I get soooooooooooooooooooooo angry at this time of year when the same old tired arguments are trotted out

I'm sick of hearing that My degree is pants, that my A-Levels were pants and my G.C.S.E.'s were pants.

I'm sure I'm not alone in having worked my socks off for what I got, its a shame that people feel a need to belittle the achievements of young people today.

So, like Byron says... Ignore the small minded critisism and just celebrate

I feel exactly the same. It may be 13 years since I did my a-levels, but I do remember that at the time it meant so much in my short life of 18 years. I felt that I had worked hard and they were the ticket to go away and study. If I was doing my a-levels now I would feel so hurt that all my efforts are being rubbished by the state.

If there is so much concern that young kids are not good at school or that their techers are crap why do we not praise the people actually acheiving good grades? Why are we automatically suspicious about them doing well?

I help fund many projects with disaffected youths who would drop off the face of the earth if these interventions were not there. The projects get them to stay on and take vocational courses and some GCSEs even A Levels. How on earth can these kids be encouraged to stay on at school and try for further education when the state itself is saying that the exams are too easy and automatically undermining them?

I despair!!!!

I can't imagine many people receiving results today care a great deal what politicans are saying. Either they have what they wanted and/or needed, or they don't. More than that, they know how hard they worked and whether they've earnt those grades.

Political reaction is inevitable on an issue as central as education, and to think that the politicians will wait a few 'grace' weeks when the story is in today's news cycle is naive. To wish it is futile. The Liberal Democrats don't seem to me to be generally cynical and opportunistic so I'm willing to believe that they believe what they are saying today. (The Tories are of course Satan's Little Helpers)

Personally, I doubt the papers are getting easier. Teachers know how to play the system better and pupils are working harder and smarter. There's more pressure to get good grades since the exam sitting population has expanded.

The real problem is that A levels are a blunt tool ill suited to differentiating between what has become an unwieldy population of students.

The highest grade achievable is an A, and it was gained in 21% of papers.

Unpalatable truth though it may be, people have varying levels of intelligence. 21% is too big a number to adequately differentiate achievement.

At the same time, A levels have become an exam it is almost impossible to fail. Only 1 in 20 papers this year.

This is fine, nobody wants to fail, nor to see other people fail. However, if everyone is going to get *something* then there has to be scope within the system for the most able and dedicated to excel.

The pass rate is neither here nor there. A levels are failing because the information they are providing is not very useful anymore.

A-Levels are way easier these days. I have 3 Bs from 1992, where do I send to have them seasonally adjusted to the As I clearly deserve

A Levels are not getting easier. Many people are just having a better standard of Living (compared to the 50's 60's 70's and even 80's (though not all).

Its like in the past the public schools got the best results, the inner city (poor areas that is) got the worst results, thats still the case, but its a lot closer betwwen them now.

Why was that was that because the children of the rich were brighter. No; it was those children went to better schools and more importantly grew up in a academic work pressure culture.

As many people from working class and lower middle class backgrounds are now having a better standard of living than say 20 years ago (though 30 or 40 years ago the difference is even greater). The work culture has spread further beyond the rich.

That because years ago the asparations of many working class people and what they thought people like them could achieve, was school, maybe the best grade a cse (or a low GCSE) then get a job in a shop/factory for life.

Now the asparitions are University, then who knows where. University has become the aim and standard place to finish schooling for the working class. (unlike years ago when no working class would have gone to university).

So people are working harder, turing up to school, not leaving school at 15/16 (depending on the legal age to leave) and not dropping out.

As for the places that get the worst grades, well guess what, they have not changed, they are the inner city schools in poor areas where the aparations are not university then work (even if it is just a call centre work (and a degree helps for call centre and even McDonalds now)).
But its places where most people leave school and go on income support, as now (due to the collapse of traditional industry) those people don't see the point of doing well, they have the worst schooling and the worst teachers (normally the newest ones who as soon as they can go to a better school (and a few dedicated ones who hope to make a difference).

If people in those areas were to be given hope (and funding) as those boroughs tend to have low reveue from council tax so less to spend per person (and the most demand for spending as schools their cannot depend on someones daddy buying them a new mini-bus, computer etc).

I am surprised, the tories (who I don't like) are not arguing this and trying to claim credit for wealth increases of many people improving the standards.

Of course they would ommit that the very poor have got poorer and more desperate, and can't work in factories as their are none. since they were in power for the 80's some of the 70's and most of the 90's.

To summerise arguing A-Levels and GCSE's are getting easier seems a little like arguing that the rich schools had easier papers for the last 40 years than the poor schools (or people there as they had rich parents were brighter) rather than people in other sectors are having the same asparations as those from the rich schools.

---

by Incandenza
I can't imagine many people receiving results today care a great deal what politicans are saying. Either they have what they wanted and/or needed, or they don't. More than that, they know how hard they worked and whether they've earnt those grades.[/b]

---

If only people could be so logical about things. It's worse for those who're only halfway through with AS levels, but none of my peers were exactly happy with their efforts being rubbished. Hardly a morale booster for overworked kids. Hit hardest were those who did worse than expected: how could they mess up "easy" exams? Those who were confident in themselves just sounded irritated, but that's far from the majority, and it's leading to a culture where some are seriously questioning the worth of A-levels. It comes up time and time again when 16-18 year olds are asked what's playing on their minds.

Personally, I didn't care one jot about it, but then I'd done both old and new A-levels, so could see how spurious most accusations are.

