Active discussions

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think the 2 tier GCSE system is wrong

237 replies

countingdaysuntilretirement · 16/01/2025 23:06

My dd is in year 11 and will be doing her GCSEs in June. There has been some discussion on whether she would be sitting the higher levels or not - she's borderline on most. I have only just realised that you can't get lower than a grade 4 if you take the higher paper - if you do badly you don't get a grade 1,2 or 3 but are simply ungraded. But if she takes the foundation level she can't access the higher grades.

This means children are having to take a gamble with their papers. I would have thought the higher level would just add an additional paper or layer - not that you risked losing a GCSE altogether if you had a bad day.

Can anyone rationalise this for me?

OP posts:
MargaretThursday · 16/01/2025 23:23

Used to be 3 tiers in maths.
Lowest the highest you could get was an E.(could get G in those days) They did paper 1&2
Middle was E through to C They did papers 2 & 3
Higher was C and above. They did papers 3 & 4.

Dm taught several who were doing lower level and hoping to get a G. They would be able to attempt about half the questions on the lowest paper and that was a struggle. They would have been looking At getting under 10 marks on the paper 2. Some of them 5 was a good score.
At the other end of the scale there would have been a good number of people expecting to get 99+% on papers 3 & 4.

To put those into the same paper you'd have had a paper that the lower end would hardly have been able to do a question.

Elizo · 16/01/2025 23:23

countingdaysuntilretirement · 16/01/2025 23:20

I think the main problem is her performance can be quite patchy. She does have some SN and will sometimes do well and sometimes lose focus and do next to nothing.

We may as well go back to O-Levels and CSEs if there are 2 tiers!

Have they got mock results? You could get them to do a past paper on higher/ foundation see how it comes out. Also, what do they think? Sometimes the child has a pretty clear insight into what would be best

ShamblesRock · 16/01/2025 23:20

The science teacher advised us last year that it was better for him to 'ace' the foundation paper and get a 5, then risk the higher and potentially end up with a 4.

A 5 is 'easier' on a foundation paper than a higher paper.

MayaPinion · 16/01/2025 23:20

Yes, my DS was in the ‘main’ maths stream but had a bit of a mental burst at the end of year 1 of his GSCEs (mainly due to his excellent teacher). He was told that it was too late to put him in higher set but was capable of it. In year 11 he was easily doing (max he could achieve) grade 5 work and achieved a very high 5 at GCSE. He was never going to become a mathematician but arguably he could have achieved a grade 6 with a bit of a push.

Original poster
countingdaysuntilretirement · 16/01/2025 23:20

I think the main problem is her performance can be quite patchy. She does have some SN and will sometimes do well and sometimes lose focus and do next to nothing.

We may as well go back to O-Levels and CSEs if there are 2 tiers!

OP posts:
Original poster
countingdaysuntilretirement · 16/01/2025 23:17

I was the first year of GCSEs - they were still working it out.

OP posts:
Original poster
countingdaysuntilretirement · 16/01/2025 23:16

@morbideveningthoughts
Thank you, that does make sense. But I don't see why someone entered for the higher who does badly will end up with a U rather than a 1 or 2 if they get enough marks for the lower grades.

OP posts:
Chipshopninja · 16/01/2025 23:15

I did my GCSEs in 2000 and this was the case even then

Not a new thing. But I agree it's not ideal for those who are middle of the road

Elizo · 16/01/2025 23:15

It is really tricky. But I think the difference in a 5 at foundation snd a 9 is immense. So not sure how they would cover the higher material. My school made me do foundation maths way back and my mark was so high the exam board gave me a b. I don’t think it works like that now. If your child is unlikely to get more than a 5 foundation definitely safer (assuming higher grade not needed)

Original poster
countingdaysuntilretirement · 16/01/2025 23:14

Thank you. I'm new to this and feel I should have known. My daughter is very uncommunicative about how she's doing and we don't have long to decide.
But I'm just in shock atm that it is the way it is - seems unfair.

OP posts:
morbideveningthoughts · 16/01/2025 23:13

They do it so that children do not have to sit through an excessively lengthy exam. The ones who can do it all will either be exhausted or will have lost focus by the end. And it’s not ideal for the ones who can only do the minimum to be faced with a paper they have no hope of completing.

It’s not a gamble, the teachers know the pupils well and enter them for the appropriate tier.

Garedenhelp · 16/01/2025 23:12

I agree having the same dilemma with my year 11 son. It has always been this way even when I sat my gcses.

Like you say on the face of it it doesn't seem too hard to have the questions getting progressively harder as the paper goes.

I have also been told that the reading level in the higher papers (sciences) is much harder than the foundation, which is swaying us towards foundation for my dyslexic son , so take that into consideration for your daughter too.

Swipe left for the next trending thread