This is going to be like Cummings all over again, isn’t it? Lots of hand-wringing “I share your pain” tweets but f*** all action.
Yes. This is where the Presidential trend in our politics has taken us - Parliament, which is supposed to hold government to account is increasingly toothless, and so MPs can say anything because they don't have the power to turn words into action and so don't have to take responsibility for providing an alternative.
So everyone opposes the unpopular status quo, but nothing changes. It's going to do massive damage in the long-run to trust in the democratic process.
I'm hopeful there will be a reversion but it doesn't help that Parliament is on holiday for a month. If it wasn't then there might be far more urgency to sort this out before PMQs on Wedensday.
Taking a step back, it is a poor system if the speed of sorting out problems that are not directly relevant to parliament depends on whether parliament is sitting or not.
Ofqual blames government 'policy changes every 12 hours' for A-level exam chaos
which rather sums up this government, badly thought out re-action due to the impact of the previously (badly thought out) action
And the buck-passing now begins.
I get the feeling OFQUAL are now in a blind panic. They have been shown as more naked than the Emperor, and they are wondering if their jobs are about to go.
By the end of the week Dido Harding will probably be in charge of a new educaiton and exams body.
Probably with that spelling, too.
Dido Harding's bio reads like someone said "Siri, show me what happens when the country is run by an incompetent self-selecting elite". Grandfather seems to have had a role in suppressing the Mau-Mau uprising. Father is hereditary peer and pig farmer. Private school then Oxford (PPE, obvs). Friends with the right people at Oxford (Cameron). Management consultant (McKinsey). Then a series of well remunerated roles in the private sector and quangocracy in which she doesn't seem to have actually been very good at her job, but nevertheless progresses. Yet if you point out that there is any linkage between the way people are selected into elite positions and the poor way the country is run, you get called a communist.
Some people should really remind themselves of what "AWOL" means.
Surely this indicates Ofqual's press office has been instructed not to respond to journalists' queries, which is very much absent WITH leave (indeed they've been instructed to be absent).
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
That's a very, very big assumption.
What am I assuming?
That this Government would be doing anything sensible. Possibly the last was the furlough scheme. It was also the first.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
sounds like you are sooking lemons there, upset that all is well in Scotland and all are happy happy happy.
The shit hits the fan next year in Scotland when there's a big drop in that year's highers results. England's solution is harsher this year but less problems next year.
The site has been hacked to "Palatial"betting again. Paging @rcs1000
Earlier in this thread @rcs1000 commented that it is on his to do list.
Where are people seeing "Palatial"? I'm not (on my trusty 2014 MacBook).
On the banner of the political betting wordpress website - which may be cached so you may or may not see it.
Being honest @rcs1000 is correct here, all poster details are stored in vanilla, the wordpress site is nowadays just a content management system that hosts the articles for which I suspect only 3 or 4 people have accounts and need access.
Also wordpress is so popular that it really is the preferred target for hackers as so many wordpress plugins provide possible access points.
Thanks, it must have been cached by Chrome. I just fired up Opera to see it.
We're discussing the way that the Government body has decided to award grades in exams that pupils never actually took, rewarding some and failing others by use of an arbitrary algorithm (and talking about "retakes" of exams that were never actually taken in the first place).
In order to approximately simulate (and "maintain the integrity") of an exam system that was optimised for conditions as they existed for our grandparents more than half a century ago, and has continued because "that's the way things should be."
Closed-book exams on subjects evolved for the post-Victorians on a schedule to allow the children to work on the fields over summer for careers that have changed out of mind, hammered to sort-of-fit while the original purposes of the system have long ceased to be applicable.
Exams that add a true random element based on a blend of which marker you get and how they're feeling on the day, plus whatever random events affect the mental and emotional state of a teenager on a particular day, and whether or not they make an exam-related blunder on a particular individual paper.
And then, just to add a true level of surreality to it all, the most important decisions of your future career (which university will accept you on which course) are done before the exam is taken. In order to preserve a schedule through the year based on what precisely?
Why tie up with school timetables, especially when the big driver over summer is to free the kids to work in the fields?
If we had open-book exams, using multiple assignments over the year, with less fetishing of subjects that were perceived as important a century ago, with the results given prior to university application, maybe the system would do the intended purpose somewhat better?
And maybe we could have held the exams remotely - far more feasibly than the traditional "sit in a big hall and regurgitate memorised facts about the formation of oxbow lakes because that's exactly what you need to be able to do in your future career or to learn stuff at university - no, wait..."
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
If you haven't got a fairer solution then we need to do the fairest solution possible - which is the teacher's grades.
Giving a C to someone who should have got a C is more unfair...
Which is why once the results were revealed last Thursday the issue was baked in - while the problem needs to be fixed, the world has moved on and no fix is going to resolve all the problems.
Which is why once the results were revealed last Thursday the issue was baked in - while the problem needs to be fixed, the world has moved on and no fix is going to resolve all the problems.
Nonsense. The Scottish results weren't baked in and were fixed days later.
Why do you keep repeating this nonsense? What evidence do you have for it?
This is going to be like Cummings all over again, isn’t it? Lots of hand-wringing “I share your pain” tweets but f*** all action.
Yes. This is where the Presidential trend in our politics has taken us - Parliament, which is supposed to hold government to account is increasingly toothless, and so MPs can say anything because they don't have the power to turn words into action and so don't have to take responsibility for providing an alternative.
So everyone opposes the unpopular status quo, but nothing changes. It's going to do massive damage in the long-run to trust in the democratic process.
Parliament also has itself to blame (in part) by voting not to sit and have long holidays instead.
Our democratic institutions - and such checks and balances as we have - are being hollowed out and will, if this trend is not reversed, end up being about as meaningful as all the flummery that happens when HMQ opens Parliament.
We are only just startig here. Once the government has got its teeth into quashing judicial review, the sky's the limit. We'll be able to see what people who view the likes of Trump, Modi, Orban and Erdogan as allies can do when they know there are no checks on their power.
Some people should really remind themselves of what "AWOL" means.
Surely this indicates Ofqual's press office has been instructed not to respond to journalists' queries, which is very much absent WITH leave (indeed they've been instructed to be absent).
Absent without the leave of those on whose behalf they operate. I note that 'transparency' is one of their explicit statutory duties.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
sounds like you are sooking lemons there, upset that all is well in Scotland and all are happy happy happy.
The shit hits the fan next year in Scotland when there's a big drop in that year's highers results. England's solution is harsher this year but less problems next year.
Yet the whole business has shown that the exam system needs a good shakeup anyway. If it doesn't get one, anywhere and everyehere in the UK, I will not be impressed.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
You are accusing Teachers and Head teachers there of being unprofessional.
And the question is who is being unprofessional here - the teachers who when asked to predict the grade students would get gave them a grade or the computer system that decided that the student actually deserved a U because someone had a mental breakdown 2 years ago.
