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Original poster

English language GCSE

17 replies

Twentyman71 · 01/10/2018 16:21

Hi
My daughters result was not what she had been attaining in her mocks. She was getting 6’s and only come out with a 3, 4 marks off a 4.
School had chosen to only send students papers back if they was one mark off the next grade. I chose to pay to have my daughters paper remarked. Got the results today and she’s only gone up by one mark. Apparently AQA are not budging on marks. I’m considering the appeals process. I’ve asked her teacher to go over her paper to see what he advises.
Is there anyone else in a similar situation

OP posts:
Flyingarcher · 01/10/2018 19:22

Same here. He keeps failing English. He is actually pretty good at it! So pissed off. Remark didn't change anything. Gutting. I'm not appealing unless a teacher finds something really chronically wrong but I doubt that will happen.

clary · 01/10/2018 19:27

Thing is, she maybe did get a 3. Just because you would like her to have got a 4, doesn't mean she did! It's been reassessed and not changed. Not sure why AQA should "budge".

Why not focus instead on why she didn't do better - sounds like she has ability, did she freeze up in the exam? Were the mocks generously marked? What are her weaker spots - work on those for a retake. A pal's son got a 3 in yr 11 then a 6 when he retook this year!

CherryPavlova · 01/10/2018 19:32

AQA wouldn’t be allowed to ‘budge’. It wasn’t a remark it was a review of the marking. The process is agreed and monitored by OfQual.
Exam boards can’t just increase exam marks because parents want them to. They mark about 11 million exam scripts with a very low margin of error. Very few papers are upgraded following reviews of marking - although some do go down too.

ClashCityRocker · 01/10/2018 19:48

If I understand correctly, the mocks will have been marked without knowing the grade boundaries - so I guess it's likely that they were marking her blind, so to speak?

Original poster
Twentyman71 · 01/10/2018 20:20

its got nothing to do with me wanting her marks to go up!!!! Just because I think they should. It wasn’t only her results that teachers had concerns about, there was also other students. I was there on the day of results and spoke to her teacher and head of English. Interpretation in English Language depends on who’s marking the paper, it’s not like a right/wrong answer in maths. When students are attaining grades in mocks then come out with grades way off it’s bound to raise a few concerns. Just doing the best I can by my daughter.

OP posts:
Original poster
Twentyman71 · 01/10/2018 20:31

I think some are misinterpreting my point here. Concerns were raised on results day. She had the ability to get grade 6 and was attaining this through assessments and in her mocks leading up to her exams. Yes the grading is more strict we was well aware of that considering this was the first full year that all subjects would be harder.
Her college is not doing English Language resits due to the fact (we was told) that they don’t need to get language in GCSE just literature, that actually beggars belief to me. So at this stage she doesn’t even have the option to resit!!!! Hence me getting her paper sent back off.

OP posts:
RowenaDedalus · 01/10/2018 20:34

You don’t necessarily know that she had the ability for a 6 though as these assessments were teacher assessed and marked.

CherryPavlova · 01/10/2018 21:03

It could well be overgenerous marking by teachers in school if many had the same issue. I think I’d look closer to home rather than assume it was a marking issue.
The exam board benchmarking is very sophisticated software. They have very low error margins and outlier schools are identified rapidly and reviewed internally whether reviews of marking are requested or not.
She could resist at a different centre.

HarveySchlumpfenburger · 01/10/2018 21:05

I don’t think posters are misinterpreting. But there is more than one explanation for the difference in grades. You seem to be assuming that the 6 is correct and the AQA marking is wrong.

There is a possibility that the school don’t understand the syllabus or mark scheme and have overmarked the mocks. Or she just had a bad paper.

ClashCityRocker · 01/10/2018 21:24

If many have had the same issue it does sound like the school had pegged the grade boundaries wrong (as I understand, it was pretty much a guessing game and a lot of teachers were concerned about this) and marked too generously in mocks and assessments.

Or she had a bad day. Was one paper significantly higher than the other?

clary · 01/10/2018 23:34

Yeah, what pp say - if a lot of students did worse than expected, based on mocks, then I'd be suspicious of the mock marking.

I utterly don't blame the teacher - they (we, I was one until nine months ago) have been de skilled and no longer know what grade a piece of work is. I used to be able to say - this writing is an A, this is a C - but when I marked my year 11 mocks last December, I had to admit I was guessing a 7 or a 5.

Yes, there has been an extra year in English, but still it's tough to assess, difficult to get it right.

That's true about Eng lit counting afaik op, but still a lot of schools are doing eng Lang resits. Is she staying at the school? Is there an option to resit elsewhere? How did she do in the rest of her exams - is she ok at exams in general?

ShalomJackie · 06/10/2018 14:56

Yes it sounds very much of there is a number of problems that the school has failed to mark the mocks properly. Although there is no right or wrong like in maths there is still very much a formulaic mark scheme that applies to the English which it seems like the school has either not applied or misunderstood.

evenstrangerthings · 06/10/2018 19:29

Schools and colleges can count either Eng Lang or Eng Lit in terms of pupil performance and entry for 6th form places/exemption from compulsory resits, however universities are still insisting on a good pass in Eng Lang schoolsweek.co.uk/english-gcse-mismatch-puts-university-offers-at-risk/

Moussemoose · 06/10/2018 19:32

English language GCSE AQA marking is shit.

My son went up 11 marks and a grade (nearly 2 grades) when we had ONE of his paper remarked.

Shameful.

Kazzyhoward · 06/10/2018 19:37

Yep, marking was very inconsistent. My son was forecast a 9. He got a 7. Teacher recommended a remark. Came back reviewed up to a 9.

KeithLeMonde · 06/10/2018 19:45

If a student has 4+ in English Literature then school will not receive funding for them to retake Language. You could ask whether she could enter privately i.e. pay her own way.

Curioushorse · 06/10/2018 19:46

I’m a Head Of English. We sent back 20. The majority haven’t changed (though we also had some big increases). We are also still querying some of these, as marks appear to have been added up wrong- despite having been reviewed.
With an appeal this year, youd be taking on the whole system rather than just an individual student’s marks. The review looks to see whether the marking is within tolerance. The problem is, that if every question is within tolerance, but on the low side, then the student may be two grades below the grade they could be (and we have a student I consider to be in this category). I’m finding it a real struggle this year, and feel really disheartened by it as it feels very unfair. I have no confidence in the marking system- particularly for a paper in which 50% of the marks are for creative writing.
Sorry OP. Don’t know if that helps- but i’m very sympathetic.

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