To have not known kids have to attain grade 4 in maths?

[Pepperpotladles]

I did not know this!
I have obviously been living under a rock.
So today someone told me that if kids get grades 1, 2 or 3 in their maths GCSE, it is compulsory that all these kids have to keep on studying GCSE maths until they achieve a grade 4 or above, and they have to keep trying to achieve this up until their 25th birthday.
Is this true?!?
I can't believe my ears.
What about kids who simply can't achieve grade 4 or above in maths, for any number of reasons?

And let's be honest here. The best most well paying careers are the numerical ones. Finance, engineering, tech, medicine/pharma. Law is the exception but there are areas of law where mathematical skills are necessary.

Your average musician or artist doesn't make much, unless they are truly exceptional.

Not everyone might "want" to do this, but in the state of the economy and cost of living crisis, do you not want the best job available? Do you not want to be able to buy a house one day and have nice things?

Areas of triangles have lots of practical applications for calculating amounts needed to cover them.
Also v. Useful for cutting the last slice of cake in half.

I think they should be made to retake and also drastically change the way they are taught to get to the underlying issue of why they don't get it.

But frankly if you aren't good at maths, scraping a GCSE after several goes is not going to result in you having one of those types of jobs, is it? If a pupil takes 3 attempts to get level 4, they aren't going to be looking at careers in high finance, etc, are they?

Are you being deliberately obtuse ?
If someone if someone is struggling to get a grade four after several goes
They are unlikely to go into careers where maths skills are essential it doesn't matter how ambitious they are
And you get kids that are just not very academic, my son is one of them
He's a lovely polite young man who I'm very proud of but he's just not cut out for high flying career, s and that's fine.

But they are already made to retake umpteen times it's soul destroying.

With access to modern technology, knowing theories like the one you describe is becoming increasingly unnecesarry. Like others, teaching the basic four elements of maths to students who struggle makes far more sense.

I have reached 50, had several responsible jobs, now run my own business. But despite numerous people trying to teach me, I cannot get my head round long division. I can hold my own in average company with the rest of it, and when I was using it regularly could outshine most at mental arithmetic.

Was it sensible to keep making me try to learn something it was blatantly clear I had the ability of a primary school child where that was concerned!

Is anyone else casting their mind back to their own gcse results and breathing a sigh of relief they left school so long ago?

No? Just me then

Nail on the head. We need to be realistic and practical. Give an academic education to those able to do it and a practical one to others.

No. Not just you. The whole system is just bonkers.