Maximizing chances of GCSE grades at 8/9 is essential

[Elizo]

Interested in views:

A child is heading for 7-9s. In a school where 8s/9s not v common.

Two views/ options:

Getting high numbers of 8s/9s is essential for top unis. Tutors/ work flat out and maximize chances of 8s and 9s. YANBU

or

7s are great so as long as they are on the cards no need to stress. YABU

Just remembering that a friend of DS's was rejected from LSE due to his GCSE grades.

I don't think people are saying that GCSE grades don't matter or that Universities don't look at them. Aside from anything else, schools are unlikely to predict high A level grades for a pupil with a raft of 4s and 5s at GCSE and if they did I would imagine there would need to be some strong mitigating circumstances to explain it or admissions tutors would be very sceptical.
But the OP is not asking about the difference between 10 9s and 5 4s. Her son sounds to be heading for very creditable set of results and in reality, for most people, with most aspirations, a bunch of mainly 7s with a couple of 8s /9s is not going to close many doors. Unless he has his eyes on a few specific destinations he is not likely to need a full set of 9s at GCSE. A 7 at GCSE will be more than enough to get you onto an A level course in most 6th forms which is the most important thing (assuming he wants to do A levels of course.)
For some subjects, maths in particular, some extra tuition to get higher than that would probably be advantageous, not because the grade on the certificate changes anything but because starting the A level course with fewer weaknesses in the GCSE material maximises your chances of achieving well at A level.
If 8s and 9s can be achieved with a sensible amount of additional effort/help and the student is motivated to do that then great, that obviously makes sense, at least for the subjects planned for A level. But I don't believe that the " all 9s at any cost" attitude you see sometimes is healthy. Some people are talking as if 7s are failure. That's nonsense and can be very damaging to young people who are conditioned to see it that way.
Tutoring has it's place. My DS who has just done his A levels has had a maths tutor. He's hoping to do an engineering degree and whilst he's good at the mechanics side of maths his pure is less strong and he really struggles with stats. He has willingly given up one of his hobbies to have maths tutoring and also formed a study group with friends. His choice, as he can see that the short term pain will hopefully (we'll see next week!) bring long term gain. But had I engaged the services of an English tutor at GCSE in an attempt to boost his grade from 7 to 8 and made him stop a hobby to do so, I really don't think it would have been worth it. It may even have made matters worse and would definitely have made him less happy. Nobody gives a toss that he's not quite as good at English as he is at physics. His GCSEs demonstrate that he's a good all rounder with some particular strengths and he had offers from all the Universities he applied to. That's plenty good enough for him and it would be for most people. There will be a few, very specific courses, where very high GCSE results may make the difference between getting an offer or not, but that's not the case for the majority of pupils and I don't believe it is worth sacrificing general well being.

Interesting thread as I have a DS going into year 11. Sounds like a similar academic level to the OPs DS. 8/9s for maths and geography, his favourite subjects are achievable targets, also probably for music, but need to work at getting 7s for the others. Although this is a school where is is common to get 7-9s.
I'd be happy if he can achieve that.

Great post @MrsAvocet and just what I think. Ds2’s grade 6 in Eng lit will never hold him back I’m sure, but making him work to gain an 8 would not have been a good experience for anyone. He also got offers from all his uni choices inc RG and RG+

@Pleasealexa do you think that is because you have to do so few subjects at A levels?
I think it would be quite manageable to get top marks in 3 subjects but much harder to get tops marks in 6. I just checked the breakdown for 2024 and only 1.6% of students who sat the leaving cert got full marks. We therefore don't have an issue with too many people scoring top grades. In fact if you do in Ireland you are likely to make the news!!
We also have to do math for leaving cert and a lower level of math is allocated fewer points so if you are not good at math you are going to struggle to get into top courses.

@Rumors1 yes, very true, 6 subjects including Maths would be a differentiator. Previously AS results listed the scores so that was taken into account when making offers, which reduced the volume of applications for most competitive courses. Another difference seems to be that in Ireland most students study locally which is rarer here (but becoming more popular due to costs)

Also how does Ireland apply weighing for contextual factors/diversity? Is that done pre or post results?

I know many non uk parents find the UK focus on 3 or 4 subjects too limited but it might not be popular with many students if they were forced fo study Maths up to 18.

No, high grades are not essential.
You need a higher grade if you are studying a subject for a' level.

It's all about school tables and ratings.

