University 2020 :4: The wait for grades and better days ahead

[MillicentMartha]

New thread for us. Interesting times.

Old thread here

@DuckyMcDuck it's helpful that isn't it ? So glad they put it up as it has saved me so much time with my lovely students.Schools asked for a FAQ thing to help with a bit of clarity. What we should get this week is how teachers give the information to exam boards. And what information we can base this on. Personally I'm dreading if. A lot of my students don't have great home lives and struggle but we throw everything at them for these last few months and get some amazing results in the end. That's what guidance I want - how can I use a formula to count for that ?
Hope everyone is well. Good news, parents of student off ventilators this morning. And one colleague has now tested negative so looks like has flu instead. Had to be ill enough to go to hospital to find this out though !

I really feel for the teachers. Our head had to send an email telling parents to stop contacting the teachers to tell them why their little Johnny Is so special and was definitely going to get an A despite having bunked off most of this year.*

** not an exact quote

@mumsneedwine

Could I make a polite request to keep accounts of coronavirus patients away from these threads, at east unless they're not close relatives. Just because some people on the threads will be much more directly affected and it ramps things up a bit in already tense times. Understood if a DC or partner or sibling or parent are currently seriously unwell but otherwise please could we dial down the stories? There are plenty of threads elsewhere to share and this is supposed to be an area free from that sort of stuff. Thanks.

Jeez what is happening with my phone? Should read at least unless they're very close relatives. Apologies.

To be honest, reading that D of E information, I think students may actually have significant advantages this year because -

• they don’t have the whole build up, revision schedules and stress of the exams which as we know, don’t always go to plan, even for the most able students.

• it sounds like they will get their calculated grades in July, rather than August - so less of a wait and, in most cases, they can then get on with their summer and look forward to uni with the extra month to prepare for the move.

• if they’re not happy with a particular grade or even all the grades then, unlike other cohorts, they have a second chance. They can inform unis they wish to appeal and / or take the September exams. They can use late July and August to do intensive study and then retake one or all exams in Sept. Most unis don’t start until October anyway and it sounds like they’ve been told to be flexible.

To be honest, my son is in the lower sixth and if he were in this position, we’d be quite positive about it. (Having said that, he is in a school where they know students very well and I accept this isn’t the case for everyone).

I agree Solara. I'm completely positive on the exam grades front, it all sounds pretty sensible and as though huge efforts will be made to make the whole thing fair. I think the Y13s are in a better position than the Y12s, overall. What DD is sad about is the abrupt ending of her schooldays. But you know, it is what it is - easy for parents to say I know.

Of my DS’s friends, the most worried are the ones who need (at least) 2 Astars, as their school doesn’t award them in mocks. So even though they know they probably would have got them in the summer, they don’t have that comfort of having already nailed them in an exam situation. Some of them also had to do well in the STEP papers, and no one has said a word about them yet.

Same hear @goodbyestranger.. DD was really upset about school ending its such a big part of her life because she doesn't have any siblings...

I'm glad the exams aren't going ahead but a tinge disappointed because Dd has matured so much this year and was beginning to show her full potential.

Hopefully she will be awarded grades to reward her hard work... without the stress or worries of a rogue exam paper.

On the positive side Dd is learning sign language as a new skill over the Easter period.

Could I make a polite request to keep accounts of coronavirus patients away from these threads

The point is @goodbyestranger , what @mumsneedwine has posted is 100% relevant to the thread. Some parents are making demands on school, without stopping for a minute to consider what staff are also dealing with. The fact it has needed pointing out, proves the point.
So yes, this is a discussion board. You can request whatever you like, but relevant information from teachers is particularly welcome, from where I'm sitting, so hope people don't feel prevented from posting what they wish to.

Backforgood some people will have had deaths in their families, so mentioning the fact that you know someone who knows someone on a ventilator is in pretty poor taste, in that it is all about them, when it shouldn't be. It's not relevant to anything which has been said. Some people are facing real difficulties at the moment so hopefully mumsneedwine will give that a little thought before posting about people twice removed.

We haven't anywhere discussed parents making demands on school. No-one on this thread have said they've contacted school.

More bad phone related grammar :)

mumsneedwine posted a comment about schools being in the wrong sending emails to parents re grades. Nothing at all to do with demands on schools.

Plenty of people will be on here as distraction, is my point. And lots won't post about personal worries. So worth saying maybe think about those others?

Can I ask a different question, any thoughts on taking a gap year this year?

I’m reading on a TSR forum where a Y13 student is disappointed to not get an offer from his preferred uni and is being encouraged to defer.

I know gap year’s can be a great time to stop and reflect, my DD is on one now.
But, I’m thinking that 2021 applicants are a higher birth year than the 2020 cohort, plus pent up demand from international students looking to come to the U.K., and (controversially) gap year students will be competing against students who will be taking A level exams with the external corroboration of the results achieved.

