Results Day 2018

[Groovee]

Hi everyone

Thought that as the 7th is fast approaching, it would be worth doing a thread to for the day and the build up.

Dd needs a B in anything to get into Uni and ds is getting his Nat5 results. Will be a tense morning.

Yes. So many things are unfair, my son is very principled and sticks up for the underdog and that's one of the reasons he wants to practise Law.

I wish him well in it Aurea, DS2 wanted to be a judge when he was 2 and a half. He was always protesting at anything he deemed unfair and at one point DH in exasperation, said to him that he just had to do whatever it was as it was "the law". He then demanded to know who made the law and whilst DH contemplated a long explanation about parliament and the Lords and the queen, he just replied "the judges". Soooo he wanted to be a judge.... Which was all fine until years later and he was watching the X-factor. He turned to DH and said, are you seriously trying to tell me that Simon Cowell makes the laws in this country? :o :o

He was very precocious as a young child and could talk in sentences at 13 months!. I have this on dated video so I know it's not just my memory being generous. At some point in his early teens he lost all that confidence and struggled a bit academically, he is still very socially aware and is majorly into politics but has now decided he'd like to be a barman. He is some case.

Post results service (new names as appeals don't exist ) can consist of clerical check ie correct scores matched to correct candidate/all pages marked/all components entered or full remark. Remarks can go up or down so worth thinking about if closer to lower grade than higher. In the local authority where I teach and where my DDs attend school the criteria is 2 grade boundaries away from estimate grade. Estimate grade will be based on Mocks, class tests marked drafts of Folios etc. So if pupil is estimated a A band 2 but is awarded B3 no grounds for remark as this is significantly away from the anticipated performance. Eg my DD3 has been told all year they expected her to get an A band1 and already had enough marks from performance element to have a C6. She was awarded a C5. This meets LA criteria for remark as it is wildly out from what they anticipated and suggests clerical error or unduly harsh marker. She has nothing to lose if mark goes down she still has a C if mark goes up and she is close to boundary she may get a B.

That is my LA and like many other aspects of Scottish education there is no national policy. Private schools request remarks for all who want and bill parents. Some LAs don't demand as significant a gap as mine.

Thank you all.

My son has shown his draft coursework (which he learnt my heart for the actual assessment as he has a good memory) to his teacher (who also marks for SQA) who says she would have given it over 80%, not 56% like he was awarded. If he was awarded 80% on his assignment and his exam mark stayed the same, he would have achieved an A grade.

I don't know what our LEA rules are but the remark doesn't seem to be a problem.

A small risk, but he thinks it's worth taking. We find out at the end of September whether the grade has changed. He's taking AH Mods this year and a total crash RMPS AH so he wants to feel confident moving forward.

Thanks once again. I'll try to remember to update the thread in September.

DS didn't have the 2 grade boundary gap as they'd estimated him low mainly based on the prelim results, the prelim that he didn't study for based on them continually saying that as there was no appeal service anymore that these could not be used to appeal a grade. Technically correct but in practice it was obviously more important than was said when interpreted by a 16 year old. However it was said in the same fashion in the parents meeting too. At the end of the day it is his fault that he didn't study for the prelim but they didn't seem to care that they had given such a low prediction to someone who should have been looking at A band 1 given previous performance in Nat5. Anyway he's left now and is doing what he wants in a place that suits him so just needs to chalk it up to experience.

Fingers crossed Aurea, sounds like he has a really good chance. DS1s was in Maths so I imagine even if he'd been allowed a remark/clerical check it would have been difficult to find that 1 point anyway. We were going on the basis that he is supposed to use ICT as his handwritting is very poor and he didn't for Maths. We thought there was a chance that a written number could have been mistaken for another e.g. 5 and 8 etc.

I think the remark is being allowed as a subject like Modern Studies is very subjective, while I guess Maths mostly has right or wrong answers so is easier to mark accurately.

X

Indeed Aurea :)

Modern Studies is one of DS2s favourite subjects, He is doing Politics H and History H and English AH this year, though I know they were struggling for teachers before the holidays. Unfortunately they also don't offer AH Modern Studies which is a shame.

Seven that was exactly our thinking on extra year working vs paying fees. In the end DD1 thinks she would prefer the flexibility of the longer Scottish course, especially since in her ideal World she will compete successfully for a sandwich year in the US - big fans of Captain Sensible in our house . (she's home and on the mend and fingers crossed nothing more serious than aggravated food poisoning)

DD2 is a November birthday so is considering options for a year out and since she has no idea what she wants to do and is not in the science or arts box I think this may be a good plan.

Ds was half-regretting not having crashed the Advanced Higher in Modern Studies as he enjoyed it so much. But it was probably best that he just did the Higher

Instead he blamed us for not encouraging him to continue Modies after S2 (despite his teacher telling us he was really good at it) - conveniently forgetting that at the time it was all the science subjects (and geography) he was interested in - and was thinking in terms of a Maths/Physics/Astrophysics/Geophysics degree

The only subjects he hadn't had a choice in continuing - both to Nat 5 and to Higher - were Maths and English. To give him his due, he is now grateful for me forcing encouraging him strongly to do English Higher - although he is very nervous about the "test" that they get given and have to pass within the 1st few weeks (sounds like an old fashioned précis: condense 750 words down to 250, but they've been told they will also be assessed on grammar and punctuation). Haggisaggis - has your ds mentioned this? I've told ds he shouldn't worry as they're just trying to assess (especially with many foreign students) who might need extra support.

pretty the advantage of having 2 completely different specimens close together is you quickly realise whatever you advise will always be wrong and whether they follow your advice or not it is always your fault. Then to add insult to injury they misquote you to all their friends and sometimes even their teachers (I have been known to turn up at parents night to have teachers amazed at how reasonable I actually am in person).

