AIBU to despair about DofE cheating

[WhatTheHeckIsIt]

Someone I know very well is the teacher who leads the Duke of Edinburgh at a school. Their teen is going to Buckingham Palace to receive their gold award. There is no way on this planet the teen has completed any of the activities - it's a stitch up.

It's made me feel really sad.

a) I expected more of this person
b) I expected more of their child
c) how could you let your child accept an award amongst people who have worked really hard to achieve it
d) it devalues everyone else's award
e) it's just shit

Rant over - but there's nothing I can do is there?

I wasn't aware that Cambridge use a points system in their application decisions.
Interesting, I'll raise it with Mike Nicholson next time I chat with him.

You do that and get back to us, please. I'd be particularly intrigued by what system they use to assess their candidates fairly across all criteria if they don't score them...

I read an article, from a while ago, about it. It couldn't be more open to unconscious bias if it was deliberately designed to be that way. They sat around discussing the merits of each person, application by application. Including comments on their appearance and hair. Some of the comments were a bit shocking tbh.

https://www.cambridgeinterviewquestions.com/so-who-is-good-enough-to-get-into-cambridge/

Hopefully it's a bit better these days but possibly they really don't score the overall application at all.

Very interesting but even back then they did score the interview - that's where you might get to talk about an experience you had - but I seriously doubt having that experience within the DoE or outside of it would not matter...and indeed that is what the Admissions Tutor said - publicly. Other people cheating does not devalue your experience - because cheaters aren't very good at talking about an experience they didn't have.
"one of the academics notes that he got an interview score of two, out of a possible 10. “Oh dear,” says Richard Partington, the senior admissions tutor, who sits at the head of the table."
"This is an easier case – her interview scores are high, an eight and a seven out of 10."
"There is another girl from a comprehensive school who got an eight at interview, but one academic exclaims: “Blooming heck, her GCSE score was terrible.”
And I'd say when it comes to deciding who to give a job to conversations are had like this.

Regardless of "Cambridge".... it's derailing the main convo that for the majority of DofE participants who do it properly, it is likely to lead to increased confidence and proof that they are able to put hours of effort outside of academic exams. If cheating were suspected, any admissions tutor/job interviewer worth their salt could deduce that reasonably quickly.

Maybe...but given that quite a lot of kids do it to add to their CVs or their personal statement, it's not totally derailing to discuss the merits of doing it for CV building.

I should have been clearer. I meant talk of one particular university and whether DofE holds any merit with them is derailing the conversation.

Fair enough - I'm, done with my input anyway, will be interesting to see how the discussion develops further.