The Exam Situation

FatCat said:
My godson had an A star recommended by his teacher and in his mock - he was given a B.

He has submitted an appeal.

However he has applied to the university today online (his teacher has supported the application with some comments on the application) the uni came back an hour later and phoned him with an offer of a place.

Seems like the Unis have at least got their act together and are being fairly flexible and pragmatic.
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Sadly this isn’t the case for everyone. Lots of examples on social media of students losing their places.
 
To quote Gavin Williamson: he acknowledged the danger that an “exceptionally high-performing child in a low-performing school” would not get their expected grades.

Some grades were dropped from an A to an E.
 
Primus84 said:
Sadly this isn’t the case for everyone. Lots of examples on social media of students losing their places.
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yes i guess for every good news story there are others missing out. Hopefully when appeals are done and everyone takes stock there will be places for the majority. Seems foreign students are only expected to be two thirds of their normal number due to covid so hopefully that frees up further places.
 
This may be cold comfort to those students who have been hard done by, and I believe many have, but I fluffed my A levels so didn't get into my uni of choice, but I did manage an hons degree and a MSc with some hard work. It's not the end of the world if you dont get what you want straight away. I fully empathise if you didn't get what you wanted by virtue of a peculiar, and in many cases, unfair assessment in unusual circumstances, but the key is resilience. Dont accept being knocked down, but you're far more valuable if you get back up again
 
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Cooper671 said:
Hi BM welcome to the restricted club. My account has been like it since day 1. FatCat has also posted in the past his account is restricted too. When he did some posters stated it was a conspiracy theory against admin. Borolad advised their are algerhythems (I know that’s spelt wrong) built into the board to slow down and put off potential unwanted or troublesome posters. The fact it’s me you and FatCat on the list gives an idea of what that might be.

The only way round it is to wipe your browsing history after you post which will log you out and then the board work fine, it’s when you try log in you get some problems. Once you post you will need to delete the browsing history again. Ridiculous really but that’s the way
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Literally not a word about this shambolic affair. Typical Coops.
 
FatCat said:
yes i guess for every good news story there are others missing out. Hopefully when appeals are done and everyone takes stock there will be places for the majority. Seems foreign students are only expected to be two thirds of their normal number due to covid so hopefully that frees up further places.
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But all of this was avoidable. Real people have lost out here.
 
WeeGord said:
Literally not a word about this shambolic affair. Typical Coops.
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Come on mate. There is abit below the belt. I literally have no understanding of how these exam grades are being calculated hence why I passed no comment on the thread.

I simply made a comment about BM being to this mysterious list of posters who find it difficult to post. All of which seem to be of a similar view.
 
Primus84 said:
But all of this was avoidable. Real people have lost out here.
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Yes I don’t know enough about it.

The few thoughts I have are we shouldn’t t have gone down the Scottish route and went with teachers predictions, this would over inflate grades.


The blanket algorithm approach is clearly not good either as it doesn’t take into account individual cases.

When you say avoidable - what would you have done ?

Finally there are a finite number of places available at uni- this is not going to change - they will still be taken up so hopefully students will not be disadvantaged as badly as people may think.
 
FatCat said:
Yes I don’t know enough about it.

The few thoughts I have are we shouldn’t t have gone down the Scottish route and went with teachers predictions, this would over inflate grades.


The blanket algorithm approach is clearly not good either as it doesn’t take into account individual cases.

When you say avoidable - what would you have done ?

Finally there are a finite number of places available at uni- this is not going to change - they will still be taken up so hopefully students will not be disadvantaged as badly as people may think.
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Teacher predictions are the only fair way.
 
FatCat said:
Yes I don’t know enough about it.

The few thoughts I have are we shouldn’t t have gone down the Scottish route and went with teachers predictions, this would over inflate grades.


The blanket algorithm approach is clearly not good either as it doesn’t take into account individual cases.

When you say avoidable - what would you have done ?

Finally there are a finite number of places available at uni- this is not going to change - they will still be taken up so hopefully students will not be disadvantaged as badly as people may think.
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Get yourself on social media, there are plenty of students with plenty of evidence that they have been significantly disadvantaged.

But hey what would I know? I've only worked in the sector for the last 15 years?
 
Primus84 said:
Get yourself on social media, there are plenty of students with plenty of evidence that they have been significantly disadvantaged.

But hey what would I know? I've only worked in the sector for the last 15 years?
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Like I said I don’t know enough about it , it sounds like you do. Thinking out loud , my main point is are they really going to lose out on uni places. The blanket way this has applied means that many have been downgraded - uni still need to fill their spaces so who will take up these places?
 
There is an appeal process is there not? If so it's going to be busy. Overall result for grades A-C were 2% higher than previous year which suggests to me that is o.k, and overall they have got something close to right, but regrading of lower grades has been the issue. Some number crunching numpty who understands algorithms decided to reinvent the bloody wheel. Should have gone for mock results and course work grades and not past performance by others at those teaching establishments. This country is not the only one being effected by this mess. So lets not just think it's Boris or Gavin, maybe the blame should be Ofqual for giving out bad advice to Ministers.
 
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FatCat said:
Like I said I don’t know enough about it , it sounds like you do. Thinking out loud , my main point is are they really going to lose out on uni places. The blanket way this has applied means that many have been downgraded - uni still need to fill their spaces so who will take up these places?
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Yes they already have lost out on uni places. The ones taking their places? Easy answer - if grammar schools and private schools have seen their results go up - who do you think might take the place of working class students who had their results pulled down?
 
tripleheader said:
There is an appeal process, going to be busy! Overall result for grades A-C were 2% higher than previous year which suggests to me thats o.k, but regrading of lower grades has been the issue. Some number crunching numpty who understands algorithms decided to reinvent the bloody wheel. Should have gone for mock results and course work grades and not past performance by others.
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The problem is there's very little coursework these days - most subjects are entirely exam based at the end of Y13 with no AS in Y12. This "Government's" changes to the assessment format has had a dramatic impact on the results this year because of this.
 
FatCat said:
Yes I don’t know enough about it.

The few thoughts I have are we shouldn’t t have gone down the Scottish route and went with teachers predictions, this would over inflate grades.


The blanket algorithm approach is clearly not good either as it doesn’t take into account individual cases.

When you say avoidable - what would you have done ?

Finally there are a finite number of places available at uni- this is not going to change - they will still be taken up so hopefully students will not be disadvantaged as badly as people may think.
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Would you rather we over inflate some grades, or massively understate many grades robbing people of the potential of social mobility which they have rightly earned and instead will be given to some Tarquin or Beatrice who didn't work hard or do so well but had rich parents. I know who deserves the chance
 
FatCat said:
Thinking out loud , my main point is are they really going to lose out on uni places.
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Yes, yes yes. Many are losing out on their uni places. How can you have contributed so often to this thread and not be aware of that??
Seems you are trying to down play the significance of this latest, most colossal Government screw up for some reason. 🤔
 
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