When are Y12 getting their predicted grades?

[TheCrunchTimes]

Has your school told you when your kids will be told what grades they have been predicted for A levels?

Mine is keeping very cryptic about this ( understandable given school closures) but without the predicted grades we cannot even choose options for the UCAS applications or even decide on what universities to target as we have no clue on whether DS have a chance.

If your school has told you when these grades are going to be made know to the students, did they mention any estimated date?

Thank you

I told form tutor Dd was doing her ucas form over summer hols and sending it off day ucas opened entry. she said we won’t be doing predicted until October.

I said that’s too late. She said dd should tell the teachers what she needs and ask them to ensure it matches her needs.

We do a report of where dd is now, with missed teaching, so she agreeed with me that The grades dd needs are realistic as obvious grades generally go up after teaching in y 13. Assuming teaching starts again.

Why would your DD be sending her UCAS form off the day they open entry? Unless you are doing something weird, it won’t be her sending it anyway, it will be the school. They need time to put together a reference for her and to check over the application so it is unlikely to be ready for sending on their part by 8th September. The deadline for early entry isn’t till 15th October.

Y12s at my school will already have predicted grades from their report before school closed - obviously the UCAS predicted grades will be different but it will at least give them a ballpark idea. They’ll be sitting exams a few weeks into term and we will use those for proper UCAS predicted grades.

The college my ds is at are holding online progress reviews this week with subject tutors to discuss this. DS got his on Tuesday.

Thank you all. We have not given any indication on when we will get the predicted grades but hearsay has it that it would be some time in September/October, which I agree is FAR too late (we may have been checking universities he has no hope to be accepted in or missing online open days from those he had a chance to get an offer from). But understandable given the current circumstances, all the same.

BTW, there is nothing "weird" about sending the UCAS application early on in fact, you can apply for 2021 entry since last May. Not all schools do the applications on behalf of their students. The UCAS expected way is for the student to complete their application and the referee gets an email with a link to enter their reference. I admit however that I am a bit dismayed that DS' school asked him to complete his application by the end of June and to submit his UCAS password and password retrieval questions to his school. I'm sure this is bang out of order but I don't want to rock the boat...

We do AS grades and results will go out on 13th August....

The UCAS expected way is not via an email link if the student is at sixth form or college. Students submit and pay for their UCAS independently but then it goes into a holding area where the school check it, add predicted grades and reference then the school actually sends it to UCAS.

You should already have a decent idea of predicted grades though - my Y12s have a target grade then a predicted grade given each term during y12 and 13 so they had already got 3 sets of grades to give them an idea of expected level of progress.

Bloody hard to do when so many of my class have submitted no work all lockdown

I agree I am struggling with some of mine. No work for whole of lockdown, some for valid reasons, some not. We did an exam - which was virtual so done in trust. Some I can see did it without assistance, help. Others - it pretty much matched the mark scheme! Sadly this is from one who I have had nothing from. Oh its a challenge.

My school have asked us to do Predicted grades by the end of last week.

We have had "working at" grades but been told that official predicted grades won't be done until they are back at school in September when they will be doing exams. Goodness knows what happens if they don't return to school in September though. DS is less than completely thrilled at the prospect of going straight into exams on return, having had very little by way of live lessons and the grand total of three half days in school since lockdown began. He already has a tutor for one of his subjects and I am now looking for the same for his other subjects. He's going to have a bit of a crap summer I'm afraid, but needs must..Considering he goes to what is almost universally considered the best school in the area I am a bit underwhelmed by how they have handled all this to be honest.

I'm with you hedgehogger1... 100%.

Having said that, and I am not saying that the same is happening in your school, but at DS's schools us parents have been informed that about 50% of the students are not submitting any work but my son has submitted all the work in time (weekly) and is still to get any feedback...

Obviously some schools have responded to this crisis better than other ones but... sigh*

Same here Avocet.... DS's school only started to do live lessons two weeks ago. His previous school's mates (also in Year 12) have been having lessons via Zoom on the same schedule as before they sent us into lockdown all the time.

DS's current school is supposed to be better than the previous one BUT they didn't use as many online resources as his old school did so were ill prepared to deal with this challenge.

Around late Sept time here . DD2 has been told she will go back in Sept, take some tests and then get her predicted grades.

DS got his predicted grades about a month ago.

My year 12 has decided to repeat the year rather than go into Y13. She was fine in two subjects but has really struggled in the other one and now having missed so much this year feels she can’t take the risk with going into exams feeling so far behind.

OP- This all sounds very odd. Schools don’t complete the UCAS form for the student but it is normally the school that send the application to UCAS after checking it and adding the reference. It is very strange for the school to have requested his password and password retrieval questions. I have never heard of that before. They wouldn’t need his password to view and send his application, that is done through centre-linking using a “buzzword”. Each centre sets a buzzword that students use to link their application to the correct centre. The school can then view their students’ applications, add predicted grades and references and send to UCAS. In my school we will be giving students their predicted grades in October. Students need to be assessed when we return to school and teachers need time to mark those papers before giving the grades. We wouldn’t be sending any applications any earlier than that and there is no conceivable advantage to sending an application any earlier than the 15th October anyway. We usually get our early deadline applications in by about the 10th-12th but students who submit on the 15th are not at any disadvantage. Our other applications are usually sent in late October to November but some stragglers leave it until January and still end up with decent offers from good universities. It’s not unheard of for kids to change their minds about a gap-year and then make a last minute clearing application and still secure Russell Group places.

We also prioritise those applying for oxbridge/ medicine etc. They have earlier deadlines

Have your new yr13s received their predicted grades for ucas yet?

No! Our school have said it'll be after Oct 5th, and no one is to 'pester' teachers about them. They've had no assessments at all in year 12 and doing some rushed exams this week and next. My ds is early entry and massively stressed.

Year 12 should have a predicted grade based on gcse grades by now, but it’s meaningless. They have not been in long enough to demonstrate any aptitude for their A levels.

Year 13s should be sitting assessments during this half term to determine a predicted grade for UCAS.