And if teacher overgrading is happening, it's already happening, because some subjects at some schools have been allowed raw teacher assessments with no adjustment. Not because those results are super-reliable, but because Ofqual didn't think of a way of doing the adjustment for small schools.
If we're thinking of A Levels as a race, it's as if a proportion of the runners have been allowed rocket boosters. That's apparently OK because most runners aren't allowed them, so the average race time hasn't moved much.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
If you haven't got a fairer solution then we need to do the fairest solution possible - which is the teacher's grades.
Giving a C to someone who should have got a C is more unfair...
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
sounds like you are sooking lemons there, upset that all is well in Scotland and all are happy happy happy.
The shit hits the fan next year in Scotland when there's a big drop in that year's highers results. England's solution is harsher this year but less problems next year.
be back to normal next year , they will either pass or fail the exam, why would that cause an issue.
We're discussing the way that the Government body has decided to award grades in exams that pupils never actually took, rewarding some and failing others by use of an arbitrary algorithm (and talking about "retakes" of exams that were never actually taken in the first place).
In order to approximately simulate (and "maintain the integrity") of an exam system that was optimised for conditions as they existed for our grandparents more than half a century ago, and has continued because "that's the way things should be."
Closed-book exams on subjects evolved for the post-Victorians on a schedule to allow the children to work on the fields over summer for careers that have changed out of mind, hammered to sort-of-fit while the original purposes of the system have long ceased to be applicable.
Exams that add a true random element based on a blend of which marker you get and how they're feeling on the day, plus whatever random events affect the mental and emotional state of a teenager on a particular day, and whether or not they make an exam-related blunder on a particular individual paper.
And then, just to add a true level of surreality to it all, the most important decisions of your future career (which university will accept you on which course) are done before the exam is taken. In order to preserve a schedule through the year based on what precisely?
Why tie up with school timetables, especially when the big driver over summer is to free the kids to work in the fields?
If we had open-book exams, using multiple assignments over the year, with less fetishing of subjects that were perceived as important a century ago, with the results given prior to university application, maybe the system would do the intended purpose somewhat better?
And maybe we could have held the exams remotely - far more feasibly than the traditional "sit in a big hall and regurgitate memorised facts about the formation of oxbow lakes because that's exactly what you need to be able to do in your future career or to learn stuff at university - no, wait..."
Cummings created the new GCSEs on the basis that closed book exams where the perfect preparation for how the world now works.
When in reality it was the exact opposite. I don't need to know that you remember how xyz worked, what I need to know is if you can find that out and then apply it to the project you are working on.
In the current world 30 seconds on Google will give me more knowledge about XYZ then a day trip to the British Library would have done 25 years ago. So the important fact isn't do you know it, but how do you apply that knowledge.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
sounds like you are sooking lemons there, upset that all is well in Scotland and all are happy happy happy.
The shit hits the fan next year in Scotland when there's a big drop in that year's highers results. England's solution is harsher this year but less problems next year.
Conveniently, though, that will be after the Scottish parliament elections.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
If you haven't got a fairer solution then we need to do the fairest solution possible - which is the teacher's grades.
Giving a C to someone who should have got a C is more unfair to that person than giving an A to someone who should have got a C is to everyone else.
Benefit of the doubt should go with the student.
If correctly applied, the algorithm probably predicts exam grades more accurately than the teachers. But the consequences of a downgrade are significantly greater than an upgrade.
And those consequences seem to be particularly felt by poorer students/non private schools. So they further entrench existing inequities.
Out of interest, does anyone know if large numbers of Scottish students go to English and Welsh universities, given they'd need to pay full fees whereas they don't closer to home?
It feels a bit unlikely to me that Scottish students having all met their offers to English universities is a more than trivial issue given the size of Scotland as a country plus the strong incentive for Scottish 18 year olds to stay in Scotland for university.
The site has been hacked to "Palatial"betting again. Paging @rcs1000
Earlier in this thread @rcs1000 commented that it is on his to do list.
Who is doing this, and why?
I believe the Palatial one was done here by someone here (not sure whom) as a bit of a gag to show it was still vulnerable before a malicious hacker strikes the same vulnerability.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
sounds like you are sooking lemons there, upset that all is well in Scotland and all are happy happy happy.
The shit hits the fan next year in Scotland when there's a big drop in that year's highers results. England's solution is harsher this year but less problems next year.
be back to normal next year , they will either pass or fail the exam, why would that cause an issue.
You think passes down by 10-15 or so % from the previous year won't create an issue ?!
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
If you haven't got a fairer solution then we need to do the fairest solution possible - which is the teacher's grades.
Giving a C to someone who should have got a C is more unfair to that person than giving an A to someone who should have got a C is to everyone else.
Benefit of the doubt should go with the student.
If correctly applied, the algorithm probably predicts exam grades more accurately than the teachers. But the consequences of a downgrade are significantly greater than an upgrade.
And those consequences seem to be particularly felt by poorer students/non private schools. So they further entrench existing inequities.
How when it's based on past performance and all results are individual. See once again algorithms assigning a U because a different student 2 years ago had a mental breakdown in the exam.
Care to continue your argument now I've shown the flaw in the algorithm or do I need to continue and show how another decision (small cohorts) meant that the algorithm was handicapped further by the fact x% of A grades had already been awarded thanks to the 4.7% increase in private school small cohort results.
Out of interest, does anyone know if large numbers of Scottish students go to English and Welsh universities, given they'd need to pay full fees whereas they don't closer to home?
It feels a bit unlikely to me that Scottish students having all met their offers to English universities is a more than trivial issue given the size of Scotland as a country plus the strong incentive for Scottish 18 year olds to stay in Scotland for university.
I know of 4 siblings, 2 studied in England, 2 in Scotland
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
Giving people who would have achieved A's a U because someone one once got a U in that subject at the school due to a freak event is beyond bonkers yet that is what the system is doing.
We're discussing the way that the Government body has decided to award grades in exams that pupils never actually took, rewarding some and failing others by use of an arbitrary algorithm (and talking about "retakes" of exams that were never actually taken in the first place).
In order to approximately simulate (and "maintain the integrity") of an exam system that was optimised for conditions as they existed for our grandparents more than half a century ago, and has continued because "that's the way things should be."
Closed-book exams on subjects evolved for the post-Victorians on a schedule to allow the children to work on the fields over summer for careers that have changed out of mind, hammered to sort-of-fit while the original purposes of the system have long ceased to be applicable.
Exams that add a true random element based on a blend of which marker you get and how they're feeling on the day, plus whatever random events affect the mental and emotional state of a teenager on a particular day, and whether or not they make an exam-related blunder on a particular individual paper.
And then, just to add a true level of surreality to it all, the most important decisions of your future career (which university will accept you on which course) are done before the exam is taken. In order to preserve a schedule through the year based on what precisely?
Why tie up with school timetables, especially when the big driver over summer is to free the kids to work in the fields?
