The return of the O Level.

[hermionestranger]

Leaked reports suggest that the government is to scrap the GCSE from 2015, 2013 option takers will be the last year to take them.

I'm sorry it's the mail bug they were first on my twitter feed. I 'm on my phone so can't link properly.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2162369/Return-O-Level-Gove-shake-biggest-revolution-education-30-years.html

I agree the present system needs changing and yes I did O levels and think the current GCSE's are a bit of a joke, but for all our rantings, stuck in the middle of all this are children/young adults who will suffer because they will be the last to know what the hell is going on.

Every new government and every new education minister can't help themselves - they have to tinker with education. Whatever Gove does will then be tinkered with by his successor. And so it goes on...

I tried to help my 7 year old the other day with his subtraction homework and I didn't understand how he was working it out?! Even how we subtract has been tinkered with!! Parents have to go on a course now to learn how to subtract 'the new way' so they can help their children with their homework - how bonkers is that!

Changing the exams or just the name of an exam will not improve results. I am a teacher and the only way to improve results is to give teachers more time to improve and stop putting us down all the time. Yes, there are some inadequate teachers out there but the vast majority are good and want to do the best by their students, but the government keeps changing things and doesn't give us the time to plan, implement and embed these changes before the next load. Why is it, every new minister for education wants to make changes just for changes sake, to make his/her mark? Stop interfering and let us get on with our job!

Perhaps Gove is thinking about from the wrong angle?

Why do teachers teach to the test rather than teaching a broader range of skills that would be beneficial? Why do schools no longer work collaboratively to drive up standards? Why do teachers select 'easier' boards' exams? Why do teachers allow countless resits?

I think the answer lies in league tables. Abolish the competition between schools and the exam system becomes more honest and reflective of students' true abilities.

The most highly regarded countries in terms of education do not have league tables. Why does the British government feel that they are necessary?

The argument against just awarding an A* to the top 5% of students is particularly a problem in modern languages. No matter how hard a student works, they are never going to get to the same level as a native speaker.

I have 11 o levels all grade A bar one they are not that hard.

If the school leaving age is to be raised to 18, will anyone really take any notice of what you did two years previously?

Personally, I envisage more and more schools adopting the IB (International Bac) as it is politically independent and 'inflation' free. Admittedly it is aimed at an academic elite and does not suit everyone, but it is better than A' levels

I personally think 16 is the wrong age for exams

The argument against just awarding an A* to the top 5% of students is particularly a problem in modern languages. No matter how hard a student works, they are never going to get to the same level as a native speaker.

No, it will just mean that the native speakers SHOULD get an A (then again a lot of English kids do not get A in English)
and that an A grade from a monolingual child is an excellent result.

The point is that 53% of candidates for an exam getting an A or A* devalues both

and for the kid doing Greek - even if the cohort is only 1000 kids nationally, the standard deviation will be under 2% do the grade bandings will be valid despite minor variations in year groups.
Remember that Latin GCSE is taken by a lot of comp schools (over 30 in DDs school) so that cohort is quite big.

The public schools will NOT want normal distribution as narrowing the number of students who get an A might just let some of those nasty state oiks push them down to B grades.

TalkinPeace2, 53% of triple award science students getting an A or A is not devaluating it. The only people who are advised to take it are those who are going to get a C or above in science. If you look at it that way, only four grades are really given out for biology for example. If 25% of candidates get each grade then around 50% getting A/A is about right. If you at other subjects such as english, maths or core science then the data will be different.

GCSE
No. I'm sorry, but that is a circular race to the bottom argument.
Each subject should be graded on its own merits.
Are language exams given higher amounts of A's because some people are foreign? No. Of course not. Its silly.
"A grade" should not mean "average or above"
and THAT is what Universities and employers are so pissed off about.
"A grade" should mean "top 15% in the test taken" regardless of what that test is.
They do not let all the Vet students pass just because they were bright to get onto the course.
Why should it be the case for lower exams?

Sorry but I agree with GCSE. The standard for an A grade in Chemistry should be the same standard as an A grade in Dual award Science. If we only award the top 15% of students an A grade then the better students will not choose to study individual sciences, they will choose to study Dual Award as they are better than a higher proportion of the others entered for that exam. At all of the schools I have ever taught in it is only the top set who are given the option of studying individual sciences, and they are ALL aiming for A/A. Why would they choose to sit the individual exams and compete against every other top set in the country for A - G, when if they took Dual award instead they would be competing against a much broader ability range for the same grades, therefore standing a much higher chance of getting those coveted A* s?

Talkin do you mean veterinary students? Is that true? It certainly wasn't the case when I was at university (not that I did veterinary science, mind).

Nobody rationed the firsts and the 2:1s and the Desmonds and the Thirds and the Passes - why on earth would they? A high failure rate is generally thought of as a Bad Thing, no?

What I mean is at undergraduate level and beyond, as long as you demonstrate that you have the knowledge and the skills, you get your degree and the classification you deserve (hopefully!). It should be exactly the same at GCSE and A-Level.

Vetinary medicine doesn't have classification in the same way as other degrees. Medicine definitely doesn't. It's pass/fail. Either you're a safe practioner, or you aren't!

But do they ration the number of people who are allowed to pass, Lilka? Do they have a failure quota?

Or do they pass everyone who demonstrates that they're good enough and a safe practitioner?

I agree about the league tables.

Does it matter what they're called?

I did my GCE O levels in Singapore and when I came over here and found the AS level courses here for Maths and Sciences covering most of what I already did for my O levels back then. I'm not sure why this is the case. I know the O levels we do in Singapore are slightly different though still under the Cambridge exam board. I also find that current GCSE syllabus here does not cover as much as the O levels did in my case (granted I graduated at 16 with O levels in Singapore about 18 years ago!) I don't think this is fair to either the locals or the ones taking it abroad.

GCSEstudent makes a very good point about Triple Science and Core and Additional. These are not completely different exams. The majority of the content is the same, as are the assessment objectives. If you went with norm referenced grading, many schools would probably stop entering students for Triple Science. And I don't think that's what MN many parents would want.

I'm finding this very unsettling, and sitting here trying to work out what it will mean for dd, who's currently in Y8 (aged 13) - but I think may take some GCSE's early in Y10. Will they still be doing them when she's in Y11 ?
I just hope it isn't all a muddle for children of her age in the transition type years, and that Uni's and employers will honour all the effort she puts in to whatever exams she does take.

Otherwise would have said it's just the government seeking votes from playing about with education ( it's always playing around with either health or education - often with little or no positive effect and a lot of hassle for those of us delivering services) - and pandering to oldies like me who might think "It was all so much better in my day when we did proper difficult O Levels.

I think there is something in the idea that different exam boards have been able to take part in "competitive dumbing down" though - getting schools to do their exams by making them easier with higher grades given.

Any advice from fellow parents of teenagers about what it will mean for dd ?
(Must read through thread - someone's probably already said !)

Did you all see that David cameron didn't know about these plans, so it is entirely possible that they are all pie in the sky anyway.

I appreciate that the plans may have been made but they haven't made it into official policy so we may be rather premature discussing it all.

I am just fed up with hearing how much more difficult O levels were. I did 10 in the 1970s and got decent grades with very little revision. I think the only book I worked at was Macbeth because I hadn't a clue what the language meant, but by work, I mean read through a set of revision cards.

Fast forward to today, my 2 dds worked their socks off for the grades that they got at GCSE. So my conclusion has to be, that O levels were a doddle.

The plan was "leaked" in a mysterious way. We may never know who did it. Ken Clarke said It was probably someone who disapproved of the changes.
I gather it is at an early stage