 3 months before the exams. By then, there isn't much left on the syllabus to be covered. Universities still held exams albeit remotely. Should be less of an issue for schools as most children live in the vicinity of the school.
Also key worker's children still went to school, so why not 5th and 6th formers?

[Long slender neck]

You either achieve a certain mark or you don't. Ridiculous that rankings of any kind should come into it.

[Dohnut]

Not any consolation to the boy we spoke to this morning who needed an A in Maths to get to Uni and was downgraded from A* to B. Nice lad who worked really hard will appeal but may lose out on the Uni of his choice. Not sure your life lesson would hold any water given the current circumstances.

Not having a degree in the next few years wont stop you doing anything. And with a recession that will probably get worse, i'm not sure that a Maths degree will get you far in JD sports any ways.

I'm being flippant. It's a shame that people who have worked hard are being screwed by the system. but when I was that age I thought that qualifications were the be all and end all. I've gone past pretty much everyone in my department and 99% of them have degrees.

Qualifications opens doors. Once in, what matters is how well you do the job. Those with the most ability will generally rise to the top irrespective of School/college/uni qualifications. But first you need to get in!

[Millennial Snowflake]

Making exam results void this year would’ve been the fairest thing to do imo

[Top of the JES]

Making exam results void this year would’ve been the fairest thing to do imo

Really, how would that help the 400,000 or so pupils who needed grades to get into a University? Many who have worked really hard to achieve the best Grade possible.

[Ronnie Hotdogs]

Those with the most ability will generally rise to the top irrespective of School/college/uni qualifications.

You only have to look at our Government to see that’s absolute tosh.

[LeighO]

Those with the most ability will generally rise to the top irrespective of School/college/uni qualifications.

You appear to have misspelled money and connections there.