To wonder what will happen if exams are impacted by Corona

[B1gbluehouse]

Starting to think they aren’t going to want halls filled with 100s of kids if it spreads more.

What will happen to GCSE and A level students if they can’t take their exams?

Didn’t mean to set the poll thing.🙄

Also wondering. Perhaps they will use mock results or predicted grades? Really hope that it doesn't come to that for many reasons, not least the thought of how many would be ill for that to be the case ...

They'll use mock results. And I'll be gutted because my daughter get her autism diagnosis two days before her mocks, and her dad fucked off in the middle of them so they aren't a true reflection of her ability. And she wants to do medicine. Clearly public health is more important but this could be a disaster for this year group

I know. I don’t think it would take many to be ill though , just a couple within a school. One of my dc has a major wobble during mocks and many don’t settle to work or finish curriculum until post mocks so using them wouldn’t be that fair and could be disastrous for many.

My dc is also doing hugely better now and much nearer predicted grades.

Wouldn’t predicted be fairer.

They are planning arrangements for people to sit at home using an internet based system.

Really, that would be better but how will they stop some from cheating. I’d ensure it was done properly but many wouldn’t.

Surely they cant use mocks? That was not proper exams. That's not fair.

Also have a son doing gcses this year.

JCQ are meeting with the exam boards to put in contingency plans if the need should arise. Nothing has been published yet but they are working in it.

A mixture of technology and 'open book' exams could work. I'm doing an OU course at the moment and some of the assessments are online.

I'm doing maths, when I log on to the iCMA - computer marked exam I don't get the same questions as other students but we all get similar questions that require the same skills.

So I might be asked to work out the volume of water a swimming pool, the next candidate might have to measure the volume of water in a hot water tank.

Mocks vary hugely too in content. Would be hugely unfair.

I work on a school where many students don’t have WiFi at home - just mobile data usually. Interested to see how that would play out with online exams.

Also have students who have said they aren’t revising because exams will be cancelled...

It’s not as simple as “just use their mocks” as obviously they’re not standardised, we’re sat at different times etc. I’d hazard a guess (I’m an A level teacher) that the exam board would ask teachers for their best predicted grade. Teachers would use a combination of mocks and their own mark books along with their knowledge of the student to give a realistic grade. We have to submit working grades into the college system several times a year so we wouldn’t be able to cheat and give wildly higher marks as the exam board would probably do random checks to make sure the grade submitted were in line with internal marks. It’d be fairly simple (obviously this is relatively speaking!).

One of the newspapers, reported that exams in the summer hols may be a possibility.

I was wondering that as well (a-level dc).

This is one of my main concerns at the moment. DS is due to sit Scottish Highers, the exams start this year in the last week of April. These are the exam grades he will use to apply for a university place so they are crucial.

I'm sure it'll all be fine though.

If it does come to that- which it may not - then it is not a disaster! GCSE can be taken again; it's unfair yes but it doesn't need to impact everything.

Am also concerned about university exams and finishing courses. I think ds' university were planning strike action, so not sure if this will go ahead if there's a significant chance that classes will be cancelled due to Coronavirus.
Universities are a breeding ground for illness - thousands of kids from all different parts of the country, living in very close proximity. Total nightmare to manage!

With GCSEs a teachers predicted wouldn’t be that great. With my dc it is now simply learning the content. Concepts are all in there but thanks to the way GCSEs are now it’s just a lot of fact learning for him at this stage.I know many don’t bother to do that until a month to go.

I can't see them using mocks - it would be a disaster for a lot of kids. How often on here do we here stories of mocks being below expected, and then they pull it out of the bag on actual gcse results day?

How are they going to be taken again to get into 6th form/ diff schools?

Would things like CAMHs be taken into account?

They will not use mocks. The process is entirely different, unmoderated and insecure. I think the most likely is some sort of online system. Not failsafe, but none of it is.

So much to think about.

They had better not use mock results! We’ve been spending a fortune on tutors since 😫