How on Earth do a level lower achievers get to uni with the grades that are being asked?

[NCTDN]

If I wanted to go to uni now, I'd have no chance. In my day, I needed three E grades to get into teaching, from which I've had a fabulous career.
DD is very lucky and looking at places asking for 3As (Not teaching) but I'm so shocked at how high everywhere asks for. I went to what was primarily a teacher training college and even that is asking for 3 alleged at grade b.
So my question is, what do teenagers do these days if they get grades C D or E? It must be so disheartening.

I got ABB in 1988. That was very good and I had my pick of unis for the course I wanted. DH found the pub during year 13 and got CCC, and was still accepted on an engineering course at a (now) Russell group uni.

So even a lower offer of 3 Cs is ridiculous. Poor kids- the pressure is phenomenal.

I don't think a grade C requires a lot of marks, so probably not difficult to achieve. The grade boundaries are surprisingly low!

There's been massive grade inflation.

The grade boundaries are surprisingly low!

Not in all subjects.

There hasn't been massivegrade inflation.

I have been teaching for 25 years.The students that get Cs in my subject are basically the same as they were then. They are harder working, more tested, more focused, on the whole. which contributes to an increase in top grades. The students who get A* (it's 1.8% in my subject) are astonishingly good. The students who get Es are very weak.

Clearing.

OP, 'teaching degrees' don't exist in the same kind of volume these days. Are you secondary or primary? I will admit , whilst thinking that the grade inflation bit can be a red herring, two Es would be an unacceptably low bar for teachers. I'd have real questions over capabilities there and , if secondary, sufficient ability and subject knowledge to teach GCSE and beyond. I know a few colleague with fairly ropy results but none that low.

it really isn't beyond most sixth form students to get an A or B f they work hard enough.

That rather depends on the school's entry requirements to sixth form!

I have three A Level classes in year 12 : two subjects. In one of them, the majority will gets Bs/Cs with an A or two, because the entry requirement is a little higher. In the other, students only need a certain number of GCSEs at 4 and above and En/Ma at 4. The best performance a few can expect is a D or a C and some, to be honest ,and E. There is a limit to the value I can add!! The students destined to get something like DDD or below really shouldn't do a conventional uni route on the whole but I dodn't knwo what else they can do. The days of being able to walk into work in an estate or travel agent, legal secretary, police force etc straight after A Levels have gone.

There has been such a huge grade inflation that E grades in the 1980's will be more like B grades today

I'd love to see the actual hard evidence for that because that is nonsensical hyperbole! An E grade in the 80s might have been not pushed as much as now and could have been very lazy (students really weren't tracked at all) in which case, yes, they could get a B now. But the requirements are really not so different.

@Zandathepanda

Prince Charles went to Cambridge on BCN I believe, so it was possible .

What was N?

DS is applying for Uni. Out of interest I looked to see what the entry requirements were for the degree I did.

When I applied for admission in 1990 the Scottish Highers needed were BBBB (so 4 out of the 5 that most people do). Now the same course at the same university is looking for a minimum of AAAAB.

I did my teaching degree in the late 80s with no A levels at all, and no access course. I was a 25 yr old single mum and therefore got special dispensation! There were 5 others like me. We all did very well and have all had very successful teaching careers.
DD1 did a BTech route as she bombed her 1st A level year, got a degree (scraped it really) and walked into a temp job straight from Uni. She now earns more than double what I earned as a teacher on top pay and is in her mid 30s.
DD2 did A levels, top grades, degree at a competitive Russell Group Uni and is a qualified lawyer going for her Bar exams.
I’d say in terms of success, for some careers, academic ability is very important. For others, the type of person you are, plus a strong work ethic, are what will make you successful.