---

Political reaction is inevitable on an issue as central as education, and to think that the politicians will wait a few 'grace' weeks when the story is in today's news cycle is naive. To wish it is futile. The Liberal Democrats don't seem to me to be generally cynical and opportunistic so I'm willing to believe that they believe what they are saying today. (The Tories are of course Satan's Little Helpers)

---

These would be the same Lib Dems who declared they were against war in Iraq without a second UN resolution, then promptly about-turned and said they now supported the war because a Blair-dominated Parliament voted for it?

It would of course be naieve to expect most politicans to act with anything approaching tact and compassion. One can but dream.

---

Personally, I doubt the papers are getting easier. Teachers know how to play the system better and pupils are working harder and smarter. There's more pressure to get good grades since the exam sitting population has expanded.

The real problem is that A levels are a blunt tool ill suited to differentiating between what has become an unwieldy population of students.

The highest grade achievable is an A, and it was gained in 21% of papers.

Unpalatable truth though it may be, people have varying levels of intelligence. 21% is too big a number to adequately differentiate achievement.

At the same time, A levels have become an exam it is almost impossible to fail. Only 1 in 20 papers this year.

This is fine, nobody wants to fail, nor to see other people fail. However, if everyone is going to get *something* then there has to be scope within the system for the most able and dedicated to excel.

The pass rate is neither here nor there. A levels are failing because the information they are providing is not very useful anymore.

---

I don't think raw scores have ever been much use in appraising the interlectual inquisitiveness of a university candidate. This is why I think Oxbrige can quite fairly turn down candidates with streams of A-grades. But in complement with personal statements and interviews (which there could be far more of), they can be a very useful tool: which is all any exam system can hope to be.

If A-grades become too plentiful, the bracket can of course be raised a little. (Though it varies from subject to subject, and fewer than 21 per cent gain three A-grades.) But now is not the time to debate it properly. Give it a few months for statistics to be properly anylised and anecdotal evidence compiled. The shortsighted opportunism we're seeing doesn't do anyone any favours, least of all those sitting the exams.

Byron
I for one do not think the bracket should be moved up if A-grades get more plentiful. The reason is because that will mean the exams will get harder, so an A Grade after then will not be comparable for an A Grade 5, 10, 20, 30 years ago. The problem is that employers and universities will not recognise that someone with an A should that happen has done better than their easier A, and that someone with a B may have got an A if they had sat the easier older exam.

That is the problem also with awarding A*s (for future A-levels or GCSE's) The people who did it before then do not see the A being given now as being the same A they got but the A* being that (depite the A being lower and 8* representing a higher level of attainment than they were tested for). This is despite the fact that had they done a paper with A* or a modern paper they may only get an A.


Its becasue the tests are not getting harder. Just to go back to my earlier point more schools are achieving the level of results that only private schools used to achieve. This is good.

It is the rich who feel threatened as their own self inflated sence of superiority about themselves and their families that are being challenged.

Also if in society everyone has a degree, what is wrong with that, if anyone capable of getting a degree has a chance they should (and should not be put under extra pressure of a sort not felt by the rich by having finacncial problems, funding, equipment, socialising (which is important as it means you generally work better))

If that leads to masters and PHDs meaning what BA/BSc's used to mean then nothing wrong with that.

Also as for stress, executives and the rich are under far less stress than anyone else. They spread a lie about having more money due to more responsibilty for centuries, however it is "white collar" lower paid non executive people who are under the most stress, have to juggle money, work the most hours and are most prone to stress illnesses than say company directors who dissapear off to golf clubs, foreign countries, going out, eating expensive meals more than most peoples wages and do the least work (and also get pay offs for failure).



(Edited by Gopher 18/08/2003 12:45)

Things have changed alot since I took A Levels but at the end of the day tech resources these days are more advanced. Even over the last few days. I just despise the fact that these muppet politicians cannot accept the students are working hard for their results.

To everyone gettign results...well done for trying and ignore the idiots who quite scarily run our country

---

by Gopher
Its becasue the tests are not getting harder. Just to go back to my earlier point more schools are achieving the level of results that only private schools used to achieve.

---

And grammar schools...

---

Also if in society everyone has a degree, what is wrong with that, if anyone capable of getting a degree has a chance they should (and should not be put under extra pressure of a sort not felt by the rich by having finacncial problems, funding, equipment, socialising (which is important as it means you generally work better))

---

Most jobs don't require degrees, and certainly not the highly specialised information that one acquires doing a degree. If anything is gained it is usually the tools for rigorous logical thinking and application to a single complex task - which are no doubt valueable skills for everyone, but I do wonder whether they shouldn't be introduced lower down the educational chain.

And of course that's if the student is capable of taking a degree, which is fair enough of those that have got A's and B's and C's - whether or not that means more or less than it used to - but it's not of those that only managed two E's at A-Level.

Putting vast numbers of people though university is expensive and not necessarily to the benefit of the individual - someone who drops out of university is in a worse position than someone who never started: financially, in how it looks to a potential employer, and in personal self-esteem.


I'm not sure that how hard people have worked for their A-Levels is at all relevant. If that hard work is only time spent memorising facts and learning exam technique, then I think it is wasted hard work. If that is the case then students needn't feel bad about the mistakes of those setting the exams, though they might wish to be angry about it.

What is relevant is whether they have been set to worthwhile academic tasks that separate those who only learn large quantities of data from those who have the brains to think about and apply it - both should be required of those who embark upon a university career.

(Edited by Demona 19/08/2003 15:11)