Exam results

So you are trying to tell me that 20 years later where results are even more important to schools than ever that they now leave Exam prep to a week before study leave? You aren't after all leaving something important to a semester that you lose half of it for exams and study leave and if its not important they aren't leaving useful months of prep and refeshing knowledge

There just is absolutely no way they hadn't already started exam prep. Infact I know for a fact they had because there have kids TV today bitching about how hard they had been working on exam prep when the exams were cancelled and how they feel like they are going to get screwed over by predicted grades being used

 

But surely that's because you can't really standardise across schools when the 'grading' isn't consistent. When you have an exam that everyone (well everyone on the same exam board) sat the same one so its all marked at a consistent level its fine but when every school (and even every teacher in the school) is predicting differently because its opinion not fact and each teacher has a different motivation how can you standardise? Lets say the 16% correct predictions all come from the same school because they made an effort predict realistically, if you now 'standardise' nationally you are putting these 16% at a massive disadvantage. You have little choice but to standarise on a school by school basis bring predicted grades inline with the results that the past 5 years suggest the school would achieve

 

The thing is though as I said previously yes over time the impact won't be a problem as other grades and experience will override it but there is a certain section of people over the next few years it will impact. When I left Uni it was at a point the IT job market had collapsed (we had just had the first internet bubble burst) and the Uni realised this and got a recruitment expert in to come and give a talk. One of the things he said was that every entry level job we go for they company will get 100+ more CV's, way more than they can interview so they will be looking for the smallest thing as a reason to dump your CV in the bin and things like grades are an easy thing to use to discard one. He advised that we list our qualifications but leave grades off so as not to give them an easy way to dismiss us (although he also said some may just dismiss it for not having grades)

You now potentially have people applying for jobs who only have these qualifications to be judged on at the CV stage who now have grades that make their CV stand out more. So I'm not sure saying its not an issue is correct, its not an issue for those who goto uni and it may not be an issue for everyone else a few years down the line but right now it is a problem for a certain group of people (Especially with COVID making competition for jobs greater. I saw a news report about a pub that advertised for a new member of bar staff and would usually get 30 applicants but got over 200)

 

That doesn't change my point though. It's being claimed that students haven't had the time to be prepped. My point was that even when I took them where we were near the start of them almost guiding us through the exams we started prep at the start of the semester before study leave. As you have just pointed out they are being guided even more now so are the teachers really now leaving it to like a week before they go on study leave? Seems unlikely, if anything you would think it would start even earlier as its become more and more important for schools to do well

 

I'm not suggesting they should be punished though. Wanting them to get a fair grade that see's the overall results inline with what would have been expected isn't punishing them.

And as it is with predicted grades they are punishing lots of people. Those who got qualifications prior to this year for example, kids that had teachers who were more realistic with the grades etc etc. We already see now the BTEC's which weren't impacted pulling their results so they can adjust them up so that these students don't get punished. We also see calls for next years exams to be made easier so that next year aren't punished, which then means its going to have to remain easier thus devaluing the qualifications from every year prior. Are they also going to have to dumb down degrees to account for the fact classes may be of 'lower quality' as no uni wants a massive drop out rate.

Yes the algorithm has issues as it can't account for outliers so maybe someone who would have under nationally adjustment scrapped into an A when adjusted at the school level stay at a B but is that really any worse than giving everyone their predicted grade that is seeing the number of people getting A and above sky rocket making the actual A students achievements less and punishing the students I mentioned before?

 

If its like A-Levels its whichever is highest