Just like SATS in year 6 have no benefit to the child AT ALL, just school league tables. What year 6 pupils have to put up with for the sake of sats is a disgrace.

I thought someone would say that. Not sure how? In my day the top grade was A. C was the equivalent of an old O Level or GCE pass. Anything below C was the equivalent of a CSE. Basically we saw C as a 'pass'.

Yes and a 4 is now a pass. So it’s roughly equivalent to a 4/low 5.

I have O levels and the top grade was an A. But the letter GCSEs went to A star - roughly equivalent to 8/9; the top end of a 9 is meant to be a higher level still.

8s and 9s are lovely but not essential for any future path. Schools put pressure on because of their progress 8 scores. A star grades, then the splitting of A into 8 and 9, were political choices. A 7 is an old school A which is very good indeed.
The absolute Wild West that is English GCSE marking means that 7/8/9 grades can be quite random there.
A levels matter more and a happy and well rounded child matters most

Hm I remember at the time there was grade inflation, so an A star was the old A, A became B and so on. There used to be a G grade that vanished when A star came in.

England is very unusual worldwide in forcing children to specialise so early. It's not going to change though because it would require the Universities to change as well.

Like Ireland in Scotland people study more subjects so typically 5 at Higher in Y5 (equivalent to Y12) then can either go straight to Uni or study more Highers or do Advanced Highers in Y6 (equivalent to Y13). I studied my Highers back in the 80s and did seven different subjects at Higher. I was a big swot though.

There was still a grade G when the A-star came in!

A-star was intended to acknowledge that there were higher levels than an A. An A was still an A an a B was a B.

There are more numbers than grades and the system is very different to the CSE O Level one. A 4 is now considered grade required as an equivalent to the old GCSE grade C.
I should say that it would be a low C in GCSE terminology.

And not even those necessarily. My DC is about to start 3rd year of uni. No GCSEs taken ( 2020 cohort) and didn't do A levels either did a level 3 btec at college

I'm going to go against the grain here and say you need them to focus their aspirations a bit. I don't mean that they need to know they're going to study x subject at y uni, but if they're going to change the track they're currently on (of very good if not top grades) they need to know WHY they're doing it. Blindly working away at getting 8/9s across the board is going to be hard if there isn't an end goal.

It they're on board and happy to aim for the top grades then great, but that has to come from them, not you.

YANBU if they are up to it. DS16 is desperately waiting and hoping for 8s and 9s, especially in maths otherwise he won't be able to take Further Maths A level and then won't be able to achieve his dream of Maths degree at Cambridge. If they can do and can take the pressure,fine, but it completely depends on the student.

My daughter’s friend refused to divulge her GCSE results for weeks because they were ‘crap’. She had got nine 9s and one 8. When all their group had all got ten 9s.

It was an incredibly unhealthy mentality. When I asked my daughter, she said the pressure didn’t come from school or parents. But each other. My sons’ friendship groups have been far more healthy.

Looking back, the GCSEs were simply not that important and I just wish they had worried and worked less.

Hi OP, I have replied previously and but wanted to show you that depending on course they do take the number of 9's and 8's into account definitely at Oxford. I've put a screenshot from last year's physics admission report which says they use the information about how many 8'sand 9's a child at that school would be expected to get. They do say it is used as part of the shortlisting. With so many posters saying it doesn't matter I just wanted you to see that it does in some circs.

Hopefully a bit clearer.

FoI request results show that even for medicine places, lots of successful applicants have had at least one duff grade at GCSE, by duff I mean <= 6. Hard to get more competitive than medicine, so I humbly submit that all x 8/9s is not necessary for hardly any Uni course ever.

A child is heading for 7-9s. In a school where 8s/9s not v common.

Given that "very common" means >= 10% , that's like nearly all schools, yes?

Some Unis score GCSEs for medicine so you need all 8/9 to get an interview. But lots only need 7 7s. And a few happy with 2 4s. It's mostly down to UCAT these days.

It's always best to get the best grades you can, but not at the expense of hobbies or mental health.

GCSEs are more of a stepping stone to A Levels, yes they're important, but the universities will look more at A Level grades.

If they know what A levels or next courses they want to do at college aim for high grades in the requirements for those. Also as good a grade in Maths and English as possible. Getting passes in the rest would be fine.

If he can't get a 9 in maths gcse then realistically he's probably not going to be a Cambridge mathmo, but I'm pretty sure that's one course where it's all about the maths and they're not going to be too bothered about top gcse grades in all subjects.