I had this conversation with DC the other day oddly enough. Even when I left school c. 2000 someone with 3x A grades was a rarity I can’t even remember if As existed because I didn’t know anybody with even 1 x A let alone 3. Even straight A’s or A at GCSE were rare. Anyone who achieved that was bound for medicine, vet med, Oxbridge and the likes thereof. Then I noted how in recent years many DC are being predicted 3 x A grades so either the grades have been inflated or people are getting more intelligent. In other European countries such as the Netherlands they often have a baseline offer of 3 x C’s for entry (even at the best institutions), however you need to pass the year to carry on to the next and the process is quite rigorous. I assume there are uni’s out there that will accept lower grades in general but they many not be the RG’s etc.

I just checked, and the course I needed ABC for now requires A*AB-AAA.

It's called clearing!

The grades required for uni are also about competition for places, though and exoectation and ambition.You need As and you will work harder to get them. When I went, science degrees were undesirable so people had Ds Cs and Bs. Now the same courses require As. It's not just grade inflation; there are multiple factors.

I really do hope parents don't spout about grade inflation when their DCs bring results home!

@Piggywaspushed

OP, 'teaching degrees' don't exist in the same kind of volume these days. Are you secondary or primary? I will admit , whilst thinking that the grade inflation bit can be a red herring, two Es would be an unacceptably low bar for teachers. I'd have real questions over capabilities there and , if secondary, sufficient ability and subject knowledge to teach GCSE and beyond. I know a few colleague with fairly ropy results but none that low.

I think it's such a shame to think that anyone my age with similar a level results would not be classed capable of being a good teacher. I have seen many ropey ones in my time and it's nothing to do with a level results. But yes, schools direct etc makes the routes into teaching variable, although you still need a degree.

University isn't and shouldn't be for everyone. IMO Converting polytechnics to universities years ago was a big mistake.
Polys offered different courses which were often more suited to the less 'classically' academic student.
We also need to see more foundation courses, the old fashioned YTS schemes and apprenticeships.

Less able students are being allowed into universities to read courses which are often pointless (in the sense of helping them get a decent job) and these kids are ending up in debt up to their eyeballs.....

Here's some stats about grades going back to the 90s. www.bstubbs.co.uk/a-lev.htm

No idea what subject Piggy teaches, but it certainly looks like there's grade inflation on almost all of them to me.

In answer to the OP, I'd imagine the two routes you'd be looking at would be going through clearing and foundation courses.

DH found the pub during year 13 and got CCC, and was still accepted on an engineering course at a (now) Russell group uni.

I'm similar to your DH (though I found the pub earlier and also was more interested in music than my A levels) but got into a Russell group uni to do engineering with CCD in 1987, though my offer was something like BBC.

N grade (I had to look it up):

From 1987 grade N was awarded to indicate a narrow failure in a subject at Advanced level. This meant the student did not pass at Advanced level but was judged to have fallen short of the standard required for grade E by a narrow margin
www.aqa.org.uk/exams-administration/about-results/certificates/aqa-certificates?a=67781#:~:text=From%201987%20grade%20N%20was

@MarchingFrogs

Thank you

My course wanted BBC when I applied in 1998. It doesn't exist in the same format anymore but looking at similar courses at the same uni they want ABB now. This is University of Manchester. I remember one girl from my sixth form getting AAAA and that she was doing Chem Physics Maths and Further Maths. I came out with ABB and this was a really good set.
Some of the universities with lower offers have very high drop out rates of over 25%. I feel great empathy for those students who were perhaps never university material and would have been much better off going down a different route and not acquiring the debt. At work I have a number of graduates in my team who have degrees from lower ranking universities with 2:2 or a third and just aren't especially capable. I also manage a couple of school/college leavers who came into the Council as apprentices and are progressing and have achieved the same role, completed apprenticeships and now moved up to a low management level and have really promising futures without a load of debt hanging over them. It's a shame there aren't far more organisations offering this sort of development

Go through clearing?

So not sure how Prince Charles got N in a third subject? This article only mentions two A levels achieved
www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/uk-news/how-royal-family-levels-including-18746002

I got 3 Es, then a first class degree and a distinction when I went on to do teacher training.

My Alevels probably would have been much better if I had better teaching during 6 form.