If we had open-book exams, using multiple assignments over the year, with less fetishing of subjects that were perceived as important a century ago, with the results given prior to university application, maybe the system would do the intended purpose somewhat better?
And maybe we could have held the exams remotely - far more feasibly than the traditional "sit in a big hall and regurgitate memorised facts about the formation of oxbow lakes because that's exactly what you need to be able to do in your future career or to learn stuff at university - no, wait..."
The fact that exam results aren’t themselves the holy grail, but simply another method of deriving what we really need to know - pupils’ relative knowledge and ability - is an important point. Any exam system itself contains a host of random errors and if the results differ from teacher predictions it isn’t necessarily the case that the teacher assessment was objectively wrong.
The site has been hacked to "Palatial"betting again. Paging @rcs1000
Earlier in this thread @rcs1000 commented that it is on his to do list.
Who is doing this, and why?
I believe the Palatial one was done here by someone here (not sure whom) as a bit of a gag to show it was still vulnerable before a malicious hacker strikes the same vulnerability.
The nefarious hacks have done more damage.
And as I pointed out while it's annoying it's more an annoyance to @rcs1000 then it is an actual issue for posters here whose details are stored by Vanilla and not on the wordpress website.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
Giving people who would have achieved A's a U because someone one once got a U in that subject at the school due to a freak event is beyond bonkers yet that is what the system is doing.
Unlikely. The teacher would have had to royally screw up their rankings in order for that to happen.
Giving people who would have achieved an A a B or a C, or giving someone who would have got a C or D a U instead is bad enough without exaggeration.
Sort of on topic, I don't understand why invigilated exams couldn't take place this year - particularly for A-levels.
The invigilator sits 5-10m away from the candidates anyway, the desks could easily be spaced, one-way systems put in place, and security too.
The invigilator simply wears a visor when 'patrolling' the room.
If it works for pubs (loud, drinking, and casual) it'd definitely work for a formal structured exam, which is all about procedure.
You are applying the logic of June / July after months of thought to decisions made in a hurry back in March.
I don't see why a decision couldn't have been taken in June-July for A-levels for this year to be sat by, say, Christmas on this basis, and university entries deferred by one term.
Sort of on topic, I don't understand why invigilated exams couldn't take place this year - particularly for A-levels.
The invigilator sits 5-10m away from the candidates anyway, the desks could easily be spaced, one-way systems put in place, and security too.
The invigilator simply wears a visor when 'patrolling' the room.
If it works for pubs (loud, drinking, and casual) it'd definitely work for a formal structured exam, which is all about procedure.
Err. Perhaps because pupils were told 5 months ago that there wouldn't be any? And consequently haven't done any studying in that time? Small matter I realise.
Sort of on topic, I don't understand why invigilated exams couldn't take place this year - particularly for A-levels.
The invigilator sits 5-10m away from the candidates anyway, the desks could easily be spaced, one-way systems put in place, and security too.
The invigilator simply wears a visor when 'patrolling' the room.
If it works for pubs (loud, drinking, and casual) it'd definitely work for a formal structured exam, which is all about procedure.
Yes, they're far more important than sports or pubs; or even regular school (For a short time). A delay till June? perhaps. Tbh I'd have exams in the covid hierarchy as
Food Grocers A-level, GCSE, BTEC and so forth exams "Other shops"
They're not as high a priority as the ability to buy food but they're not too far off I think
The site has been hacked to "Palatial"betting again. Paging @rcs1000
Earlier in this thread @rcs1000 commented that it is on his to do list.
Who is doing this, and why?
I believe the Palatial one was done here by someone here (not sure whom) as a bit of a gag to show it was still vulnerable before a malicious hacker strikes the same vulnerability.
The nefarious hacks have done more damage.
Really? That's a bit weird.
I'd have thought they'd show Robert the process and weaknesses in a private message. Not actually do it.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
sounds like you are sooking lemons there, upset that all is well in Scotland and all are happy happy happy.
The shit hits the fan next year in Scotland when there's a big drop in that year's highers results. England's solution is harsher this year but less problems next year.
be back to normal next year , they will either pass or fail the exam, why would that cause an issue.
You think passes down by 10-15 or so % from the previous year won't create an issue ?!
No.
If anything it will be great news. If there is wild grade inflation this year that is forever marked with an asterisk to explain then never again can we get news stories about "record grades". Good riddance to that nonsense.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
Giving people who would have achieved A's a U because someone one once got a U in that subject at the school due to a freak event is beyond bonkers yet that is what the system is doing.
Unlikely. The teacher would have had to royally screw up their rankings in order for that to happen.
Giving people who would have achieved an A a B or a C, or giving someone who would have got a C or D a U instead is bad enough without exaggeration.
Say you have a group of super stars this year. Every one an A student.
The teacher still has to rank them.
And because the algorithm has determined there must be a U for the class a U must be given.
Sort of on topic, I don't understand why invigilated exams couldn't take place this year - particularly for A-levels.
The invigilator sits 5-10m away from the candidates anyway, the desks could easily be spaced, one-way systems put in place, and security too.
The invigilator simply wears a visor when 'patrolling' the room.
If it works for pubs (loud, drinking, and casual) it'd definitely work for a formal structured exam, which is all about procedure.
Yes, they're far more important than sports or pubs; or even regular school (For a short time). A delay till June? perhaps. Tbh I'd have exams in the covid hierarchy as
Food Grocers A-level, GCSE, BTEC and so forth exams "Other shops"
They're not as high a priority as the ability to buy food but they're not too far off I think
I think Boris was following a bread & circuses approach.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
sounds like you are sooking lemons there, upset that all is well in Scotland and all are happy happy happy.
The shit hits the fan next year in Scotland when there's a big drop in that year's highers results. England's solution is harsher this year but less problems next year.
be back to normal next year , they will either pass or fail the exam, why would that cause an issue.
You think passes down by 10-15 or so % from the previous year won't create an issue ?!
No.
If anything it will be great news. If there is wild grade inflation this year that is forever marked with an asterisk to explain then never again can we get news stories about "record grades". Good riddance to that nonsense.
Every Scottish higher and NI student this year certainly has a * next to their grades. This isn't the case for England (Or Wales).
Out of interest, does anyone know if large numbers of Scottish students go to English and Welsh universities, given they'd need to pay full fees whereas they don't closer to home?
It feels a bit unlikely to me that Scottish students having all met their offers to English universities is a more than trivial issue given the size of Scotland as a country plus the strong incentive for Scottish 18 year olds to stay in Scotland for university.
I went to a Russell Group University about 8 years ago now and returned to do a masters degree a couple of years ago. I could count the number of times I met a Scottish student on one hand.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
Giving people who would have achieved A's a U because someone one once got a U in that subject at the school due to a freak event is beyond bonkers yet that is what the system is doing.
Unlikely. The teacher would have had to royally screw up their rankings in order for that to happen.
Giving people who would have achieved an A a B or a C, or giving someone who would have got a C or D a U instead is bad enough without exaggeration.
Say you have a group of super stars this year. Every one an A student.
