Exam results

Where did I say they were lairs? The stats however show they are awful at predicting grades. I don't know if its a pressure thing to give higher marks, or that the nature of taking an exam over coursework (or even over mocks) is a bigger factor that they can't judge but as mentioned before only 16% of students achieve the grade that they were predicted. Even when you add in margin of error only 42% get a grade within the margin of error, 48% the predicted grades were overly optimistic and 10% overly pessimistic.

And the students are screwing over everyone else because they are demanding that teachers predicted grades which have been proven to be inaccurate are trusted knowing they are inaccurate. Would they be demanding the predicted grades if the the overly pessimistic figure was 48% rather than 10%. Hell no but as it benefits them they are happy screwing over the validity of GCSE and A-levels. Someone from 2020 now going for the same job where these qualifications are important now has a massive advantage over someone from a year earlier because their grade was easier to get

 

Why when they have been proven by statistics that their judgement when it comes to predicted grades is way off.

 

The thing is though that is fine when it has no bearing on anything. The problem is it now does. You will get people who wouldn't have met their provisional uni offer who now get in to that course while someone who would have got that place through clearing may now miss out because they haven't dropped out of the course.

And not everyone goes to uni, qualifications are used for other things in life which this now impacts

 

But to get that higher qualification or training can be impacted by your previous ones. Lets say I was someone who took A-Levels last year, I wasn't sure what I wanted to do so went backpacking for a year and now I'm entering the same marketplace as this years A-level students. That job I might be going for I might not even get an interview as people on my academic level from this year are a grade up because they are going on predicted grades. Or that course you want to do, you may miss out because there are limited places and again you are now further down the list. It may only be an issue for say 3-5 years but its still now an issue

 

They are the stats that have been being shown on the News so I don't have a link I can provide. But it was being used by BBC, ITV and Sky and I would assume others

A quick web search did bring up

https://www.ucu.org.uk/media/8409/Predicted-grades-accuracy-and-impact-Dec-16/pdf/Predicted_grades_report_Dec2016.pdf

Which says in the conclusion

I find a high level of inaccuracy of grade prediction. Among the best 3 A-levels students achieve, only 16% of higher education applicants’ grades are accurately predicted. However, the vast majority of applicants actually receive predictions that are too optimistic for the grades they actually go on to achieve, with 75% of applicants achieving lower grades than predicted

So 16% are correct with 75% getting lower than predicted.

I can't find the margin of error ones so you will just have to go back and watch old news reports if you really want to see them as I have better things to do than trawl through the Google rabbit hole.

And I don't know what is the best way but the simple fact of the matter is the algorithm resulted in schools performances being more in line with previous years than the predicted grades have. Schools grades don't fluctuate that much in reality, certainly not over a 5 year period that was being used so it seems about as accurate as you can get. And schools had the opportunity to appeal across the board under the original idea so if they could show why the algorithm was unfair to them for example maybe they can show a consistent improvement year on year at their school and they could get them adjusted.

I appreciate in some cases people would have got screwed over by the algorithm but some are also getting screwed over now with predicted grades, infact you are likely to now see some people have their grades fall. Giving many grades they wouldn't have achieved though isn't a solution