If they f***ING delay the GCSE results I will not be accountable for my actions

[ScrapThatThen]

They need to sort it out before Thursday or allow centre assessed grades.

I work in children's mental health. Stop heaping unfairness on unfairness and uncertainty on uncertainty. Give them 2 weeks notice of where their life goes next fgs.

I'm totally with you OP I am so angry and worried for my DS. He is waiting for GCSE results.

Of course some teachers will have been a bit optimistic I have no idea why we are so obsessed with keeping our children down. Every year there is talk of exams getting easier. What if the children are working hard and getting taught well? Just a thought.

I'll definitely join a protest if they delay. They have had long enough to sort it out.

TunnocksOrDeath

I think the majority of the “over inflation” was inevitable-

I have 8 students who I can evidence could achieve a C.
If they took the exam, chances are some wouldn’t get it - they’d get a D.
I have no way of knowing which ones.
So - who do I mark down?

Ofqual should have accepted CAGs for all centres who were broadly in line with historical results - maybe within 5%, because it would be very unusual to see an increase bigger than that in a year. Centres submitting CAGs way beyond that should have been challenged and asked to submit again, more realistically.

That’s also what should happen for GCSEs.(except there probably now isn’t time for schools to re submit)

I don't see how anything is workable if they delay. As it is, colleges only have just over two weeks to finalise places and there is no time for any appeal system. Realistically the only fair approach is to accept teacher assessments. If they are exaggerated it will be sorted out very quickly in college.

@Wheresthesanitygone

Now both Scotland and NI are using CAGs ( I’m assuming Scotland are/did for GCSEs as well as A level, I’ve not heard anything on that) it would be impossible for England to stick to the algorithm surely? Three students, one in Scotland, one in NI and the third in England going for the same college space/ apprentice/ job. Two have correct grades the other is 2 grades down on everything thanks to computer generated shit. Even more unequal than just the current system was.

As has already been said - Scottish students don't generally sit GCSEs or A levels. So the first barrier in your scenario would be that the employer actually understands what Scottish grades mean!

Looked at as a whole, the A-Level assessments delivered by schools were significantly higher than the usual results - do we honestly believe that this year's group were materially brainier than all classes that have gone before?

Well teachers have looked at the evidence they have about each student and made a decision about what grade they think they were most likely to achieve.

They can't randomly assign people to have had a 'bad day' like what happens in real exams because of illness, mental health issues, or having the only thing come up you haven't revised etc (although this is essentially what the algorithm being used has done).

So it's doesn't mean the kids are brainier, just that the CAGs are probably a fairer way of holistically assessing what each individual student is capable of rather than jus basing it a 3 hour exam on one day.

Northern Ireland had now announced gcse students will review their cag grades as results. 97% of NI DC sit NI boards for exams the other 3% that sit English boards will have to wait to see what English do.

Ofqual should have accepted CAGs for all centres who were broadly in line with historical results - maybe within 5%, because it would be very unusual to see an increase bigger than that in a year. Centres submitting CAGs way beyond that should have been challenged and asked to submit again, more realistically.

I think this model would have to be tweaked to allow centres who believed that their assessments were entirely realistic to explain why and submit evidence supporting the explanation. There are cases where schools/colleges genuinely have a big improvements, particularly with a small cohort, because of a change of leadership, specific resources being thrown at A level teaching, or simply an unusual cohort.

Scotland has a completely separate education system from England it is a devolved power. Typically Scottish students sit Nat 5/Highers/Advanced Highers. It’s perfectly reasonable that the Scottish Government made an independent decision on how to cope with this situation.

Any student in Scotland that sat GCSE/A levels would be subject to any decision that is made this week - as the school they are in have chosen to opt out of the Scottish system and follow the English one. As these are predominantly v expensive independent selective schools they will probably do well out of the algorithm.

There are no 6th form colleges in Scotland so no competition to gain any places at colleges from Scottish students. Typically Scottish students stay in Scotland for tertiary education with v small numbers going to England for university - so any impact from Scottish students benefiting from CAG rather than the English model will be tiny.

Receive not review

Also I thought we were still a United Kingdom?

Don’t be silly.

I have a DC waiting results on Thursday and it is very frustrating. But this was inevitable, how anyone thought fair results could be awarded without actual exams being sat is beyond me.

If they go with CAG's then I suspect the overall results will be way higher than previous years which is obviously unfair or if they go with the solution they used for A levels which will also be unfair.

It just makes them all a bit pointless really.

I am also intrigued as to the ranking and how purely objective it is, I wonder if we will be able to see the ranking by subject from the schools if requested - I doubt it.