The teacher still has to rank them.
And because the algorithm has determined there must be a U for the class a U must be given.
Unlikely to have a group of all superstars in a class. I wonder what the odds of that are.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
sounds like you are sooking lemons there, upset that all is well in Scotland and all are happy happy happy.
The shit hits the fan next year in Scotland when there's a big drop in that year's highers results. England's solution is harsher this year but less problems next year.
be back to normal next year , they will either pass or fail the exam, why would that cause an issue.
You think passes down by 10-15 or so % from the previous year won't create an issue ?!
No.
If anything it will be great news. If there is wild grade inflation this year that is forever marked with an asterisk to explain then never again can we get news stories about "record grades". Good riddance to that nonsense.
Every Scottish higher and NI student this year certainly has a * next to their grades. This isn't the case for England (Or Wales).
It is the case in England.
Just because some have received worse grades than the deserve to offset those that have got better grades than they deserve does not make the grades accurate, does it?
Sort of on topic, I don't understand why invigilated exams couldn't take place this year - particularly for A-levels.
The invigilator sits 5-10m away from the candidates anyway, the desks could easily be spaced, one-way systems put in place, and security too.
The invigilator simply wears a visor when 'patrolling' the room.
If it works for pubs (loud, drinking, and casual) it'd definitely work for a formal structured exam, which is all about procedure.
Err. Perhaps because pupils were told 5 months ago that there wouldn't be any? And consequently haven't done any studying in that time? Small matter I realise.
I think that was a mistake - suspended, yes, but studying should have continued regardless. Schools are supposed to have continued teaching throughout.
They should have been deferred, not cancelled.
Even those who've "got" a A* have been cheated: they've never had a chance to show what they can do and prove it to themselves and others under exam conditions.
They'll always feel a level of guilt and impostor syndrome.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
Giving people who would have achieved A's a U because someone one once got a U in that subject at the school due to a freak event is beyond bonkers yet that is what the system is doing.
Unlikely. The teacher would have had to royally screw up their rankings in order for that to happen.
Giving people who would have achieved an A a B or a C, or giving someone who would have got a C or D a U instead is bad enough without exaggeration.
Ofqual blames government 'policy changes every 12 hours' for A-level exam chaos
which rather sums up this government, badly thought out re-action due to the impact of the previously (badly thought out) action
And the buck-passing now begins.
I get the feeling OFQUAL are now in a blind panic. They have been shown as more naked than the Emperor, and they are wondering if their jobs are about to go.
By the end of the week Dido Harding will probably be in charge of a new educaiton and exams body.
Probably with that spelling, too.
Dido Harding's bio reads like someone said "Siri, show me what happens when the country is run by an incompetent self-selecting elite". Grandfather seems to have had a role in suppressing the Mau-Mau uprising. Father is hereditary peer and pig farmer. Private school then Oxford (PPE, obvs). Friends with the right people at Oxford (Cameron). Management consultant (McKinsey). Then a series of well remunerated roles in the private sector and quangocracy in which she doesn't seem to have actually been very good at her job, but nevertheless progresses. Yet if you point out that there is any linkage between the way people are selected into elite positions and the poor way the country is run, you get called a communist.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
Giving people who would have achieved A's a U because someone one once got a U in that subject at the school due to a freak event is beyond bonkers yet that is what the system is doing.
Unlikely. The teacher would have had to royally screw up their rankings in order for that to happen.
Giving people who would have achieved an A a B or a C, or giving someone who would have got a C or D a U instead is bad enough without exaggeration.
Say you have a group of super stars this year. Every one an A student.
The teacher still has to rank them.
And because the algorithm has determined there must be a U for the class a U must be given.
Unlikely to have a group of all superstars in a class. I wonder what the odds of that are.
Around the entire country? Damn near certain. Especially because there will have been some self-filtering going on in the choice to stay on and the choice to do those subjects.
The year I was doing my A-levels, all of those doing Further Maths were insanely good at it (I didn't do Further Maths that year). The same, bizarrely, for French that year (the only ones who chose to stay doing French were those who were really interested in the subject and tended to be very good at it).
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
sounds like you are sooking lemons there, upset that all is well in Scotland and all are happy happy happy.
The shit hits the fan next year in Scotland when there's a big drop in that year's highers results. England's solution is harsher this year but less problems next year.
be back to normal next year , they will either pass or fail the exam, why would that cause an issue.
You think passes down by 10-15 or so % from the previous year won't create an issue ?!
That would just be sour grapes, they will need to suck it up.
Sort of on topic, I don't understand why invigilated exams couldn't take place this year - particularly for A-levels.
The invigilator sits 5-10m away from the candidates anyway, the desks could easily be spaced, one-way systems put in place, and security too.
The invigilator simply wears a visor when 'patrolling' the room.
If it works for pubs (loud, drinking, and casual) it'd definitely work for a formal structured exam, which is all about procedure.
You are applying the logic of June / July after months of thought to decisions made in a hurry back in March.
I don't see why a decision couldn't have been taken in June-July for A-levels for this year to be sat by, say, Christmas on this basis, and university entries deferred by one term.
So who will teach between now and Christmas? Or are we going to have the students who can afford private tutors, and have access to Online learning at a huge advantage? Also. If we do this for A Levels, what about GCSES? Are schools, already struggling to have capacity for social distancing and staff, going to have to rip up their plans to timetable another entire year group until Christmas?
Out of interest, does anyone know if large numbers of Scottish students go to English and Welsh universities, given they'd need to pay full fees whereas they don't closer to home?
It feels a bit unlikely to me that Scottish students having all met their offers to English universities is a more than trivial issue given the size of Scotland as a country plus the strong incentive for Scottish 18 year olds to stay in Scotland for university.
I went to a Russell Group University about 8 years ago now and returned to do a masters degree a couple of years ago. I could count the number of times I met a Scottish student on one hand.
You would need to be either pretty stupid or fabulously rich to take on all that debt when you can do it for free at home.
Sort of on topic, I don't understand why invigilated exams couldn't take place this year - particularly for A-levels.
The invigilator sits 5-10m away from the candidates anyway, the desks could easily be spaced, one-way systems put in place, and security too.
The invigilator simply wears a visor when 'patrolling' the room.
If it works for pubs (loud, drinking, and casual) it'd definitely work for a formal structured exam, which is all about procedure.
Err. Perhaps because pupils were told 5 months ago that there wouldn't be any? And consequently haven't done any studying in that time? Small matter I realise.
I think that was a mistake - suspended, yes, but studying should have continued regardless. Schools are supposed to have continued teaching throughout.
They should have been deferred, not cancelled.
Even those who've "got" a A* have been cheated: they've never had a chance to show what they can do and prove it to themselves and others under exam conditions.
They'll always feel a level of guilt and impostor syndrome.
You're right.
But its too late to turn back time now. What's done is done and a solution is needed for today not for last March.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
Autumn exams, Max's solution of going back to the school, bumping up double downgrades to single...
