GCSEs will be cancelled this summer!

[AKissAndASmile]

So the Scottish equivalent of GCSEs have been cancelled this summer.

I posted in chat about this but barely anybody responded. Seems nobody cares because it's Scotland. I thought we were a united kingdom. Seems not. I can guarantee that if GCSEs were cancelled in England my post would have had numerous posts. Nobody cares because it's Scotland, even though during these corona days Scotland seems to be showing us a sneak preview of what will be happening in England in a few weeks. So my guess is that GCSEs will be cancelled this year soon

@toffeekiwi

I've got zero interest in whether or not Scottish exams are cancelled other than that where Scotland leads England seems to follow kicking and screaming some weeks/months later. I fully expect somebody in Scotland to have zero shits to give about whether or not the English GCSEs are cancelled.

Yeah, what she said.

The algorithm wasn’t used

@IrmaFayLear

If exams are cancelled and the situation improves greatly by next summer, people will be roaring about the exams being cancelled way too prematurely.

It is too soon to cancel. Pupils should be told exams are going ahead but should the virus persist as it is then work will be assessed. Many kids will rest on their laurels/not bother if they are led to believe there will be a 2020-style grades bonanza.

It’s nothing to do with whether they can physically sit the exams, it’s about the weeks of schooling they have already missed. Even if we find a cure tomorrow that won’t change.

The algorithm wasn’t used

It was in the Alevels

It was also used in the GCSE but wasn’t released when they saw the utter utter fuck up of the A levels

(I do appreciate that i should have clarified that)

I also appreciate that this thread is about gcse and no one cares about the A levels

(Joke 😀)

And

(Last thing .....promise)

Not all children lucked in with the cags....Some children were just beginning to turn themselves around And may well have done better in exams as there was a lack of ‘evidence’ for many

Some pupils were disadvantaged, but looking at the grades overall, they were up hugely on the previous year.

Over 75% level 4 and above, 25% level 7 and above and 7.5% level 9. That says it all, really.

Anecdotally in 2019 in DD’s school 2 people got all 9s. In 2020 22 did.

I thought that the algorithm was only used if it gave a higher grade

The algorithm was used in Cambridge exams - these were released. Then a week later CAGs were used.

Those who ‘sat’ the welsh board and Edexel exams didn’t know what the algorithm said.

@WeAreFromThePlanetDuplo bleat away - please! I posted a response to the OP up thread noting the announcement from Peter Weir on Friday and it has been completely ignored, not only by the OP, but by everyone else. Maybe I should get on my high horse and start berating people..... or maybe I should just focus on my DS and on the pupils in my school who are due to sit exams this year and next, and do my best by them.

My son didn’t get inflated grades in his A levels. Infact the school has admitted they internally downgraded his results to match previous years result. IT IS INSULT TO THESE KIDS TO SAY THAT. Private schools where there are pushy paying parents might have inflated the grades as they had a lot to lose if they didn’t. State schools were at risk of having a whole years results downgraded by OFQUAL if there was even a hint of grades being overstated.

These kids have been shat on.

You do understand at the end of this they need to ready for the job market, to be a successful part of the world. We need to do everything possible to support them

They will be ready and successful. Exams don’t define success. Worth ethic, willingness to learn, politeness, caring, attitude, determination, timekeeping, social skills, grit, all help them make a success of their lives.

Exams are only a small stepping stone.

*All those saying they're not in Scotland so don't care, how far does this spread?

Did you not care about the 9-11 bombings?
Are people in Scotland allowed to say they don't care about the London bombings? *

You say it's an odd thread, but that's a HUGE difference in saying you aren't bothered about how children get their qualifications (whether it's by exam or by, for example, continuous assessment) and being bothered about terror attacks.

Do you care about the American education system? What about the Slovakia one?

