Does EBacc mean anything??

[bamboowarrior]

Any thoughts? about to take options here!

[mumsneedwine]

No. Nada. Nothing. Totally meaningless. Hope that helps.

[TeenTimesTwo]

I think it is a sign of a nicely balanced education.
But I wouldn't do an MFL or Hist/Geog just to get the Ebacc iyswim.

[whoamitojudge]

Nope, not a single thing

[Comefromaway]

To me it means a narrow education with a lack of arts and a narrow view of humanities.

[steppemum]

dd is at a superselective grammar. She is year 9 and just done options. She did not have enough slots for everything she wanted, and her least favourite by a long way was Geography.

Wihtout Geog, she didn't have EBacc. We had a long talk to her teachers etc, and they all said it doesn't matter, go with the subjects she wanted. So she's doing computer science instead of geography.

(we are mean though, and insisted on a language)

[Bestseller]

It's can be helpful if a child is hoping for Oxbridge. Other than that it's good for the school's figures but makes no difference to the child.

[SweepTheHalls]

Russel group universities like to see it as they recommend A levels from the E Bacc list, for which you would need E Bacc subjects at gcse to be able to study. russellgroup.ac.uk/for-students/school-and-college-in-the-uk/subject-choices-at-school-and-college/

[Somethingsmellsnice]

It's can be helpful if a child is hoping for Oxbridge.

This is totally incorrect!

[mrsm43s]

@comfromaway To me it means a narrow education with a lack of arts and a narrow view of humanities.

You do know that they are allowed to choose arts and other humanities in addition to the ebacc? The ebacc is only 7 (or 8 if triple science) out of the 10/11 GCSEs they will be taking. Plenty of room for arts and additional humanities to be taken too.

On the whole, I would say that it represents a well balanced education, and for most children it would be a good thing to do, keeping their options open for future choices. However, there will be exceptions, for example children who are unlikely to achieve a GCSE in one of the subject areas (like languages) due to lack of aptitude, but would get a good GCSE in a different subject, in which case I don't think that rigidly sticking to ebacc is a good idea.

[titchy]

From the Russell Group:

The English Baccalaureate includes academic subjects highly valued by the Russell Group but it is not required for entry to any Russell Group university.

It is NOT required by anyone.

[MintyCedric]

According to our deputy head, who coordinates options, EBacc and it's usefulness is 'a figment of Michael Gove's fevered imagination' !

[AppleDump]

My DS Y8 really doesn't want to choose French (no alternative MFL) for his options. How much will this bra problem?

[AppleDump]

Sorry to hijack op

[Dermymc]

Debatable tbh.

For pupils it is meaningless.

For OFSTED they have explicitly mentioned it in their draft 2019 framework. This could lead to a narrower curriculum for some students IF Ofsted continue to use Ebacc as a measure to inform their decisions.

It's a measure for schools, nothing to do with pupils. But schools are judged on it so they will want students to take Ebacc subjects.

[BubblesBuddy]

Requiring it and it being meaningful are not the same thing. It has meaning because it covers a spread of subjects that a broadly and well educated child should be capable of doing. Plus an art. It isn’t required by anyone but it isn’t necessarily disregarded either. They are not the same thing. I don’t have the data, but I suspect most Oxbridge students have it. Required or not!

[MaisyPops]

It depends.

It's a good principle to promote a broader curriculum & offer those previously denied academic options the chance to study them. Some schools would make poor choices pushing students into mixed quality qualifications and shutting down academic study for their pupils in order to boost league table rankings.
In reality it is now pushing schools who've always had a good curriculum to cut other valuable subjects such as music, DT etc. (And the schools who used to narrow the curriculum still do it by other means)

It's all a bit of a no-win for schools really.

Having the label Ebacc is meaningless to students, but having a broad range is good. I wouldn't advise someone to take a subject just so they can say It's ebacc if the rest of their options were balanced.

[PuddingsAreMyJam]

But I wouldn't do an MFL or Hist/Geog just to get the Ebacc iyswim

DS didn't have a choice. At his school, they separate the year into two groups. One group who they think has a chance to attain the EBacc and the other who they think doesn't. So DS only had 3 option choices (including either History and Geography) as he was in the EBacc group and had to do a MFL whereas the other group had four.

Everyone (parents and teachers) seemed pretty vague as to what the EBacc was worth.

[OddBoots]

It means the state under values the arts despite the clear evidence of the value of the arts educationally, socially and economically.

[PuddingsAreMyJam]

@OddBoots how do? (Genuine question, btw).

He's still taken Music as an option (and could've taken either Dance, Drama or Art as his other option if he fancied it. He didn't and went for Computer Science instead).

He still had a far wider choice than I had at GCSE, even though I could had more options then he did.

The only criticism I would have is that he had to take all 3 sciences.

[PuddingsAreMyJam]

Sorry, how so, not how do

[NotAnotherJaffaCake]

Sometime Oxbridge admissions interviewer here (natural science). Wouldn’t know what an Ebacc is if it bit me in the arse, I am afraid.

[BertrandRussell]

“The ebacc is only 7 (or 8 if triple science) out of the 10/11 GCSEs they will be taking.”

This is wrong. The EBacc is only 5 subjects. And I reckon that they are all subjects we should encourage our even slightly academic children to do. Maths, English, a MFL, a Humanity and a Science. Why would anyone want to stop their children doing those?

[OddBoots]

It doesn't stop them taking an arts subject but the arts are excluded from the EBacc itself so not a valued subject area.

If the EBacc is of importance (and I realise that is questionable in itself) then excluding an area of learning is dismissive of that area.

[WanderingDaffodil]

It's meaningless. Irrelevant. Schools are judged on Progress8 scores and EBacc is just for decoration.

[BertrandRussell]

It is intended to encourage schools to offer solid academic subjects. It’s ironic that the sort of people who used to be really outraged about schools doing “soft” GCSEs are now being outraged about them doing “hard” ones!