A level results day 2021 support thread

@pistachioicecream We are in the same boat, lost our first choice Uni and now gone through clearing and going to a completely different one not even on the radar. Do we just move on, do we appeal?

@MaddieElla I sincerely hope the grade is increased for your daughter and the process is quick.

DS is in the very fortunate position of having still got his firm choice University despite dropping a grade, so wouldn't want to do anything to jeopardise that.

Really feel for those like @MaddieElla's DD who have lost their places. Just terrible. Have everything crossed your appeal is successful - can't see how it won't be with the situation you've described.

I do appreciate the viewpoint that A-levels are a stepping stone and shouldn't matter in the long run so just let it go. But DS feels like he's failed and is struggling to move on at the moment.

@MaddieElla I am so sorry to see your post here. I had noticed you hadn’t been on the other thread but was hoping you just hadn’t had a moment.
This is so unfair for your DD. I hope so much that her appeal is successful- it sounds like she has a strong case. How on earth can you get a B when you’ve never ever had a B before?
Hang in there - I know it must be tough but we’re thinking of you and DD and hoping for a good outcome in the end.

We have been made to feel that there is no point in appealing as we won’t win so I guess that’s it for us. What a shame to leave a school after all this time feeling this way and what a shame for the students. They must feel it’s all been a waste of time 😢

I think the deadline is Thursday but to be honest my head is a mess so I could be wrong on that.

How long is the second appeal likely to take?

To be fair DDs stage 1 appeal came back very quickly, so it's possible they did the same thing. We were expecting them to say of course there's been no mistake our end.

Stage 2 appeal went off on Thursday.

@Bryonyshcmyony They didn’t know what we were predicting. But we did, and we knew what their firm choice offers were. So for every student who might need a priority appeal we ran all of the checks before staff went on holiday so that if the student made an appeal on results day we could give them the outcome immediately, having checked it all in advance.

It wasn’t already decided. We checked all of the grades for every student that we thought might appeal before the holidays. That way if we found any errors we could sort them out before they were rejected by their university. If we didn’t find any errors our end then we could tell them that straight away if they appealed, so that they could move on immediately to the stage 2 appeal to the exam board. By doing that it meant that anyone who needed a priority appeal could go to stage 2 as quickly as possible rather than waiting for us to do our clerical checks while their university place hung in the balance. Pretty much every school around here did the same thing.

For example, we ran stage 1 appeals for every student who had a chance of being rejected from their firm choice university before term ended and teachers went on holiday

How did they know what you were predicting?

Well, that’s opaquely clear then 🙄
We’re ok here -into first choice.
However, if you weren’t, you’re now telling us that this first step was already decided -so why have it?
Absolutely floored by your logic

The immediate rejection of stage 1 appeals is because schools were allowed to run stage 1 appeals before results day. For example, we ran stage 1 appeals for every student who had a chance of being rejected from their firm choice university before term ended and teachers went on holiday. That way, if we had any priority appeals on the day we could respond and move them onto stage 2 immediately on results day. If we’d found any errors in any of the stage 1 appeals we would have been able to try to fix them before results day and save the kids the hassle and stress. It isn’t that we are being dismissive of appeals, the opposite in fact.

Not all independent schools handed out top grades willy nilly.

Many of my children’s friends got Ds, or lower, at A level and 3/4s at gcse. (I might add they are not at a selective independent!)

That’s not to say we haven’t noticed inconsistencies amongst friends at other independent and also state schools. What we have noticed is an immediate rejection of stage 1 challenges to results. I really do think it’ll be nigh on impossible to challenge these results.

What wasn’t fair was the ability for schools/colleges to devise their own way of deciding grades -there should have been a uniform procedure.

That’s the Williamson’s fault.

Hopefully they don’t f* it up for next year’s GCSE/A level pupils. Not holding my breath…

I have to say that I would disagree that with CCAABC in assessments that a C could be a reasonable outcome. I'd have thought you'd average them out and it would be a B. I suppose if they came in that order and the C was for the last piece of work you might think it reasonable but with two As there too? I think a B is the reasonable outcome in that instance. Whether the exam board would agree with me...and given all the media flak about grade inflation...it's really rubbish.

A lot of the grade inflation was at private schools.

This is not me being bitter, but the stars on this were in the paper

Anecdotally I don’t know a single state school kid who got higher than expected grades

And yes if you know of a C to A* jump then that is particularly jarring.

I do hesitate to dismiss other people's success, some deserved those grades and I don't want to come across as though they don't. But yes, when you read the headlines about the massive increase in top grades it really does add to the bitterness.

@MaddieElla I totally sympathise with you as I will not forget the look either, it was completely stomach churning as a parent to have to try and explain why this has happened when so many others have had their grades so completely inflated its mind boggling - we know of one ourselves who has been awarded A* in a subject that was at best due a C so has gone through the "adjustment" for Unit, whereas we sit in clearing ......

Thank you for the good luck wishes, we will need them.

Beyond, I am so glad your DD picked herself up and got that A that she was capable of. That's the most distressing part of it; that you know they deserved it but end up feeling a failure. DD thinks she had ideas above her station but it is so far from the truth.

I hope she does decide to resit, but at the moment she feels it's futile as how can she get 2 x 90+% and not get an A. She can't do much better than that.

It will all work out in the end as it did with your DD, I am just trying to parent her as best I can at the minute.

We had similar with Chemistry last year... teacher awarded C, all mocks were A (she excels in exam conditions). Hit our heads against the brick wall a few times, but Dd just took the exam in October in the end, got her A.

Going to uni this year feeling confident that she is up to the challenge.

It is utterly baffling to me that a school wouldn’t be looking to give the best possible grade based on the evidence. I wish you and your DD luck with the appeal. It sounds very stressful indeed.

Thank you @MadameMinimes it really has blindsided us and I will never forget the look on her face. She didn't aspire to get an A, she had them all along. She was even quietly confident she might get an A*. The subject was chemistry, and yes, that's the road we've taken on appeal, that the grade isn't reasonable.

At the stage 1 appeal they said that they had taken a holistic approach to grading as there were no grade boundaries, and that's when they confirmed her final two exam scores. That's it, one paragraph saying that their grade was correct and no error made.

I would imagine that they have ranked her mocks and final exams with others in her year, but her chemistry teacher told her that only one person had scored higher than her in her last two tests.

Her mock A was based on last year's grade boundaries, which DD realises is just a guide but pointed out in the appeal that moderation surely wouldn't have brought her score down to a B. And the school have confirmed that more weighting was given to the final two exams - so it just doesn't make any sense.

@MaddieElla Yours is one of the rare cases where, actually, I think you have a fair chance of success. If a student has achieved A-A grades in every assessment and test for two years then I’m not sure that a B grade is “reasonable” based on the evidence. Which subject is it? In mine 90%+ would be a very high A. The cut off for A* grades normally falls around the 75-80% mark for my students. I’m surprised that the stage one appeal didn’t find a clerical error. Did they give any more information about why they gave that grade when they responded to the stage one appeal?