Or am I being too pessimistic?

@KingscoteStaff same here and that is exactly what we are worried about

Error - good point. With low international students this year and some deferring I agree taking a gap year feels different though no harm asking the uni when results are out?

DS is currently in Year 12 and probably applying to Cambridge this Autumn. The school want all the UCAS forms in by the middle of Sept for Oxbridge applicants, so unless things change over the summer, none of them will have a chance to visit colleges before they apply. Same for anyone applying to any uni as all open days closed.

They were supposed to have exams straight after the Easter break which went towards their predicted grades, but obviously these have been cancelled. They’re talking about some kind of online assessment instead and encouraging them to still revise over Easter, but it won’t be the same.

However, he did get talking online to one of the heads of the sixth form the other day because on his report there were grades and his were A, A, B,B. He wasn’t sure if these were predicted grades and obviously he would need A*AA for Cambridge. The teacher told him that these grades relate to where he is performing in A-level standards right now. He said that nearly all pupils will be performing at least one grade higher by this time next year and they have data that tracks this kind of thing etc etc. So it seems they do know the levels students are performing at. They track performance for the cohort year after year and they have a pretty good idea, even early in Year 12, how things are likely to pan out. I think A-levels are probably easier to assess than GCSEs as well because for GCSEs its easier to pull it out the bag at the last minute.

He also asked about taking a gap year and if this improved the odds of an offer and was told that although Oxbridge say they treat all applications equally, it is slightly harder to get a gap year offer - definitely for maths or sciences. This is a school that get maybe 20 or so into Oxbridge each year and lots of others into US unis and other equally competitive courses, so they must have some data on this. They said unis don’t like to give many deferred places because it reduces the spaces for the following year’s cohort and also they’re worried they will forget a lot of info during the year.

I reckon there must be a lot of students - mine included - who are mulling over what to do - ask to defer? - if by any chance unis say they'll be teaching online in October.

I think the reliability of teachers' knowledge of grades probably varies from school to school.

There are over 300 in DD's cohort. 25-35 in each of her classes. All the teachers also teach at least one other A level class as well as GCSEs and lower school classes too.
So they do their best, but don't know the students nearly as well as they would in an indie or grammar with less than 10 in a class.

Teacher turnover has been high the past couple of years so in only one subject has DD had the same teacher throughout the A Level course.
In chemistry her teacher has been off sick since October half term and she's had a variety of cover and supply teachers.

So DD is far from happy about her grades being decided for her.
She would have much preferred the chance to sit the exams and be in control of her own future.

I’m not sure of the source but it’s possible that the autumn exams might be rather later than September. Even if in September by the time they are marked it may well be too late for uni places this year.

I’m hoping that the grades awarded will be sufficient for most students to get a uni place, especially with results being compared to the expected trends and it being a low birth rate year in the UK.

There will still be clearing options, I’m sure, which may be better than taking a gap year and either sitting the autumn exams or even sitting them next summer if grades don’t quite go to plan.

My DS is a bit borderline, I would say, whether he meets his offers based on GCSEs (a bit rubbish) and teacher assessment compared to actually having sat the exams but I’m trying to be optimistic for his sake. And he’ll get into a university, even if not his main choices.

Not sure why the thread has got so combative all of a sudden? It’s been very friendly and supportive mainly. It would be nice if it could remain so. I’m sure we all have our own worries, some more serious than others, so could we keep that in mind?

One point about deferring is that if the universities are teaching online in October, then in that hypothetical scenario - which is that very significant social distancing measures are still in place - it's likely that it won't be easy for a gap year student to find work, or to travel.

So starting online with a view to going 'full university experience' in January 2021 may seem like a preferable option. (Although of course there'll be no guarantee that universities will 'open up' in January in that hypothetical scenario.)

Still hoping that it is hypothetical, of course.

Agreed Millicent. And after all, my request was only a request, in terms, and a polite one at that, so not sure why I needed to be told I could only make a request Anyhow, hopefully no more need be said.

Lobster that's harsh. Not much comfort perhaps but our grammar has very few classes of less than/ around ten (MFL and Music). But teacher turnover and teachers off sick is really tricky, obviously. A good HoD will help - or perhaps it is the HoD who's off sick? Ofqual will have to make specific adjustments where there are hard cases such as your DD's.

fromlittleacorns that's the line I'm plugging!

I am anticipating being asked to predict (with co-teachers for trilogy) about 120 grades this week. Hoping for nice clear advice from OFQUAL as to what data we should use and how we work out uplift. I'm going to hate it as some will not like me v much (the emails telling me I'm lovely have been coming all weekend - funny but not going to change my mind). But I know all my students well and have mountains of data to rely on.
But quite a few of my colleagues are currently ill so we might need to do their grades too.
My own year 13 is still working hard. On line lessons and loads of work - keeling her busy and with some routine.