Who is going to help students prepare for those Autumn exams and how do you cope with the people who could afford for private exam prep and those who can't
Especially as those who can afford it have already won due to the small cohort bump...
well it wont be teachers, they dont want to go back to work
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
Giving people who would have achieved A's a U because someone one once got a U in that subject at the school due to a freak event is beyond bonkers yet that is what the system is doing.
Unlikely. The teacher would have had to royally screw up their rankings in order for that to happen.
Giving people who would have achieved an A a B or a C, or giving someone who would have got a C or D a U instead is bad enough without exaggeration.
This is one of the easier appeals (To at least get it to a C I think), I'd suggest Abby takes a year working or travelling then applies next year. She could even take the next exam
Sort of on topic, I don't understand why invigilated exams couldn't take place this year - particularly for A-levels.
The invigilator sits 5-10m away from the candidates anyway, the desks could easily be spaced, one-way systems put in place, and security too.
The invigilator simply wears a visor when 'patrolling' the room.
If it works for pubs (loud, drinking, and casual) it'd definitely work for a formal structured exam, which is all about procedure.
You are applying the logic of June / July after months of thought to decisions made in a hurry back in March.
I don't see why a decision couldn't have been taken in June-July for A-levels for this year to be sat by, say, Christmas on this basis, and university entries deferred by one term.
So who will teach between now and Christmas? Or are we going to have the students who can afford private tutors, and have access to Online learning at a huge advantage? Also. If we do this for A Levels, what about GCSES? Are schools, already struggling to have capacity for social distancing and staff, going to have to rip up their plans to timetable another entire year group until Christmas?
This is going to be like Cummings all over again, isn’t it? Lots of hand-wringing “I share your pain” tweets but f*** all action.
Yes. This is where the Presidential trend in our politics has taken us - Parliament, which is supposed to hold government to account is increasingly toothless, and so MPs can say anything because they don't have the power to turn words into action and so don't have to take responsibility for providing an alternative.
So everyone opposes the unpopular status quo, but nothing changes. It's going to do massive damage in the long-run to trust in the democratic process.
Parliament also has itself to blame (in part) by voting not to sit and have long holidays instead.
Our democratic institutions - and such checks and balances as we have - are being hollowed out and will, if this trend is not reversed, end up being about as meaningful as all the flummery that happens when HMQ opens Parliament.
We are only just startig here. Once the government has got its teeth into quashing judicial review, the sky's the limit. We'll be able to see what people who view the likes of Trump, Modi, Orban and Erdogan as allies can do when they know there are no checks on their power.
Given the number of judicial reviews already started by students and schools, it will be interesting to see whether Tory MPs revise their views towards it. This is now - given that the appeals system has been torn up - the only way OFQAL’s decision can be challenged. If even this route is removed, what do MPs think the aggrieved will do to express their dissatisfaction?
This is going to be like Cummings all over again, isn’t it? Lots of hand-wringing “I share your pain” tweets but f*** all action.
Yes. This is where the Presidential trend in our politics has taken us - Parliament, which is supposed to hold government to account is increasingly toothless, and so MPs can say anything because they don't have the power to turn words into action and so don't have to take responsibility for providing an alternative.
So everyone opposes the unpopular status quo, but nothing changes. It's going to do massive damage in the long-run to trust in the democratic process.
Parliament also has itself to blame (in part) by voting not to sit and have long holidays instead.
Our democratic institutions - and such checks and balances as we have - are being hollowed out and will, if this trend is not reversed, end up being about as meaningful as all the flummery that happens when HMQ opens Parliament.
We are only just startig here. Once the government has got its teeth into quashing judicial review, the sky's the limit. We'll be able to see what people who view the likes of Trump, Modi, Orban and Erdogan as allies can do when they know there are no checks on their power.
Sort of on topic, I don't understand why invigilated exams couldn't take place this year - particularly for A-levels.
The invigilator sits 5-10m away from the candidates anyway, the desks could easily be spaced, one-way systems put in place, and security too.
The invigilator simply wears a visor when 'patrolling' the room.
If it works for pubs (loud, drinking, and casual) it'd definitely work for a formal structured exam, which is all about procedure.
You are applying the logic of June / July after months of thought to decisions made in a hurry back in March.
I don't see why a decision couldn't have been taken in June-July for A-levels for this year to be sat by, say, Christmas on this basis, and university entries deferred by one term.
So who will teach between now and Christmas? Or are we going to have the students who can afford private tutors, and have access to Online learning at a huge advantage? Also. If we do this for A Levels, what about GCSES? Are schools, already struggling to have capacity for social distancing and staff, going to have to rip up their plans to timetable another entire year group until Christmas?
Nope they are going to either offer you a full year at school or more likely say sorry we can't help.
In the case of the school I know about some have been offered a full year, others have been told the opposite - it all depends on how much the school liked you.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
Giving people who would have achieved A's a U because someone one once got a U in that subject at the school due to a freak event is beyond bonkers yet that is what the system is doing.
Unlikely. The teacher would have had to royally screw up their rankings in order for that to happen.
Giving people who would have achieved an A a B or a C, or giving someone who would have got a C or D a U instead is bad enough without exaggeration.
This is one of the easier appeals (To at least get it to a C I think), I'd suggest Abby takes a year working or travelling then applies next year. She could even take the next exam
A year working - in all those jobs which will be so plentiful, when even graduates are going to have a hard time finding jobs, let alone an untrained unskilled A-level student with no or little experience.
It is always Scotland that is the problem for English messes, another clown trying to pass teh buck.
Not really but the consequence of the SQA decision is that unless it was followed elsewhere Scottish students had an advantage - especially if they decide that even an English university albeit it with £40k in loans is better than an enforced year off.
Sort of on topic, I don't understand why invigilated exams couldn't take place this year - particularly for A-levels.
The invigilator sits 5-10m away from the candidates anyway, the desks could easily be spaced, one-way systems put in place, and security too.
The invigilator simply wears a visor when 'patrolling' the room.
If it works for pubs (loud, drinking, and casual) it'd definitely work for a formal structured exam, which is all about procedure.
Err. Perhaps because pupils were told 5 months ago that there wouldn't be any? And consequently haven't done any studying in that time? Small matter I realise.
I think that was a mistake - suspended, yes, but studying should have continued regardless. Schools are supposed to have continued teaching throughout.
They should have been deferred, not cancelled.
Even those who've "got" a A* have been cheated: they've never had a chance to show what they can do and prove it to themselves and others under exam conditions.
They'll always feel a level of guilt and impostor syndrome.
You're right.
But its too late to turn back time now. What's done is done and a solution is needed for today not for last March.
It is too late now, I agree.
I question whether it wasn't too late in June-July to come up with an alternative, though.
Of course, the Government would have been criticised heavily for that as well - and we'd never have lived the counterfactual to know the difference - but they are there to take the very difficult decisions.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
Giving people who would have achieved A's a U because someone one once got a U in that subject at the school due to a freak event is beyond bonkers yet that is what the system is doing.