My parents went through that really badly with my brother (year below me at school - and the school was very unfair at constantly comparing him to goody two shoes me).

In fact, at one point when they were going through a particularly bad time, after I'd gone away to Uni, I did actually go home to say that they were, after all and IMHO, pretty good parents and that I loved them

The benefit of distance

I just tell my 2 I'll disown them both and spoil DD3 instead - probably storing up all sorts of problems with her but I've got 10 years before we have to deal with that

I'm not sure if it's a parenting success or failure (there are good arguments for both) that my DSs don't think that I am an arsehole :o

We tried to have a debate about "Ban the Burkha" the other day and it quickly fizzled when we appreciated that we more or less had the same view...

It probably helps that DS2s friend was thrown out by his parents (for what seems an absolutely ridiculous reason) before exam time and has been living in homeless accommodation since :(

howabout when mine were younger I told them that DH and I had worked out we could only afford to keep one of them so we were trying to decide which one.....they were fully aware we were joking but that wee voice in the back of their head must have been nipping and saying "but are they?" and behaviour and room tidying improved for a while afterwards... :o

can the school insist on S6 pupils taking 4 subjects?

ds wants to take 2 highers and an advanced higher and school is saying he must take 3 highers and an advanced higher

can they do this? its for everyone, 4 subjects and nothing less

At DSs school they have 5 olumns they are allowed to have one as a stufy column, they can also fill one with electives and therefore the minimum is 3 subjects and an elective. DS1 did 3 AHs and passively stubbornly just didn't join any electives and they got fed up asking him to. They also said (to me) that 3 AHs was quite a lot so they were "comfortable" that he had 2 columns of study.

DS2 just gone into 6th year and is doing 1 AH and 2 Hs and been told that he should be signing up for electives and that all S6s should be signing up to do peer support or coaching. he does have an elective he wants to do but isn't doing peer support or coaching as he doesn't want to. His view is that it will be obvious that he doesn't want to do it so how is that helpful to the poor pupil who he is allocated to help?

I think insisting on 4 when they are doing AH is a bit much tbh.

No idea - but ds' school was happy with him doing 2AHs and 1 crash Higher. Plus he helped out with rugby coaching of the S1s and S2s.

It did mean that technically he wasn't entitled to study leave as he wasn't doing 4 subjects or more - but he just ignored that

It does seem a bit harsh on your ds' school's part. What if someone was wanting to do 3 AHs?

thanks, I agree with what you both said!

just checked, they have 8 columns in total, 5 subject columns, 2 study column and one PSE column

Ds2 was down for 3 AH with loads of free study time.

He's now doing 2 AH and resit 1 H so still only 3 subjects

For Graph Comm which he got C at Higher he's in a class that teaches both H and AH so if he struggles with the AH (which I'm not expecting) he could choose to be out in for the resit of H to bring his mark back up.

For Maths (D) he's been put down in the Highers class for resit for start of term but can have a chat with teacher. Ds2 still thinks he can persuade them to let him do the AH, but it would be safer to go with the resit.

Recommended he speak to Uni of choice to see what advice they give.

In fact 2 of DS1s AHs were timetabled at the same time. He did manage to get a few extra periods of one subject, but effectively he just alternated which class he went to, he had a lot of free periods.

They still get study leave as the whole school gets it even if they aren't sitting any exams!

Our school insists on 4 subjects unless you are doing 2 + AH when you can drop to 3. They are not keen on anyone doing 3AH without sufficient track record. They are trying to keep a full timetable as it keeps DC engaged better and leads to better follow on.

One good thing about DD1 being ill is that she is generally over conscientious and I am encouraging her to look after no1 a bit better. So hopefully she will do a bit more of the citizenship on her own terms rather than out of duty. She also needs a bit of flexibility as one of her subjects is consortium at another school. Thinking the juggling and negotiation ought to stand her in good stead for Uni.

There is a reason that schools look for 4 out of 5 columns to be filled. S6 year groups tend to to be pretty much the same as younger years these days - where would you like us to put them? Many PPI schools were built on projected falling numbers and libraries, bases, S6 common rooms are being absorbed into teaching spaces to cope with growing not diminishing numbers. Whilst I am sure that all our DC would use "enhancement" time to quietly study not to play cards, annoy pupils working outside classrooms or just generate noise and mess. Actually that's untrue (looking at you DD2 with your prom dress, hoodie and D in the Higher you sat) but time on their hands is not good for them and S6 hanging about can have a really negative impact and provide really negative role models.

My DD1 took 2 AHs, 1 Higher and 1 Nat 5 (Hospitality actually really helped her at uni) and S6 was a great experience for her. DD2 sat 1 AH and 2 Highers and sweet talked them into letting her have 2 enhancements - see above

Dd has been in touch with school.
The is year she's doing Nat5 maths resit, Chemistry higher resit, History higher and Advanced higher biology.

She's nervous but at the same time excited to be going back to school on Wednesday, I offered to drive her in but she turned me down with a quite horrified look on her face!

Would anyone like a 6th year support thread if I start one, because I know I would.