A’Level disasters 😔😣

[OverTheRainbow88]

Any other schools been majorly hit?

My son's school prides itself on the accuracy of the predicted grades.

This is much much easier in high achieving schools especially private schools with small classes whee the teachers can get to know the students - quite another in large comp with mixed abilities.

Haven't RTFT as my DC nowhere near A-Levels, however I've just since this. Thought I'd share in case it helps?

Larger schools and sixth form colleges do seem to have been disadvantages at much more than an individual scale, though.

A French student at a small school 6th form with an entry of 5 would have had their CAG accepted unconditionally and not moderated, whereas an identical student at a large sixth form college with an entry of 20 would have not only seen their result statistically moderated, but ALSO moderated down overall in order to keep grade inflation down.

So for each small school sixth former getting a CAG of A where they might have been on the A/B borderline, a similar student in a sixth form college would have to get a C to prevent grade inflation overall.

DD2 goes to a grammar, they are pretty consistent in grades and definitely tend to not over inflate predictions (DD1 beat her predictions and she wasn’t only one)
Not one of her friends has got their predicted grades. So odd, some statistically would have.

My DS went to a well known private boarding school. He has done incredibly well. He had great mocks, best in school for one subject. High predicted grades. If something had come back that didnt reflect this I would have pulled out all his reports, his mocks, his GCSE results and socked it to them and so would the school. I have all of that to hand. So should the schools.

Some are saying the schools have thrown away their mocks! Really?? Most were taken in Jan 20 and we locked down in March 20. Why would a school throw away something like this and so quickly. The school year wasnt even over.

All those who are saying child should have got a A. That is an easy thing to say - you are the parent. Realistically look at the grades in GCSE and all those saying that their child didnt take the mocks seriously and were just about to knuckle down. What a lesson for us all to learn.

Neighbours daughter achieved A in all of her mocks, one being Spanish (her first language). Its a highly selective school and their website shows 85% of students usually achieve A or A at A-level.

Our neighbours daughter was awarded BBC, with the C being in Spanish!

www.newstatesman.com/politics/education/2020/08/top-level-grades-soar-private-schools-sixth-form-colleges-lose-out

Says here The number of grades at A and above rose by 4.7 points in private schools but by just 0.3 points at colleges.

Yes, historically in lots of schools, low percentages achieve top grades. In others, vast numbers achieve the very top grades. The national figures for %s at each grade hide vast differences between schools.

It’s not discrimination against certain schools. It’s the reality of the cohort in terms of its ability and background situation, along with the ability of the school to get grades out of its given cohort.

And I agree that some sharp elbowed people can only accept either top grades for all or top grades for their kids. Accepting that the vast majority won’t be getting A*-B and that one’s own child is probably within that vast majority, just seems impossible for lots of people. Instead there must be a discrimination or an error, not just the case that this is what this child was going to get. Sounds harsh, but there’s something in it.

And yes, this year group have had a shit experience and it’s been horrible and the continued lack of clarity about appeals makes it worse. But a shot situation cannot mean all children must be given the inflated ucas grades that were used or inflated teacher grades which were significantly higher than usual.

The system does need to be fair and seems to have some problems, but in the end, similar percentages should get the top grades and the pandemic can’t be used to say everyone must have high grades - or they are meaningless for all too.

If you had 5 or less in your group no change was made.

This isn’t true. In my school we have a number of subjects where the cohort size is 5 or less, but they still had some CAGs moved down.

Wombat,

However, a system which says that if you happened to be in a small cohort - whether through doing a less popular subject or by being in a smaller school - you got your resuklts assessed one way [through CAG], but if you were in a larger cohort you got your results assessed in a different way HAS to be unfair, surely?

Especially if the 'overall results' have to look similar, it means that students in specific school types are disadvantaged twice - once because their results were moderated against previous years' results, whereas others weren't, and then again because their grades had to be lowered further to compensate for the higher marks given to others.

I don't see to many people on here complaining their DC was predicted an E but only got a U!!