Some pupils were disadvantaged, but looking at the grades overall, they were up hugely on the previous year

Yes, and the reasons for that have been explained many times And cohorts can be very very different

Having said that i dont know what the answer is, the example you have does seem very extreme and certainly wasnt the case in my local school

Its a difficult one, though if the cags had been evidenced and moderated you’d think that sort of example wouldn’t hapoen

It just worries me that there doesn’t seem to be a plan b...i think they will leave it til the last minute again

No idea why you're saying 'so what' that GCSEs may be cancelled . That's a big deal.

Looking at it from a different angle, I think it could be a good thing. It forces things to be done differently. Rather than pinning everything on 'one day', students can be assessed along the way and get a grade at the end of the year that truly reflects what they have done.

Some students don't do well in exams because, well, they just don't do well in exams - which is not a reflection of their ability.

How many students have hay fever, period pain or a family crisis on exam 'day' that means their years of hard work are not properly reflected in the grade they get on the day?

No exams doesn't mean no grade. It just means gaining the grade in a different way - which might actually prove better for a lot of students.

Oops

Obviously the government ignored the majority of cag evidence and didnt put anything in place to moderate and prove them

“Anecdotally in 2019 in DD’s school 2 people got all 9s. In 2020 22 did.”

Clear evidence that your school did not internally moderate the teacher assessment grades and infact over inflated them. My sons school did internally moderate his results to the three year average so same % came out with As etc. And we want to continue to use this discriminatory system for 2021?

I do agree that in a lot of cases GCSEs are pretty useless. I worked in one of the worst schools in the country, and I became increasingly convinced that examining kids in some subjects was a waste of time and money. A fair few could barely read and just failed everything.

I know a two-tier system of GCSEs and CSEs was ditched as being elitist, but there is no point in a kid who is, for whatever reason, illiterate, sitting 8 GCSEs with no chance of passing even one. I think there needs to be a functional literacy and maths focus . Other subjects taught, of course, but still the 3 Rs given absolute priority. Which, at the moment, they are not.

DDs school had one years evidence of a particular exam board - you needed 3 to get a decent comparison.

Most of the students go a U as this was the 3 year average. The algorithm didn’t take into account they only have one years figures.

I hope someone somewhere is thinking up a better CAGS system. Obviously can’t be based on last year’s results, as that would still give grade inflation.

I always thought that the best system was teacher assessed BUT with supporting evidence; schools would have had a whole year’s work to judge a pupil on. Obviously the last-minute pull-it-out-of-the-bag kids might have been disadvantaged, but no one knows if an exam would have gone their way anyway.

Last year’s system encouraged some schools to be over aspirational, knowing they’d be marked down anyway, so they had nothing to lose by predicting top grades for everyone. Obviously this shafted those at more honest schools. The pupils there might have been ok with their grades if they didn’t know that at St Canny’s down the road the whole cohort were waving clutches of lucky grade 9s.

Obviously the last-minute pull-it-out-of-the-bag kids might have been disadvantaged, but no one knows if an exam would have gone their way anyway

Bit currently the ‘freaked out taking exams* lot have been disadvantaged for years.

What’s the difference?

It’s normal to be freaked out by exams. Whose heart doesn’t pound and whose palms don’t pour copious amounts of sweat when told to turn over the paper?! Another topic, but all these kids getting 25% extra time for “anxiety” - poof! I have seen some cases of real anxiety, but they are rare. Normal exam nerves have been “labelled” .

I used to be freaked out by exams. I could take up to 10 minutes before I could even open the paper! Then would burst into tears and would cry at least 2 or 3 times during the paper.

I am old so had class teachers invigilating when doing O-levels. I can still remember their faces looking at me, willing me on.

The panic attacks would start as soon as I started revising.

My exam grades were substantially lower than work I did in class.

Another topic, but all these kids getting 25% extra time for “anxiety” - poof

Also anacdotal but i dont know anyone who gets this

Ds1 does have anxiety but we cottoned on to it much too late to get any help with gcse

(He would have benefitted from using a laptop as well....we were too late with that as well. I still feel guilty)

Dd got extra time...but not for anxiety