University 2020 :6: The one with the results at the end

[MillicentMartha]

Hopefully as the title suggests we will actually get up to results on this thread! Only 5 weeks to go.

Old thread www.mumsnet.com/Talk/higher_education/3918392-University-2020-5-Results-day-approaching-and-beyond?pg=40

DD passed her driving test this morning! 4th time lucky! Now to start worrying about A Level results

Definitely seems to be the year to be easiest to secure a good place. I can understand those wishing to defer, but unless DS3 could get a job, I couldn’t afford to support him at home. I already have DS2 who has ASD to support and it’s not easy as a single parent. DS3 is happy to go and looking forward to escaping from home!

Great news, @JufusMum! 🚗🚙

Oh wow @Jufusmum ! Brilliant news, congratulations to her!

@JufusMum

DD passed her driving test this morning! 4th time lucky! Now to start worrying about A Level results

Congrats!

☆

Whoo!
Fantastic news!

Congratulations.

Brilliant, @JufusMum ! What a relief! It takes real chutzpah to try something for the fourth time. That success will stay with her. Never give up!

Well done to your DD JufusMum.

@JufusMum 🏆🚗😀

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.tes.com/news/GCSE-results-2020-teacher-grades-ignored%3famp

Anyone else relieved at the small cohort news?
That’s dd2s most important grade so hoping her teacher was on the ‘good day’ marks.
Not great news on everything else particularly for bright children in a weaker school.

Yes - as DS is doing a subject with two entrants and another with three entrants, he was quite pleased when I showed him that article! (He believes the school would have assessed him as getting the grades he needs for his offer).

I feel the headline is sensationalist (teachers haven't been ignored - they've used centre grades to help develop the stat models, and the teacher rankings will be used).

TheDrsDoc DS goes to a mahoosive inner-city SFC (750 per year) with very large numbers of students in some of the most popular subjects. Am trying not to freak out at the contents of the TES article. In his case 60% of A Level grades down to the lottery of standardised modelling and historical data with randomised cut-off points within the grade allocations . In which case the rank order of students within a class will count for more than the CAG itself...

DD goes to a huge SFC too, about 2000 in total I believe. Feeling so upset reading this.

@Cafeconleche - why do you say "randomised" cut-off?

If he is doing a subject that has a large entry, then last year's results at his school should give a credible distribution that could be applied to this year's entrants, unless you are aware of something that would make this year's cohort different. So, the exam board will then set cut-offs to generally ensure the same distribution of grades this year as last year.

I don't think it's fair to call this year's system a lottery, but as we've already seen in Scotland, a system that has been developed in a short time from scratch without exam boards having sight of pupils' actual attainment is bound to produce some unexpected (and unfair) outcomes.

(I'll slightly correct myself by saying I think they look at historic data from a few years not just last year).

As usual this benefits private schools with small cohorts. What a surprise (not).Really unfair on bright kids at schools with low attainment. Not fair. Lots of appeals heading their way. Schools can appeal. Fingers crossed this all works out.

Better for DC taking less popular subjects and perhaps not so great for the rest. Maths, Biology and Psychology were the three most popular last year apparently.

I can see why people are worried, but I think it’s worth remembering that, on average, the grades in Scotland were higher than last year overall. I’m sure it will be the case in the rest of the UK too - possibly the best year ever for grades across the board?

There will always be candidates who don’t make the grade for whatever reason and moderation and cut-off points happen every year. I guess the difference is, in a normal year, students only have themselves to blame, but this year they can blame the moderation system.

At least they have the chance to set the record straight, if need be, by proving themselves in the Autumn exams.

Also, hopefully unis will be more lenient this year anyway as there will be a massive reduction in overseas students. So even where an A is moderates down to a B, it may well still be enough and hopefully won’t hold them back from proceeding as normal at their first choice unis.

@DadDadDad - maybe ‘lottery’ is too strong a word. Maybe I’m reading (misreading?) too much into it. I’m just voicing my fears. If my DS had been able to sit his exams then he would be feeling more confident about achieving the grades he got in his mocks (even given the year-on-year shifting grade boundaries, bell-curves etc) As it is, he feels that this year he’s not up against other A*/A/B students on a national level, but rather those in his particular subject at school according to class rank order and the grade allocations for the previous cohorts at his school. If it were a small SFC with small classes then the CAGs would carry much more weight. I realise there are always winners and losers with actual exams and things can go wrong on the day, but after seeing what’s happened in Scotland I can’t help but worry about next Thursday. Anyway, there’s sod-all I can do about it. UCAS got the grades today and the universities will have sight of the results this weekend. As far as I’m concerned it’s in the lap of the gods

You are all forgetting the prior cohort attainment and although it is not individualised if the previous cohorts only got Cs but you have an outlier with A*/As at gcse this will adapt the historic date upwards anyway. so that bright child in a performing child will not be restricted to getting a low mark!

Also the national attainments levels will be factored in. It is already known this is overall nationally a brighter cohort so those historic stats will have already been adjusted to allow a greater number of A*/As.

The TES report has some proper facts in it but has been slanted in a very antagonistic fashion.

They report a 10% overestimation (from what source who knows?). However do look that most of these are at the pass/fail level for GCSE and at a B for A level which suggests teachers did not want their lower level students to fail because of what they said or their mid to low level students getting into uni.

The small cohort does not just apply to private schools but to any school where a child takes an "odd subject". In fact many private schools will have over 15 in most of their subjects because they tend to offer fewer subjects at A level many sticking to traditional academic subjects. So I am afraid the this advatanges the rich argument doesn't cut it for me.

It is less than a week. Try to stay calm and see what happens. It may not be all doom and gloom!

Gosh my autocorrect seems to have gone mad - date = data.
"bright child in a low performing school"

@Cafeconleche - oh, I totally get the anxiety. Even though my head tells me it should be all right for my DS, that hasn't stopped worrying that the system will give him something lower than he deserved etc.

I know it's easy to be cynical, but from all I've seen, OfQual and exam boards have people working there who are trying to make a fair system and test approaches that are statistically robust. But statistics derive patterns from randomness, so it's not surprising that if you do the reverse and apply statistics to derive results, some of those results will feel random.

(What I don't know is how bad the political interference in OfQual's process has been).

You are all forgetting the prior cohort attainment and although it is not individualised if the previous cohorts only got Cs but you have an outlier with A/As at gcse this will adapt the historic date upwards anyway. so that bright child in a performing child will not be restricted to getting a low mark!*
It's the mean GCSE result, across all subjects, for that subject cohort, which will be compared to same for prior 3 years. The amount an outlier with top GCSE grades will raise the average is minimal, and gets smaller the larger the cohort.