Please explain exam boards to me: why so many? Why doesn't the DofE do it?

They don’t donate land and buildings though. The buildings remain under the ownership of those religions.

If the tax man wants to buy those then fine.

I don’t think atm they could afford that
If parishioners pay towards a school those parishioners should get first dibs. Of course they should. It’s their church school. So on this I disagree

and no my kids didn’t go to a faith school

I have often pondered this very subject so thanks for asking these questions! So much complexity caused by the current system - one recent example - my DC is at a 6th form where two schools merge and become one - but in some subjects the kids have studied different exam boards for a given subject at GCSE meaning content which may be helpful for the A level has or has not been covered. Baffling really. I just struggle to see any advantages at all.

It was me too 😆

Where is your evidence? There is evidence of how they are set, calibrated and reviewed in terms of level of skill difficulty by Ofqual. The qual spec and assessment strategy set out the level of difficulty. It's equivalent to GCSE because they ARE GCSEs. They are just written without UK bias and are recognised internationally.

Your opinion isn't fact or evidence.
Chat GPT doesn't agree with you either though.

Nope. Its bullshit

Quick Google for parents 😊

@ParentOfOne - I was agreeing with @Octavia64's point that many faith schools are undersubscribed and adding the more significant point that many faith schools are VC schools. The claim you are disputing is that many faith schools do not discriminate on the basis of religion. As most VC schools do not discriminate on the basis of religion, that claim is clearly and unambiguously true. @Octavia64 is correct - may faith schools do not discriminate on the basis of religion.

The figures given on the Fair Admissions Campaign page to which you link are over a decade out of date. A lot has changed since then.

Nonsence

This is a classic argument by those who attend, work or have their kids in state to put down private schools education
Same old same old

Luckily we don’t care and really don’t have to. Do we @twistyizzy 🤣🤣

Re Faith schools

Its worth noting that the buildings and grounds are owned by the faith and also that a % of the cost is met by that particular faith
Some %s are less than others but still subsidised nevertheless

When some faith schools changed their entry criteria in the 70s to allow those in not of the faith ( if there were places available) it was on the condition that faith comes first
Of note this happened as a result of the increase in births but the Government not providing enough school places to accommodate that

I think as the faith owns the buildings and grounds and pays a % towards the education ( however much that may be ) it’s only right that faith is an upper criteria when offering places

I've taught in both. I also taught in state when we were allowed to teach both GCSE & IGCSE. Students getting 2 grades higher on IGCSE was standard. These days, the savvy parents of state school students pay for private entry to IGCSE through a different exam centre. My friends son did it. Couldn't get above a 4 at GCSE. 6 at IGCSE.

I do not believe that the most competitive private schools would sign up to easier iGCSEs because A levels are all the same so they would be shooting their own cohort in the foot, because they get judged most on their A level results. There are no easier A levels. So I suspect the GCSEs and iGCSEs are largely the same in terms of difficulty level. Perhaps some oddities with eg English language, but again, I would expect an English selective private school to pick a challenging board and do both English lit and English language. Just like grammar schools pick the more challenging stuff as it is good preparation for A level, hence the top maths sets are encouraged to do a Further Maths GCSE, sometimes even Ad Maths which is pretty challenging. I think the only way to “game” the system now is to do fewer GCSEs and do better in the fewer that you do than doing extra ones on top. Hence the number of kids doing more than 11 GCSEs has really gone down, not least because of clashes. When there were fewer exams and more course work, it was easier to do more GCSEs as doing 2 sometimes even 3 exams a day is counterproductive.

Competition is healthy. We have to use WHEC only and on times it is shit. Changes to all subjects without proper consultation has been terrible.

back your earlier claim that many faith schools do not discriminate based on religion

As @Octavia64 says, undersubscribed schools have to admit all applicants. An undersubscribed faith school therefore does not discriminate on faith grounds. Also, just over half of all faith schools are Voluntary Controlled schools. The admission criteria for these schools are set by the local authority, not the school. Whilst some local authorities have used faith-based admission criteria for VC schools, most do not. The statement that many faith schools do not discriminate based on religion is therefore correct.

Turning to your central point about exams, as others have pointed out the current system gives schools a choice. They can choose the curriculum and approach that they believe best suits their pupils, rather than being forced into a one size fits all approach which is what would undoubtedly happen if Ofqual or the DoE set exams. It also keeps exams relatively free from political interference. Ministers cannot determine the curriculum for any GCSE or A-level subject, let alone the exam questions.

You could equally ask why we have over 100 bodies setting exams for degrees rather than the DoE setting exams for all universities.

🫣 yeh OK you'd better tell Ofqual they don't know what they are doing then!

Where is your actual evidence for your statement that a 7 GCSE is equivalent to a 9 iGCSE

Do you teach in state or independent?

Also surely if iGCSEs are taken internationally by a competitive private school cohort surely the peer group you get compared against is possibly more challenging rather than less? Let’s say if you are competing against kids in private schools in Singapore? And the grades awarded in percentage terms of top grades will be same on the curve? Off to look at Pearson Edexcel as they do both?

I teach both. One is massively easier than the other.

The people that get angry about it are the private school parents who don't like to think their children had it easier.

We have cousins in the family who are private school and did some iGCSEs but not IGCSE in all subjects, just some it seems, and the more selective private schools never go for the easiest anyway, because they want their cohort well prepared for A level as they are aiming for top grades there. Having different exam boards gives different schools flexibility as to what may suit their own cohorts best.

My Lower Sixth has just gone to a high performing grammar school which admits based on top GCSE results but in reality is actually pretty religious as far as she is concerned! So is that a faith schools or not? It happens to have a majority non Christian demographic but they seem to be perfectly OK with the Christian faith and learning about it at school (RS is a compulsory GCSE) and there is loads of hymn singing. So what does that tell you? Are you opposed to schools who practise the faith or just those who admit based on faith criteria?
Being anti faith in a Christian country with a head of state who is head of the Church of England - is not a neutral position, far from it. We are still a COE country whether you like it or not. And I am not COE by the way. But I am happy to send my DC to a good school that has a strong COE base. I also have friends who are Jewish who attended church just to get into a school that was good. That is what some people are willing to do who want a good education for their kids. Far cheaper than moving house and a lot of Christian principles are based on tolerance and love of thy fellow human anyway so hardly offensive stuff.

It's not easier but it's different. English still has coursework so the assessment styles are different. There isn't really any doubt that coursework affords opportunities to shine and to hone the important academic and life skills of reflection, editing and refinement of the written word. It also still has American Lit. I have no doubt at all that IGCSE prepares students better for the assessment style and content of A level courses. Lots of us in state schools would like to be able to do IGCSE.

Yep. Maths IGCSE has calculus and GCSE doesn't. It isn't harder/easier, it's just slightly different. The skills level is exactly the same as GCSE.

Agree with you twisty
This old claim that IGCSES are easier is bollocks

In subjects such as the sciences and maths for example the curriculum is far more loaded and they set students up for a better chance at A levels
The exams themselves are not easier either