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?

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

Cheater's charter

Mocks are too variable between schools. Predicted grades aren't relevant able enough either.

They'd have to do a new session in November - goodnesss only knows what that would mean for university entrance or those changing sixth forms, plus loss of A level teaching time round new exam timetable

What do you mean by a new session in Nov?

I can’t see how they could let them be done online from home. Everyone would cheat and get full marks!

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

Oh gosh 🙈
My dd is very definitely revising... and I wouldn't be happy if nick results were used as finals 😟

Mock

As in, the next round of exams are scheduled for November, OP. That’s when the GCSE re-sits are always done.

Anyway, 10-1 the exams will go ahead as absolutely normal and on schedule, and I’m certainly not allowing my students to say, “But they’ll be cancelled anyway!” and thankfully they aren’t seeing it as an excuse to not revise (yet)!

They definitely would not use their mock results. They’re not standardised across all schools, and they are invigilated by school staff to save money, which is never allowed for the real thing. Crikey, two of mine sat their November mocks in the corridor outside my classroom this year, as they were away on the proper day, so no way would that be passable as an official grade!

Far more likely we would use our collective data to give an accurate-as-possible grade based on their cumulative work.

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.

But what about sixth form places? Starting A levels? -schools don’t have the room to house another 150+ children. If the exams were sat in the autumn term with a massive break in teaching time, I can’t imagine results will be good. They can’t take place in the summer holidays as so many people have booked holidays.

What about A leave students who would be taking up university places in September?

I think it would be chaos!

There are online systems which can mimic exam situations so limit cheating. I think that's what will happen

They can’t guarantee that the person sitting the test online at a remote centre is the candidate, not that they don’t have crib sheets or another computer available during the exam.

It’s wide open to cheating, unless invigilated, which it can’t be if done other than in an exam centre

It's a potential nightmare... Let's say best case scenario that the exams DO go ahead - but there will be a lot of students who might have missed two or three weeks of lesson or revision time in the coming three months - and it will still cause a huge amount of stress to those who are lucky enough to escape the actual illness. My DD, sitting A-levels this year and aiming for top grades, is really worried about it already, as are many of her friends.
Plus, as a parent I don't feel that happy sending her off to a strange city to live in close quarters with thousands of other young people from all over the country, come September.
Trying not to worry about all this but it is very hard and seems so unfair on this cohort who have also borne the brunt of all the recent changes in the exam system.

Sacha the accumulated thing is a nightmare though for many who have had a rocky year 11.

They definitely won’t use mocks. As a pp said, the exam boards will work together (through JCQ) to have contingency plans in place. There have been other potential country wide emergencies in the past (terror attacks, the Icelandic volcano, foot and mouth etc) which have had contingency plans in place. Mocks and predicted grades would not be used as they are not standardised.

I think many parents will contest many of those grades too.

I think the A levels are easy. Schools have had to give predicted grades, references as part of the UCAS process (also based on GCSE results), with offers given to applicants, and applicants having to give first choice and insurance choice, so Unis could confirm places based on first choices as if predictions had been met.

Obviously far harder for GCSEs as there's no prior official exam results (like there are GCSEs for A level). But as far as I know, schools have to provide the exam boards with predicted grades based on mocks, tests, and general teacher evaluation, so the predictions could be used for GCSEs too.

Obviously not ideal, but it's impossible to hold everyone back 6 months and there's no way an internet based home alternative could be designed, implemented and rolled out before May!

I wasn't saying that it wouldn't be a set back, I was saying that if a student wants to progress in a career in the medical field as a previous poster said, then they could still do that. It is not a disaster, it is a set back. Unfortunate, yes, disastrous - no.

I don't know what will happen but it could make life very difficult for the Class of 2020.

Unis (inc medical schools) still need their intake of new students in September, so they'll have to accept people who couldn't take their A levels, otherwise they'd have empty spaces. If the exam boards can't come up with an alternative way of giving "official" results, such as based on predicted grades or mocks, then the Unis will have to make their own decisions based on info they have, such as predicted grades, references, personal statements, GCSE results, etc. One way or another, Uni and medical school places will need filling in September.

Mocks would be very unsatisfying. People with high results would always have the niggling feeling that they maybe didn’t deserve them and those with low results would be sure they would have done better in the real exams.
Ds bombed his maths and science through lack of revision and has worked really hard ever since. Some of his mocks had content they hadn’t covered and some of them they got lots of direction on what to study. He also sat them in December whereas some schools are doing them now.

I would have thought if schools are closed there would be enough healthy staff to invigilate students across different areas, so smaller groups sitting exams in classrooms rather than everyone crammed in the hall and then mixing with all the other years at lunchtime etc.

That doesn’t help if students are actually ill but maybe there could be a resit period in July for a level with might allow time for marking before normal results day so long as it wasn’t 1000s of students.

Yes and I guess only exam students would need to go in so splitting into smaller rooms would be more doable.

Why would they baulk at the students sitting exams when the schools are still open? The students are still together in the same concentration.
Or are we envisioning a time where they’ve literally shut the schools down??

Universities are already discussing solutions - as these issues already exist with applicants from Asia, Italy, etc.

Even if the rest of the school is closed, the school can still open as an exam centre, with reduced staff.

I think the most likely outcome is that the exams will be held as normal.

I hope so

The exams may go ahead but for children who have lost weeks of lessons, either through their own illness or that of teaching staff or classmates, the situation is worrying.
What will stop people feigning coronavirus to avoid sitting their exams, or get some marking credits?

There's no way an online system would work. How would they know that the exam wasn't being taken by somebody else? I think that the GCSEs they may use predicted grades. They could compare these with the schools previous grades to see if there are accurate.Alternatively, they could still do the exams but check students didn't have symptoms before they started and sit them far apart with facemasks.