Unlikely. The teacher would have had to royally screw up their rankings in order for that to happen.
Giving people who would have achieved an A a B or a C, or giving someone who would have got a C or D a U instead is bad enough without exaggeration.
This is one of the easier appeals (To at least get it to a C I think), I'd suggest Abby takes a year working or travelling then applies next year. She could even take the next exam
Are you going to give her family the money to allow her to do so? As that is another problem - child benefit disappears..
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
Giving people who would have achieved A's a U because someone one once got a U in that subject at the school due to a freak event is beyond bonkers yet that is what the system is doing.
Unlikely. The teacher would have had to royally screw up their rankings in order for that to happen.
Giving people who would have achieved an A a B or a C, or giving someone who would have got a C or D a U instead is bad enough without exaggeration.
This is one of the easier appeals (To at least get it to a C I think), I'd suggest Abby takes a year working or travelling then applies next year. She could even take the next exam
A year working - in all those jobs which will be so plentiful, when even graduates are going to have a hard time finding jobs, let alone an untrained unskilled A-level student with no or little experience.
Yes - that should be a doddle.
It's also not the best time for international travel.
I feel very sorry for Abby in Bosworth, but is Lewis actually right here?
I thought two Es at A-level was the technical minimum requirement for funding purposes (hence why Oxford gave nominal two E offers to those passing the entrance exam rather than ignoring altogether).
I'd have thought an A and a B plus a U with a massive, Gavin Williamson shaped asterisk next to it, would be sufficient to get a place at university (again, not to take away from the concern Abby must be feeling and disappointment at missing her first choice).
Ofqual blames government 'policy changes every 12 hours' for A-level exam chaos
which rather sums up this government, badly thought out re-action due to the impact of the previously (badly thought out) action
And the buck-passing now begins.
I get the feeling OFQUAL are now in a blind panic. They have been shown as more naked than the Emperor, and they are wondering if their jobs are about to go.
By the end of the week Dido Harding will probably be in charge of a new educaiton and exams body.
Probably with that spelling, too.
Dido Harding's bio reads like someone said "Siri, show me what happens when the country is run by an incompetent self-selecting elite". Grandfather seems to have had a role in suppressing the Mau-Mau uprising. Father is hereditary peer and pig farmer. Private school then Oxford (PPE, obvs). Friends with the right people at Oxford (Cameron). Management consultant (McKinsey). Then a series of well remunerated roles in the private sector and quangocracy in which she doesn't seem to have actually been very good at her job, but nevertheless progresses. Yet if you point out that there is any linkage between the way people are selected into elite positions and the poor way the country is run, you get called a communist.
This is going to be like Cummings all over again, isn’t it? Lots of hand-wringing “I share your pain” tweets but f*** all action.
Yes. This is where the Presidential trend in our politics has taken us - Parliament, which is supposed to hold government to account is increasingly toothless, and so MPs can say anything because they don't have the power to turn words into action and so don't have to take responsibility for providing an alternative.
So everyone opposes the unpopular status quo, but nothing changes. It's going to do massive damage in the long-run to trust in the democratic process.
Parliament also has itself to blame (in part) by voting not to sit and have long holidays instead.
Our democratic institutions - and such checks and balances as we have - are being hollowed out and will, if this trend is not reversed, end up being about as meaningful as all the flummery that happens when HMQ opens Parliament.
We are only just startig here. Once the government has got its teeth into quashing judicial review, the sky's the limit. We'll be able to see what people who view the likes of Trump, Modi, Orban and Erdogan as allies can do when they know there are no checks on their power.
Given the number of judicial reviews already started by students and schools, it will be interesting to see whether Tory MPs revise their views towards it. This is now - given that the appeals system has been torn up - the only way OFQAL’s decision can be challenged. If even this route is removed, what do MPs think the aggrieved will do to express their dissatisfaction?
Vote? Complain?
Judicial reviews shouldn't be needed to do the right thing. I hope and expect there should be a review this week from people realising it is the wrong thing. The argument to me that OFQUAL have screwed up is undeniable now and it shouldn't take a judicial review to get a u-turn.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
If you haven't got a fairer solution then we need to do the fairest solution possible - which is the teacher's grades.
Giving a C to someone who should have got a C is more unfair to that person than giving an A to someone who should have got a C is to everyone else.
Benefit of the doubt should go with the student.
If correctly applied, the algorithm probably predicts exam grades more accurately than the teachers. But the consequences of a downgrade are significantly greater than an upgrade.
And those consequences seem to be particularly felt by poorer students/non private schools. So they further entrench existing inequities.
How when it's based on past performance and all results are individual. See once again algorithms assigning a U because a different student 2 years ago had a mental breakdown in the exam.
Care to continue your argument now I've shown the flaw in the algorithm or do I need to continue and show how another decision (small cohorts) meant that the algorithm was handicapped further by the fact x% of A grades had already been awarded thanks to the 4.7% increase in private school small cohort results.
If the unknown actual exam result is defined as 'right' then:
The teacher prediction has the wrong grade distribution (too high) given to the wrong pupils (no one can know exam performance on the day).
The algorithm has the right grade distribution (more or less) given to the wrong pupils.
I would argue that a) is fairer but b) is probably more accurate, whilst still not being satisfactory.
b) could be less accurate if the algorithm did a really bad job of picking the pupils to get a downgrade and gave students who would have got A's --> U's.
But the distribution of changes, suggests that those huge swings are relatively rare, it's mainly people dropping 1 grade vs. teacher predictions.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
Autumn exams, Max's solution of going back to the school, bumping up double downgrades to single...
Who is going to help students prepare for those Autumn exams and how do you cope with the people who could afford for private exam prep and those who can't
Especially as those who can afford it have already won due to the small cohort bump...
well it wont be teachers, they dont want to go back to work
Sort of on topic, I don't understand why invigilated exams couldn't take place this year - particularly for A-levels.
The invigilator sits 5-10m away from the candidates anyway, the desks could easily be spaced, one-way systems put in place, and security too.
The invigilator simply wears a visor when 'patrolling' the room.
If it works for pubs (loud, drinking, and casual) it'd definitely work for a formal structured exam, which is all about procedure.
Err. Perhaps because pupils were told 5 months ago that there wouldn't be any? And consequently haven't done any studying in that time? Small matter I realise.
I think that was a mistake - suspended, yes, but studying should have continued regardless. Schools are supposed to have continued teaching throughout.
They should have been deferred, not cancelled.
Even those who've "got" a A* have been cheated: they've never had a chance to show what they can do and prove it to themselves and others under exam conditions.
They'll always feel a level of guilt and impostor syndrome.
You're right.
But its too late to turn back time now. What's done is done and a solution is needed for today not for last March.
It is too late now, I agree.
I question whether it wasn't too late in June-July to come up with an alternative, though.
