Quick question about out of sync GCSE's

[pugsandseals]

Another thread got me thinking about league tables, value add etc. Do GCSE's taken before year 11 count on league tables? I know a number of schools which offer early GCSE's for the bright sparks and was just wondering what this would mean for the school onvolved. Do they drop or gain any league table points for doing so?
TIA

Yes I believe it does. Especially as these GCSEs are (generally) taken by more able students, so the school would not miss an opportunity to add these results to the Year 11 ones. They do not get more points for doing the GCSE early; in fact it can be a negative sometimes as a child can get a B in Year 10 but maybe could have had a chance to get an A or an A* in Year 11 if he/she had taken the exam then.
It's seen as good PR for the school, but I am not sure it is always a good idea.

The school will give the results for ALL GCSE's achieved by the pupils in Y11, whenever those GCSE's were taken. Our school takes all GCSE's a year early but the league tables don't reflect the results until a year later. All GCSE'S taken will form part a school's stat's, just not contemporaneously when taken early.

form part of

yellowstone - I'm probably missing something but ,if all GCSE's are taken a year early ,what are they studying in year 11 ?

start on as levels maybe?

dd has done some this year in yr 9 - she's not that bright iykwim but it is the schools' policy

More GCSEs; if DD's school is to go by

DD starts her GCSEs in Sept (yr9) & seems to be expected to do an immense amount

Maths, 2 english, social studies, 2/3 science, french, geography, music, dance, cookery,
then in yr 11 Spanish, History

gingeroots no you're missing nothing! They start their AS courses but don't take modules until Y12 because the universities have stipulations about what needs to be taken when. They do take General Studies AS in Jan and the A2 in June so that's out of the way. They don't actually do GCSE's in one year, they just spend two rather than three years on KS3 and start the GCSE course in Y9. Much more laid back Sixth Form as a result!

Wow - I can see how that would work and ease the transition ,and success at ,studying A levels .

Well I think that shows how utterly pointless General Studies is! Luckily good universities don't include that in their requirements and I can see why. Drip-feeding GCSE modules over 3 years doesn't prepare them for A-level. The opposite I would have thought.

Early GCSE modules seem to be offered in year 10 as the norm now with the attitude 'oh just do a retake' if it's below an A. Ridiculous.

ACME (wonderful acronym) not happy about pupils taking Maths GCSE early to get it out of the way rather than because they've reached A* standard before the end of year 11. BBC news report on this here.

I agree with them - what's the point in taking a GCSE early if you could get a higher grade the following year or even two years later?

hocus General Studies is taken in Y11 precisely because it doesn't form part of university offers. I'm not sure how the fact of taking the A-level in Y11 shows that it's utterly pointless, though clearly lots of people think it is. The school takes the GCSE's in one hit at the end of Y10, it doesn't do modules. I entirely agree that doing them all in one go is a very different thing from modules here and there.

hocus I don't think any school drip-feeds modules over three years does it? I thought GCSE courses everywhere were completed in a max of two?

Yellowstone "...They start their AS courses but don't take modules until Y12 because the universities have stipulations about what needs to be taken when... "

Would be interesting (for me anyway) if you can share some of the reasons. E.g. I've heard Trinity prefer their Mathematicians not to take a gap year, something about getting out of practice. Bit worried now about early A Levels possibly being seen as deviant.

TIA

zeolite when the school first started the three year Sixth Form in 2007 they did do certain AS's in Y11, mostly science. This created some difficulties with medical schools which stipulated that exams had to be taken in Y12 and Y13. So the school adjusted it's practice. I think the issue was that the AS in Y11 was too far apart from the A2 in Y13 and that the medical schools wanted both to be completed in a two year window - so not quite the same as your concern about early A levels. The school takes German A2 in Y12 and the universities seem perfectly happy with that.

I hadn't heard about the gap year thing. Sounds quite severe. Which Trinity, out of interest?

A lot of universities don't like their mathematicians to take a gap year unless there is some way of keeping the maths skills up to date.

Thanks Yellowstone. It's the one with a sis called Christ Church. From what webwiz says, looks like they're similar to others.

I just pulled ds from doing his IGCSE French this year (Year 10), as he would have had to do his AS in Year 11; for me, that doesn't make sense as his focus should be on getting the top grades at GCSE rather than fretting about his AS French grade (especially as he didn't want to do it at AS anyway).

The other problem being that, even had he wanted to do AS and A2 French, the exam board used by his school wouldn't necessarily equate to the one used by the sixth form in UK I want him to attend, so what is the point?

Top sets often sit iGCSE French in Y10, so the French specialists can move to Pre-U level in time. Pre-U seems to be the entry standard for French for the better uni courses.

The kids who aren't planning to sit Pre-U (or AS/A2) French just get one less i/GCSE to do in Y11. That also motivates them.

Thanks for the information guys! They do count then, but not until the year that student reaches year 11 - very clever. So the schools which do this end up with kids doing A Levels early or extra GCSE's sound quite good for the bright ones then