One thought, maybe some of the over prediction was at the lower level (let's face it, what teacher is going to predict one of their students is going to get a U), and this caused the kids at the particular school more in the A, B, C category to 'take the hit'

OfQual says:

"The standardisation process will be sensitive to the fact that centres with smaller entries (because of their centre size or number of students entered for a particular subject) usually see more year-on-year variation in results than in centres with larger entries. Centres with smaller entries will have greater weight placed upon the centre assessment grades when calculating results, as this is the more reliable source of evidence in these circumstances. We do not have one cut-off point to define a ‘small entry’ in a subject – instead, the process will use a sliding scale to adjust the weighting given to the centre assessment grade or statistical evidence depending on the number of students taking a subject at a centre."

I don't think the cut-off point of 5 is correct, but the overall point it.

A school local to me has said their results are 5% higher than last year, so some are going up.

It might be “fair” nationally, but not at all fair to individual students. It would have been better to give predicted grades to all and had a massive grade inflation for all this year than this. It’s a mess.

I am so sad for all these students who are getting results that don’t in anyway reflect them or their abilities. It is completely unfair.

@SmileEachDay

Re the rank ordering and appeals - just saw this on Twitter....

I’m trying to find the document it’s from.

How is this fair ? If all the students worked hard and the whole class came out with As Bs and Cs why shouldn't they all get awarded ABCS?

simonjt - serves the neighbour’s daughter right for being a native speaker taking A Level ! Bloody nuisance native speakers are, hiding under a “British” surname and inflating the grades. There’s even been a recent OFQUAL investigation into the pesky blighters....

@Springersrock

A b to and e?!? That’s awful!

*40Eve
Product design course was all done and completed for Easter , was marked as an A but not taken into consideration for grading awarded when it should have been 50% of the mark.

Exactly the same for my Son on Product Design too.

Luckily he was offered a unconditional offer at his first choice university during his interview, but that's besides the point. He struggled massively with anxiety throughout sixth form to the point that he was physically ill and lost so much time that it got to the stage that he would be asked to leave if he failed to attend again. The school supported him fully helped him get his grades up to predicted A A C and he got A, B, U how can you go from an high end C to a U when your mock was a B?

All those who are saying child should have got a A. That is an easy thing to say - you are the parent. Realistically look at the grades in GCSE and all those saying that their child didnt take the mocks seriously and were just about to knuckle down. What a lesson for us all to learn.

It’s also an easy thing to say if your child got an A at mock, A’s at GCSE and was predicted it.

It’s not just a case of everyone expecting to be A’s all round

@MiniCooperLover Swansea is much better than Liverpool anyway. We have miles of beaches and we are a friendly University 😊

It would have been better to give predicted grades to all and had a massive grade inflation for all this year than this.

But that equally wouldn't have been fair because some schools clearly overpredict by more. Why should a child be discriminated against for having a teacher who is better at predicting?

Our local comp has released something saying roughly as expected, perhaps a little up.

I would be amazed if that twitter thing wasn't a fake. I cannot see them downgrading a pupil.

It's tricky isn't it. When I was doing A levels back in the day I was predicted BBC I did the A levels and got BCD. For the D I had never got lower than about a B in coursework for that subject and was good at the subject.

So these things do happen, but it's one thing if you must've fluffed up an exam, but another to just be 'awarded' a D and must feel more unfair.

Another point is that many get plenty of As at GCSE level but don't get As at A level which is much harder. UCAS predicted grades also add to raised expectations.

I agree it has been weighted in favour of very small cohorts, cantkeepawayforever, but those in classes of 4 and 5 have definitely had grades changed and nobody is helped by incorrect info being shared.

Much like the “if one student has an appeal granted so their grade moves up another student has to have their grade moved down” which seems to be doing the rounds today (sky news were reporting it). Ofqual have said that isn’t true.

If there is a child who is in a failing/inadequate school and they were expecting to get AAA then there are a very very small minority of the entries this year IMHO. They might be your child so get the evidence together, put your boxing gloves on and prove them wrong.

That's fine if those students have a parent to go to bat for them - but what if they don't?. If their school is downgraded on past performance, this kid loses out. If it's a kid who's in care, they could be the next Einstein, but who's going to get all the evidence together?

These are the kids who will lose out. They lose out anyway in multiple ways, but they're going to miss their chance this year and it matters more to them too.

Yes, they're a minority but the system is already so stacked against them and I do think it says something about a society how we treat children like this.

It's a bloody disgrace.

It's very sad that students futures are being based on an algorithm.

We are looking at it very sympathetically at our University so encourage you family members and friends to check out Swansea University.