Of course, the Government would have been criticised heavily for that as well - and we'd never have lived the counterfactual to know the difference - but they are there to take the very difficult decisions.
I think June/July was too late as the time since March that should have been spent studying and revising was already lost.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
Autumn exams, Max's solution of going back to the school, bumping up double downgrades to single...
Who is going to help students prepare for those Autumn exams and how do you cope with the people who could afford for private exam prep and those who can't
Especially as those who can afford it have already won due to the small cohort bump...
well it wont be teachers, they dont want to go back to work
I feel very sorry for Abby in Bosworth, but is Lewis actually right here?
I thought two Es at A-level was the technical minimum requirement for funding purposes (hence why Oxford gave nominal two E offers to those passing the entrance exam rather than ignoring altogether).
I'd have thought an A and a B plus a U with a massive, Gavin Williamson shaped asterisk next to it, would be sufficient to get a place at university (again, not to take away from the concern Abby must be feeling and disappointment at missing her first choice).
I would have said a U grade would exclude you from any Uni of note to do a degree in Geography. The best she can hope for would be a foundation degree course then a transfer after 1 year.
The question is why the other three governments do not adopt Scotland's approach
Becasue it is daft, vast grade inflation helps no one
It's the least bad solution.
Have you got a less bad solution that doesn't result in some students getting worse grades than they should have got?
No I haven't , but giving people A who would have got C is not fair on those who have A and would have got A. If there was an easy fair solution to this then the Government would be doing it.
Giving people who would have achieved A's a U because someone one once got a U in that subject at the school due to a freak event is beyond bonkers yet that is what the system is doing.
Unlikely. The teacher would have had to royally screw up their rankings in order for that to happen.
Giving people who would have achieved an A a B or a C, or giving someone who would have got a C or D a U instead is bad enough without exaggeration.
Say you have a group of super stars this year. Every one an A student.
The teacher still has to rank them.
And because the algorithm has determined there must be a U for the class a U must be given.
Unlikely to have a group of all superstars in a class. I wonder what the odds of that are.
In state schools, it's rare but I bet it happens enough to stymie the model.
I've had it twice in a decade; a couple of genuine superstars happened to be in the group and they lifted the tone of the rest of the group massively. (This is the secret sauce of many successful schools- if you can gently manipulate admissions so that there is a critical mass of superstars every year, it lifts the rest of the school. The same happens in reverse, which is why turning round struggling schools is so hard.)
There's a bit of a recognition of this by Ofqual in the small cohort rule.
Out of interest, does anyone know if large numbers of Scottish students go to English and Welsh universities, given they'd need to pay full fees whereas they don't closer to home?
It feels a bit unlikely to me that Scottish students having all met their offers to English universities is a more than trivial issue given the size of Scotland as a country plus the strong incentive for Scottish 18 year olds to stay in Scotland for university.
I went to a Russell Group University about 8 years ago now and returned to do a masters degree a couple of years ago. I could count the number of times I met a Scottish student on one hand.
You would need to be either pretty stupid or fabulously rich to take on all that debt when you can do it for free at home.
Also, the Highers + 4 years system presumably means that only the strongest at school could go straight to a 3 year course south of the border (edit: beginning as if straight to the more or less 2nd yr in a Scottish u/grad degree).
Sort of on topic, I don't understand why invigilated exams couldn't take place this year - particularly for A-levels.
The invigilator sits 5-10m away from the candidates anyway, the desks could easily be spaced, one-way systems put in place, and security too.
The invigilator simply wears a visor when 'patrolling' the room.
If it works for pubs (loud, drinking, and casual) it'd definitely work for a formal structured exam, which is all about procedure.
Err. Perhaps because pupils were told 5 months ago that there wouldn't be any? And consequently haven't done any studying in that time? Small matter I realise.
I think that was a mistake - suspended, yes, but studying should have continued regardless. Schools are supposed to have continued teaching throughout.
They should have been deferred, not cancelled.
Even those who've "got" a A* have been cheated: they've never had a chance to show what they can do and prove it to themselves and others under exam conditions.
They'll always feel a level of guilt and impostor syndrome.
OK. Good response. My youngest was told there were no GCSES back in March. After a 2/3 month break to play Xbox and sleep till 2 pm, he has got it together to put in some work to read and research the A Levels he will start in 2 weeks time. He has been reading Plato, Freud, history and sacred Hindu texts for example. Stuff that interests and engages him. He hasn't given a moment's thought to French verbs, quadratic equations, mole values or ox bow lakes apart from to give thanks that he doesn't have to consider them any more. Asking him to pivot and 're learn these now for an exam at Christmas would be a massive intrusion on his A Level prospects.
Out of interest, does anyone know if large numbers of Scottish students go to English and Welsh universities, given they'd need to pay full fees whereas they don't closer to home?
It feels a bit unlikely to me that Scottish students having all met their offers to English universities is a more than trivial issue given the size of Scotland as a country plus the strong incentive for Scottish 18 year olds to stay in Scotland for university.
I went to a Russell Group University about 8 years ago now and returned to do a masters degree a couple of years ago. I could count the number of times I met a Scottish student on one hand.
You would need to be either pretty stupid or fabulously rich to take on all that debt when you can do it for free at home.
It's certainly a benefit, but not to the extent that many people assume.
In my case, I went when tuition fees were only £3,000, and the majority of my student loan balance is made up of maintenance loans which Scottish students also have to take at home.
It's also dishonest to describe fees in a way that suggests students are being saddled with debt, especially as the way repayments work mean nothing is actually taken from you unless you're earning over £21,000/£25,000 (dependent on the year of entry).
Comments
Grandfather seems to have had a role in suppressing the Mau-Mau uprising. Father is hereditary peer and pig farmer. Private school then Oxford (PPE, obvs). Friends with the right people at Oxford (Cameron). Management consultant (McKinsey). Then a series of well remunerated roles in the private sector and quangocracy in which she doesn't seem to have actually been very good at her job, but nevertheless progresses.
Yet if you point out that there is any linkage between the way people are selected into elite positions and the poor way the country is run, you get called a communist.
Surely this indicates Ofqual's press office has been instructed not to respond to journalists' queries, which is very much absent WITH leave (indeed they've been instructed to be absent).
We're discussing the way that the Government body has decided to award grades in exams that pupils never actually took, rewarding some and failing others by use of an arbitrary algorithm (and talking about "retakes" of exams that were never actually taken in the first place).
In order to approximately simulate (and "maintain the integrity") of an exam system that was optimised for conditions as they existed for our grandparents more than half a century ago, and has continued because "that's the way things should be."
Closed-book exams on subjects evolved for the post-Victorians on a schedule to allow the children to work on the fields over summer for careers that have changed out of mind, hammered to sort-of-fit while the original purposes of the system have long ceased to be applicable.
Exams that add a true random element based on a blend of which marker you get and how they're feeling on the day, plus whatever random events affect the mental and emotional state of a teenager on a particular day, and whether or not they make an exam-related blunder on a particular individual paper.
