To think that the education system is mad

[Applebun]

What is the point of A levels, when you don't need the grades anyway.

Everyone I know this year who did A levels, told me that if they didn't get the grades that they needed, the University still offered them a place anyway.

Eg the Uni says you must get ABB to get into the course. The student got CCC. The student was offered a place in the Uni anway.

I was talking to my colleague about it. He said that he got really bad grades in his A levels, way lower than what was required to get in, and the Uni still let him in to the course straight away.

The point then is - what is the point of A levels at all.
The Unis want paying students to go to their Uni to keep them going. A lot of them let any student in, no matter what grades they get.

So why make students go through the farcical system of A levels?

It's not just up to a lecturer who passes and fails a student though. Each assessment and exam has to have a marking scheme and things are double marked and the two markers need to independently be within 5% of one another. Plus there's exam boards where they compare results across modules so any outlier modules where too many people are passing with high marks (or failing) would be picked up.

Exactly! I don’t lose my job because a student fails.

If systemic issues are picked up then fair enough but we don’t just pass students for the sake of it.

Which is a problem when you see universities like Coventry trying to influence government policy and political opinion on foreign student visas, etc, as if they are neutral academic arbiters rather than utterly financially dependent.

As I understand it Coventry used to have a very good reputation in particular technical fields, linked to local employers, who found value in paying for the skills. An old-fashioned idea...