To wonder about CSEs v O Levels

[Bakance]

My partner has a brother much older than him - my DP is youngest in large, working class, Irish Catholic family. No one in their family has passed ever gone on to higher education - none educated beyond GCSE level.
Partner's eldest brother did 6 CSE exams big absolutely no O-levels at all - would he have been considered below average academic ability ?

my mother went to a grammar school in the 1950s and their family of five children and two adults lived in a two bedroom council flat. At one time they were apparently below the poverty line, but they got grants for the school uniform.

In those days, you stayed on for a 7th term to do Oxbridge exams. I remember this rarity happening for a few (unsuccessful) dc. If you passed the entrance exam, you got the EE offer. I know you could go with fairly average A level grades. A very good friend of ours went with lower A level grades than DH. Did the entrance exam.

It was very very common for DC not to take up the grammar place. 50% in poorer areas.

My Aunt didn't go because her sister hadn't passed. Her dad had a good job. Men were singled out in factories if dc went to the grammar. My DHs dad was. Getting above himself. A great crime in those days. Still is in some sections on MN.

My DM did go and the uniform cost money. Proud parents in those days would not take grants and grants are fairly new. My friend got one as her dad had died. Before the 1942 Act, I'm not sure they existed. The uniform cost 3x my Dads wage. Truly shocking. The coats were specially made for the school. Every item was from the local uniform supplier. Parents knitted cardigans and pullovers though. And made the summer dresses from material that was available. Different world!

@TizerorFizz my grammar wasn't like that. The only things that had to be got from the suppliers was pe top, skirt, and knickers. Everything else could be high street bought. We could even buy the blazer badge from school to sew on a high street blazer, although we didn't have to have the blazer.

I agree with this. I did 3 maths 0 levels (Maths in what is now year 10 then Pure and Statistics in Year 11). I did calculus. My son is taking his GCSE's this year and no calculus but covers lots of things I don't remember.

I was the last year of O levels and actually took one GCSE which was a test before they rolled them out across the country. That was in Biology.

I must admit I thought that GCSEs were supposed to get rid of this imbalance between CSEs and O levels but it doesn't seem to have done that as there are Foundation and Higher papers. If you take a foundation paper you can't get higher than a grade 5. If you take higher you fail with less than a grade 5.

For children who are around the 4/5/6 level it seems like a real gamble whether to go for the assured foundation pass or risk failing the higher.

True. And of course earlier on, there was the additional financial burden of a child not earning. My Mum was one of 6 children. She was born in 1924 so at school in the 30s and her dad died when she was 8. No welfare state then of course so they lived in genuine poverty. School leaving age was 14 in those days and like all her siblings, my Mum was expected to leave and start earning at that age. But apparently her teacher came round to the house when she was 11 and begged my grandma to let her go to the grammar school and do the School Certificate, which was the GCSE equivalent then. I think the teacher helped her get a scholarship of some kind which helped a bit, and ultimately of course she got better paid work as a result but it was still a huge financial burden on the family at the time. Mum was the only one of her siblings to get the opportunity and I think she felt grateful and guilty in just about equal measures for the rest of her life. For all our modern problems at least we don't send children to work in cotton mills instead of going to school anymore - well, not in this country.

Parents knitted cardigans and pullovers though. And made the summer dresses from material that was available.

Goodness, that gave me flashbacks!

We too had summer dresses that had to be made from a particular, not widely available fabric -- but in any style you wished. My grandmother's favoured style for us was 'baggy', and roughly sized to (fail to) fit from age 11 to 15.

I still remember the shock of opening an O level paper and realising that we hadn’t covered one section. My school also did this at A level on the basis that we’d “still get a C”. My parents paid for a tutor for a few hours 😂to go through the text with me!! Fortunately I got a B which was required for my chosen university. I shared notes but it wasn’t really enough for the others All the rest got Cs/Ds 😟

I remember that our school used different boards for the O levels, because the Oxford board exams were considered harder than the Joint Matriculation Board exams, so they put the kids who would definitely get a 1 at CSE, but wouldn't pass an Oxford board O level in for the JMB O level instead.

And when my dad was at school, you did Matriculation, for which you had to have a language. Over the year, in Latin, he got a mark of 10 out of 1000 - 1% - so he was put in for something called Alternative Lower French, where, as part of the paper, he had to translate Goldilocks and the Three Bears from French into English.

In the 70s though it was certainly true. Leaving age was your 15th birthday and there were apprenticeships as well as employment.

i wonder whether it wasn’t so much that JMB was easier, but rather that a lot of the “top” schools did the Oxford and Cambridge board, so pupils from ordinary comps would be in direct competition and when the grade boundaries were top 10% gets an A etc, this was very relevant.

Schools chose the course they liked best. Not necessarily easier. Pre National Curriculum there was huge variation in what was covered by different boards

Can I ask why it matters what he got?

@MrsAvocet
Are you my hidden sibling! Almost the same as my mum! 1924 but one of 5. She went to the grammar a year early at 10. At least she went. She's just told me her mum got her a toy tennis racquet because they didn't have the money for a proper one.

Constant issues about not being at work too. However I feel her parents didn't see her as a golden goose. DM did have two parents but my grandfather could not see DM did have better life chances with a great education but because she was a girl, it didn't register. I think DMs experience has made me want my DDs to have opportunities. The past does shape you, even if it's escaping it.

I think we thought JMB was difficult. I also think it was regional in the 60s and 70s.

I remember GCE O Level Maths. No calculators, logarithms. And a question on Calculus which is now well into A level Maths.
English two papers, one was a 2 hour essay.

I was at grammar school in the mid-1970s - we did Cambridge Board for O Level exams in all subjects. However, the school had a fair number of pupils from Hong Kong for whom English was a second language - if they failed the Cambridge O Level in English Language, for the re-take they were entered for the WJEC O Level instead, because the teaching staff regarded that as slightly easier for non-native English speakers to attain a C in.

And I remember my dad saying, 'Log tables? We had to work it all out ourselves with a slide rule', in true Four Yorkshiremen fashion.

@Kilopascal (love the name). Did we get an extra significant figure with Logs rather than a slide rule?
My little grey cells are saying that we once had to work out Logs to different bases like 8 or 12 rather than the standard 10. You know! like for fun!🙄!

No calculus in my O level Maths and we did have calculators.

My English Language O level was 100% coursework

With maths it depended on the syllabus, I did calculus as part of my O Level maths, my brother did statistics which I didn't. He didn't do calculus.

I did linear programming he didn't come across it until he was at a poly and I don't think he understands set theory today.

Yes I still like maths.

Slide rules in my day. Just didn't understand much of it.

Just remembering. Exam Board was London maths (Calculus) and the 2 paper English. My Essay was on "Developments in Agriculture".
Opening sentence: The first major development was harnessing an animal to pull the plough rather than his wife..

Yes- I did calculus for O level.
All our exams were London board, which had the reputation of being the hardest. Cambridge was much easier.
My English language had multiple components. We definitely had a dictation and a precis to do. The essay we had a choice of a 'story' type piece of creative writing or a descriptive piece. I'm sure there was something else, but can't remember. I don't think there was a comprehension element, but maybe I've forgotten - it was over 40 years ago.

We were told JMB was the hardest, but I was at school in the North.

If you were not as good at a subject they would use a different board, AEB I think.