And then, just to add a true level of surreality to it all, the most important decisions of your future career (which university will accept you on which course) are done before the exam is taken. In order to preserve a schedule through the year based on what precisely?
Why tie up with school timetables, especially when the big driver over summer is to free the kids to work in the fields?
If we had open-book exams, using multiple assignments over the year, with less fetishing of subjects that were perceived as important a century ago, with the results given prior to university application, maybe the system would do the intended purpose somewhat better?
And maybe we could have held the exams remotely - far more feasibly than the traditional "sit in a big hall and regurgitate memorised facts about the formation of oxbow lakes because that's exactly what you need to be able to do in your future career or to learn stuff at university - no, wait..."
Especially given the collapse in overseas students coming here.
Why do you keep repeating this nonsense? What evidence do you have for it?
I note that 'transparency' is one of their explicit statutory duties.
If we're thinking of A Levels as a race, it's as if a proportion of the runners have been allowed rocket boosters. That's apparently OK because most runners aren't allowed them, so the average race time hasn't moved much.
When in reality it was the exact opposite. I don't need to know that you remember how xyz worked, what I need to know is if you can find that out and then apply it to the project you are working on.
In the current world 30 seconds on Google will give me more knowledge about XYZ then a day trip to the British Library would have done 25 years ago. So the important fact isn't do you know it, but how do you apply that knowledge.
And those consequences seem to be particularly felt by poorer students/non private schools. So they further entrench existing inequities.
It feels a bit unlikely to me that Scottish students having all met their offers to English universities is a more than trivial issue given the size of Scotland as a country plus the strong incentive for Scottish 18 year olds to stay in Scotland for university.
The nefarious hacks have done more damage.
Lol
The invigilator sits 5-10m away from the candidates anyway, the desks could easily be spaced, one-way systems put in place, and security too.
The invigilator simply wears a visor when 'patrolling' the room.
If it works for pubs (loud, drinking, and casual) it'd definitely work for a formal structured exam, which is all about procedure.
Care to continue your argument now I've shown the flaw in the algorithm or do I need to continue and show how another decision (small cohorts) meant that the algorithm was handicapped further by the fact x% of A grades had already been awarded thanks to the 4.7% increase in private school small cohort results.
Giving people who would have achieved an A a B or a C, or giving someone who would have got a C or D a U instead is bad enough without exaggeration.
And consequently haven't done any studying in that time?
Small matter I realise.
Tbh I'd have exams in the covid hierarchy as
Food Grocers
A-level, GCSE, BTEC and so forth exams
"Other shops"
They're not as high a priority as the ability to buy food but they're not too far off I think
I'd have thought they'd show Robert the process and weaknesses in a private message. Not actually do it.
If anything it will be great news. If there is wild grade inflation this year that is forever marked with an asterisk to explain then never again can we get news stories about "record grades". Good riddance to that nonsense.
The teacher still has to rank them.
And because the algorithm has determined there must be a U for the class a U must be given.
Just because some have received worse grades than the deserve to offset those that have got better grades than they deserve does not make the grades accurate, does it?
They should have been deferred, not cancelled.
Even those who've "got" a A* have been cheated: they've never had a chance to show what they can do and prove it to themselves and others under exam conditions.
They'll always feel a level of guilt and impostor syndrome.
If a university goes over their quota, they are fined by reducing their income.
Thus a university can be full based on their SNC even with less overseas students and potential capacity as a result.
https://twitter.com/lewis_goodall/status/1295082184135540737
Damn near certain. Especially because there will have been some self-filtering going on in the choice to stay on and the choice to do those subjects.
The year I was doing my A-levels, all of those doing Further Maths were insanely good at it (I didn't do Further Maths that year). The same, bizarrely, for French that year (the only ones who chose to stay doing French were those who were really interested in the subject and tended to be very good at it).
And just because it has been fixed is not proof that it is already full.
Also. If we do this for A Levels, what about GCSES?
Are schools, already struggling to have capacity for social distancing and staff, going to have to rip up their plans to timetable another entire year group until Christmas?
But its too late to turn back time now. What's done is done and a solution is needed for today not for last March.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DfKj8Q_H0Co
In the case of the school I know about some have been offered a full year, others have been told the opposite - it all depends on how much the school liked you.
Yes - that should be a doddle.
If the government does u-turn then like Sturgeon it should be praised for doing the right thing and not condemned for doing so.
When you're making a mistake u-turning is a sign of wisdom not weakness.
I question whether it wasn't too late in June-July to come up with an alternative, though.
Of course, the Government would have been criticised heavily for that as well - and we'd never have lived the counterfactual to know the difference - but they are there to take the very difficult decisions.
I thought two Es at A-level was the technical minimum requirement for funding purposes (hence why Oxford gave nominal two E offers to those passing the entrance exam rather than ignoring altogether).
I'd have thought an A and a B plus a U with a massive, Gavin Williamson shaped asterisk next to it, would be sufficient to get a place at university (again, not to take away from the concern Abby must be feeling and disappointment at missing her first choice).
Complain?
Judicial reviews shouldn't be needed to do the right thing. I hope and expect there should be a review this week from people realising it is the wrong thing. The argument to me that OFQUAL have screwed up is undeniable now and it shouldn't take a judicial review to get a u-turn.
The teacher prediction has the wrong grade distribution (too high) given to the wrong pupils (no one can know exam performance on the day).
The algorithm has the right grade distribution (more or less) given to the wrong pupils.
I would argue that a) is fairer but b) is probably more accurate, whilst still not being satisfactory.
b) could be less accurate if the algorithm did a really bad job of picking the pupils to get a downgrade and gave students who would have got A's --> U's.
But the distribution of changes, suggests that those huge swings are relatively rare, it's mainly people dropping 1 grade vs. teacher predictions.
its school holidays.
I've had it twice in a decade; a couple of genuine superstars happened to be in the group and they lifted the tone of the rest of the group massively. (This is the secret sauce of many successful schools- if you can gently manipulate admissions so that there is a critical mass of superstars every year, it lifts the rest of the school. The same happens in reverse, which is why turning round struggling schools is so hard.)
There's a bit of a recognition of this by Ofqual in the small cohort rule.
He hasn't given a moment's thought to French verbs, quadratic equations, mole values or ox bow lakes apart from to give thanks that he doesn't have to consider them any more.
Asking him to pivot and 're learn these now for an exam at Christmas would be a massive intrusion on his A Level prospects.
I hope I'm not called someone who always takes the Tory line if/when that happens.
If you're making a mistake a u-turn is the right thing to do. Come on Williamson/Johnson: do the right thing here please.
In my case, I went when tuition fees were only £3,000, and the majority of my student loan balance is made up of maintenance loans which Scottish students also have to take at home.
It's also dishonest to describe fees in a way that suggests students are being saddled with debt, especially as the way repayments work mean nothing is actually taken from you unless you're earning over £21,000/£25,000 (dependent on the year of entry).