Any secondary school only do 5 GCSEs?

[loveyal]

I live and work in London and many people I know with professional jobs including myself didn't go to school in the UK. We don't understand why most children in this country do at least 7 GCSEs with the majority do 8 or 9.

As far as I know there is no minimum requirement other than English and Maths which is totally understandable.

There is this thing called Ebacc with 5 subjects which sounds sensible to me.

Why don't schools just do Ebacc and spend the rest of the time for non examined activities, be it creative, sports, community, home economics, whatever they like? They could still have all league table requirements such as Progress 8, Attainment 8, etc and etc.

The English Ebacc is potentially 8 subjects. English language and literature, maths, mfl, a humanity, biology, chemistry and physics.
Even then, there are no art subjects on the list which DC might excel in. They all do sport already, the creative subjects are what you are suggesting should be cut out of gcses. DT food/ textile covers home economics. So your post doesn't really make sense!

Less academic children deserve the opportunity to get qualifications too, surely?
The ‘creative’ things can be taken as a GCSE and examined, what’s the problem with that?
Not to mention that the current system requires a minimum of 5 passes to move on to all sorts of different further education courses.
The system may not be perfect but I think I prefer it to having nothing at all before 18 and kids having to keep plodding on with subjects that they have no interest or talent for.

For people wanting jobs that require strong academic qualifications 5 GCSE’s are unlikely to be enough. That’s the bare minimum to get through to a levels/ university etc

What are they going to do for the rest of the timetable ?

The Ebacc is 5 subjects but a minimum of 7 GCSEs.

2 English
2 or 3 sciences
1 humanities
1 MFL
1 Maths

Becky Francis is currently looking at over hauling the education system, I suspect things will change under Labour and hopefully reverse some of the damage that Gove did. More vocational options at GCSE is a must

In my experience, the EBACC was used to ensure children did MORE subjects! It puts pressure on schools to ensure children do a modern language. We didn’t want our son to do a language as he isn’t the most academic kid and we wanted him to concentrate on the basics but the school massively pushed back and insisted he did German. A lot of other parents felt the same. The school wouldn’t let him drop something else instead of German (geography, for example), so he ended up sitting 9 GCSEs. All because they had a target of a certain percentage of students doing the EBACC. Weirdly, he passed German with a 5 and failed English Language which kind of proved our point…. He has just resat English Language. So in short, I agree - some children would benefit massively with doing fewer GCSEs.

Yeh the ebacc (which isn’t an actual qualification anyway) will usually include two or three science GCSEs and two English.

I personally think there’s a real danger of some subjects being offered less and less as schools cut GCSE numbers to eight. Creatives like drama, tech, PE, music and things like RS and sociology are being squeezed out already.

How narrow would it be if no one did more than five GCSEs? What a limiting way of teaching the future members of society! My dc loved their GCSEs in catering, drama, PE, music.

Agreed that GCsEs need to be more creative/interesting/fun. Unfortunately the funding just isn’t there for a lot of creative subjects. My daughter absolutely loves her textiles GCSE. My son would have loved to do Food Technology but it wasn’t offered.

One of my dcs moved to a grammar school for A levels and was horrified by how many of the pupils only had 5/6/7 GCSEs because the school had pressured them drop any subjects they wouldn't get a 7-9 in (the school seemed to care more about its stats than the pupils).

Your child was ‘horrified’ by kids with fewer GCSEs? I can understand them being surprised but why such a strong reaction?

Only doing 5 GCSEs would massively limit your A level choices though?

I agree that anything over about 8 or 9 might strictly be unnecessary but a lot of kids manage it.

lots of kids do art/DT/music/PE etc at GCSE so not really sure you’ve understood the system?

I thought that too. He’d be really horrified at my home educated kid only doing 3 or 4 then.

I guess the current GCSE system is a hangover of the old O Levels when people used to leave school at 16 and hence needed to study as many as they can before stopping study altogether. This is in contrast with many countries where GCSEs would probably be considered middle school level as people stay in general education until 18.

The system needs to be overhauled. 5 examined subjects should be sufficient and more time should be spent on learning about the future world of work where basic knowledge does not need to be memorised and regurgitated in exams as it is so readily available from AI.

I don’t think it’s a good idea to limit the breadth of subjects any further, it’s already too narrow.

Just a reminder that Gove’s reforms have meant that England is at the least maintaining, if not improving, its positions in the PISA league tables. My kids are times table whizzes, which is a great thing.

Yup. And a lot of grammars will force tutoring or kick you out of your grades slip.

The whole system is horrible.

I don’t think that equals. The 2023 table (as 2024 isn’t out yet or I couldn’t find it sorry) shows Canada as the highest English speaking country in the table at #8. There are far far far less stats, tests, exams, etc

You go to your local school and they make room for you.

Teachers are paid well, have an unbelievable pension and aren’t stressed/overworked and under appreciated like they are here.

Canada also has the highest university educated numbers in the western world.

i honestly don’t think we have anything to be that proud of comparatively.

I'm quite impressed with the range available at DDs school...she will likely do 8 gcses and a BTEC. English, maths, Science (6 gcses), then her choices are Geography, Computer Science or Spanish, and then BTEC Animal Care. They have options for Food, Architecture, construction, art subjects...

Bingo. I am continually annoyed at the overuse of exaggerated language to make a point.

apparently there are no compulsory nation-wide exams until 18 in most developed countries. No wonder British teens are among the most depressed.

I think 7-8 should be norm with English literature being an option I think universitities should only count grades of best 8 including english and maths so there is no advantage to schools pushing 10 and 11
This already happens in Scotland where English and maths and 4 best national 5 geades are considered as some schools only do 6 some do 7 or 8 but it is to ensure pupils from schools doing 6 are not penalised. In Scotland English Literature is part of English not a separate subject though, I do not think forcing MFL or humanities or more than 1 science is generally a good idea at this stage apart from Englsh and maths pupils should be doing what is useful for them and what they are likly to suceed in, there should certainly be more practical options so someone mechanically minded could do English maths physics. IT, metal work, and design or someone arty could do English maths history art textiles cookery while the academic could still do academic but it would make sense for the science ones to do 3 sciences and either a humanity or MFL and those more on the other side to be able to do 2+ humanities and 2 MFL with just 1 science

So you're suggesting Maths, 1 English (which - lang or lit?), one science (a third of a GCSE is each subject - hardly good preparation for level 3 study), one MFL (crap for the large number of kids who struggle with English, let alone a second language) and a humanity (again crap for kids who struggle with writing).

Most of the western world has a broad curriculum to the age of 18 - we are somewhat of an outlier in having a broad curriculum to 16, then requiring specialisation. You're suggesting we reduce the breadth at 16, moving us even further away from the rest of the world?

And how do you think that would benefit bright kids who need a more science knowledge to do science A levels? What about non-academic kids - they get nothing to show for their education? What about kids with strengths in creative subjects - again nothing to showcase their ability?

And how do propose progress 8 is measured - you know what the '8' refers to yes?

universitities should only count grades of best 8 including english and maths so there is no advantage to schools pushing 10 and 11

Most unis don't care about GCSEs at all - those that do only count the top 8 so this already happens. 11 is unusual these days - even private schools tend to limit to 9.

If SN dropping 1 could help. If anxiety had caused school absence then dropping 1 so child could cope is recommended.