They can't randomly assign people to have had a 'bad day' like what happens in real exams because of illness, mental health issues, or having the only thing come up you haven't revised etc (although this is essentially what the algorithm being used has done).

So it's doesn't mean the kids are brainier, just that the CAGs are probably a fairer way of holistically assessing what each individual student is capable of rather than jus basing it a 3 hour exam on one day.

This.

Ironically, relying on teacher assessments would have prejudiced people like my lazy DS, who did the bare minimum all year but pulled himself up by some fairly frantic last minute work and a degree of luck in the exams. But, to be honest, I could have lived with that, and might indeed have been quite thankful that DS had been given a lesson in the virtues of not leaving everything to the last minute.

@Grandmi

This government has ignored warnings over everything to do with Covid right from day 1 !!People were warning that this wasn’t gonna work months ago and Boris and friends ignored the warnings ...so what’s new there ?!!

This. I'm getting totally despondent about how shit our government has been from testing, borders, care homes, schools, track&trace and now exams.

Looking forward to schools opening as I feel so confident the government knows what it is doing and has our interests at heart

Scotland has always had its own education system. Even prior to devolution. I sat Highers rather than A levels back in 1996 before we voted to have a devolved parliament.
I started in August rather than September for my entire school life.

Going with CAGs disadvantages as many children as it helps.

Lots of schools “downgraded” their own first attempt at CAGs because we already knew they would not get through Ofqual’s moderation.

Grade inflation is difficult. Some schools are trying their hardest and on an upwards trajectory. I worked in on that went from 38%, to 56% to 81%. That would raise many red flags for grade inflation but it would be grossly unfair to undo all the work of the new leadership, teachers and pupils because it was a genuine* rise.

*If you work in education, you'll know there will have been all sorts of interventions and cash thrown about to achieve that.

Are they suggesting a 2-week delay so that sixth forms will be forced to accept the pupils they have given offers to?
One side effect of the current mess is that 16-year olds have no idea where they are going to be studying in 2 weeks' time because they don't if their conditional offers will be fulfilled by mass downgrading of their CAG. The only advantage of a 2-week delay is that sixth forms and colleges will just have to take pupils based on CAGs, everyone has a place at their chosen sixth form or a college on the first day of term and it won't be dependent on their actual moderated/standardised grades because schools will have to take anyone whose CAG would have got them in.
Just delays the inevitable crisis and fall-out until schools are already in the new term though.

Honestly, after the heartache this week caused by policy being rushed out at the last minute, it would be better if Ofqual announced a delay and reviewed the way they are allocating grades, while the schools were simultaneously lining up the admin etc to hit 'Go' when its announced, and possibly roping-in some help from somewhere.

This is what I think, too. Delaying is not an easy option for the many reasons people have said, but knowingly repeating the A-level debacle would be indefensible. Who really gains from being given results 'on time' if there's total uncertainly about whether and how they might change?

Your right Bilbo same for me but even earlier that you! I mentioned devolved in my post to emphasise that it is absolutely nothing to do with Westminster.

I think this model would have to be tweaked to allow centres who believed that their assessments were entirely realistic to explain why and submit evidence supporting the explanation

I agree.

Agree. Delay is ridiculous.

For a start term starts 2 weeks after the results and most colleges have their registrations next week.

How do you enrol on a course without the results that determine that?

Even though the results for hundreds of thousands would have been inaccurate at least they'd have had them, CAG and mock results to show college.

@Dohorseseatapples

They need to forget about their f’ing data and statistics for once and stop using bloody algorithms.

Give the students the grades their teachers have submitted. These are based on ACTUAL assessments.

Who the hell would let a computer change actual assessment grades based on fuck all to do with the student?

It’s just unbelievable.

Spot on and agree 100%

Scotland has always had its own education (and legal) system. The structure, terminology, qualifications awarded, the timing of terms, holidays and exams is, and has always been, different from England, Wales and NI.

It's one of the reasons MN set up a Scotsnet section.

Well, if anything this mess just confirms why children need to go back to school in September, to avoid all this kind of thing happening again next year.

I really hope they don't delay. One of my DC is waiting for her results (my DC1 had his last week).

It's a shit-show one way or another. However, my line all along with my exam-year DC has been that the results are likely to be weird, and that it isn't a reflection on them. Even if they failed everything, it wouldn't be the end of the world. They might have to have a re-think about what to do next. This would seem horribly unfair at the time - but it might just turn out okay in the end.

The best thing we can do for our young people is encourage them to look forward, even if it's not to exactly the thing they intended to look forward to, and not allow themselves to adopt a victim mentality.

The situation has been crap for all of them. We now need to get the results out of the way and not dwell.