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?

So how can a nation improve at maths or English if the percentage of people expected to pass is kept constant?

That's mathematically impossible. I could prove that with algebra!

Also - how do they set the pass rate for the exams in November - which are generally retake exams.

You have a different population taking them - people who didn't get a 4 first time.

Is it set so 30% of those won't get a 4 or is it set differently?

It makes no sense to me. They're basically saying they don't care how good the kids are at maths, they'll just fail anyone in the bottom third.

It should be "Have they done enough to show they are working at Grade 4, Grade 5 etc".

It's a bit more complicated. They use a bell curve to look at what the 'normal' distribution of scores is. Most people will be around average, with a smaller proportion doing either less or more well, and a very small proportion doing exceptionally badly or well. So they adjust the pass mark so that the distribution of scores fits with that 'normal' curve. They also look at work samples and other data.

Ultimately, though, it is impossible for everyone to pass.

www.gov.uk/government/publications/gcse-and-a-level-grading-what-you-need-to-know/gcse-and-a-level-grading-what-you-need-to-know#:~:text=Exam%20boards%20set%20grade%20boundaries,easier%20than%20the%20previous%20year.

My 18yr old flunked all his GCSE's and resat his Maths & English twice at college.....and still didn't pass.It was all so demoralising and depressing. So, focusing on his 'soft skills' - being entrepreneurial, hardworking and successful in other ways, I helped him knock up a great CV. I pulled him out of college one day to attend a jobs fair to meet employers and chat in person - a few days after his birthday. He landed himself a full time job, immediately left college before he was about to do a third resit....and is very happy on a starting salary of 25k with career progression. And I couldn't be prouder!

I’m currently studying for a degree which requires a lot of maths. I’m doing reasonably well in it so far.

I still cannot undersrand trigonometry!

People have different skills. Not sure what is so difficult to understand about that?

It's the very definition of doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

When someone struggles with something like maths, they often need a different approach to be taken.

Unless you can get a very good private tutor, your child doing resit maths classes at college will just be hearing the same information they were already taught in the same way. There's no earthly reason why they will now achieve what they couldn't achieve the previous year, because nothing has changed if the reason they did not pass was because they struggled grasp the subject.

I think there are some basics you're lacking, clearly.

What grade did you get for GCSE Maths?

What do you do now?

On a scale of 1-10, how happy are you?

Show that as a bar chart.

Yes, Mother of the Year here for "letting" DS fail his English language GCSE by one fucking mark last summer. Cold day in hell, indeed. We planned that well didn't we? 🙄

Many years ago, a friend of mine had to sign up to repeat her maths gcse to be able to continue with her chosen college course - she attended a few maths classes, didn’t bother with the rest, and completed her chosen course!

Except they often are literate... they just can't do the exam the way Gove changed it. Breaks my heart every year.
Kid can read.
Kid can write.
Kid can't write a story in 45 minutes.
Kid writes a boring letter to the council to appeal for more bins.
Kid is written off.

Being retired for many years I'm out of touch but is a Maths pass still a requirement of every Uni course? I recall struggling to get a friend's son through Maths as he wanted to do a Music degree and needed a pass. We managed it after 4 tries!

I'm a mathematician and a great maths teacher. So are many of my colleagues.

Hate this 'if you're good at maths you'll be shit at teaching it' thing.

It’s based on the idea that if the exams are the same standard then, across the population the same percentage will pass. If results are higher or lower, it suggests the exams were easier or more difficult. So there is a logic to it, but it’s a logic I despise. I’d do away with the current system altogether, make maths modular, with modules building on each other, so some pupils could just take the core maths modules over the same timeframe and still get a pass. A pass would be a pass based on demonstrating solid core maths skills in the modules and nothing else. I see no value in the endurance aspect if forcing children to take all their exams in a one month period at the end of year 11.

Sorry, meant for @JudgeJ It isn't. My youngest is doing GCSE currently.

He is off to do quite a specialist level 3 course next year for which maths isn't even required.

He's set to do fine (as in pass) on most things, great in a few others (7 or above).

GCSEs don't count towards UCAS points. Level three courses (A level or equivalent) do.

University isn't right for everyone but everyone needs to stay on in education or training until they're 18 currently.

Some young people will need to do retakes to make this happen practically.

I find threads like this are - for some people - just a bit show offy vicariously because Ruben/Daisy got a 9 in maths at 16.

GCSEs are just an outmoded and ridiculous means of getting you through to the next round.

They have a sample of Y11 students sit what are called National Reference Tests in Maths and English in March of Y11 each year. It's exactly the same tests each year so the papers are top secret.

They use these tests to decide whether the cohort are cleverer or less clever than the previous years and then adjust the grade boundaries so that appropriately more or fewer get good grades than the previous year. So the pass rate isn't constant, it is adjusted.

They used to use KS2 SATs to do this but that wasn't very good because it meant they couldn't take into account any improvements made to secondary education.

I'm not sure how to quote another poster but it's simply not true that passing a Maths or English GCSE is necessary to be "a literate or functioning member of society ".My non academic,yet highly ambitious,hardworking,financially savvy and bright 18yr old .....with no qualifications.....is currently focused on building up his credit score and saving for a deposit so he can be the first of his mates to buy a property next year . It's attitude that determines your altitude in life .....not whether you scrape a pass in Maths or English.

Is there a reason 1/3 just won't pass? Does someone make this decision, are the questions/marks set to rule some children out or is this based on at least 1/3 children performing poorly?

This 100%

It's something like 19% of the higher paper, which starts at a grade 3, so that paper does not test the lower level skills. Children who struggle with maths will sit a foundation paper where they need to get about 60% to get a grade 4.

I completely agree, but a young person’s career options are severely curtailed without a pass in Maths and English GCSE. Not because of a lack of many important life skills, but because many professions require it. That doesn’t make them essential for young people to thrive, but across a population it makes it sound advice to recommend trying to pass them.

This thread has made me think about things that have not entered my mind for decades. I have just had a memory of my parents being summoned to my secondary school ( I went to a single sex grammar) because my maths was so poor. I was top of my year in English so the teachers concluded that I was deliberately messing about in maths as I was obviously intelligent. There was no understanding that there are different types of intelligence and ability, I used to feel so incapable and useless because maths was a insurmountable puzzle to me. All we ever heard about was our deficits rather than our talents and interests.

They have to keep on attempting it whilst in education. Some L3 course & apprenticeships will hoof them out after the first year if they don’t get the grades as there is no room in the timetable for it after the first year. Same goes for English.

I'm not at all surprised. Why would one bother with this info? I doubt I was interested when my DC did GCSEs - I was more annoyed my DS took Computer Science instead of Music (which I thought was a bloody sight more useful). Heyday!
Anyway, any competent DC can get level 4 - if in doubt get a tutor, now.