GCSE Results Day 2017

[justmumof1]

Hard to belive that I was here 5 years ago sweating it out for the results of his secondary school offer!

Only a few days now bwfore the GCSE results come out. DS is starting to get nervous....as am I!

Never mind the grades: how much did you have to pay for the extra curricular events for the first term alone?

Feeling skint.

True noble - especially when we don't know if the universities will use GCSE grades in the future now that AS levels are done away with.
For some children a grade up in GCSE may be useful in 2 years time!!

Maisy i noticed this today too. It's happened at A level too. now, I know gcse kids do daft things but not 14 of them and 7 a level kids.

I think Edecxcel are going the only reasonable way about it. Parents are never going to have total confidence in exam marking and tbh, they shouldn't. At the moment some are paying for a better service for their kids with speculative remarks.

So Edexcel is giving schools access to all the marked scripts. Teachers will do the work that would be done by the exam board for free, of checking for obvious errors near boundaries, and only ones where real errors have been caught will be sent back.

I'd feel less confused under the old system. For example, some schools are claiming a 5 is a B others a C. Am I right in understanding next year a 4 won't be a pass so that will make the 5 equivalent to a C? In the future they expect it to go up to 10,11 etc. Do you think they will ever go back to the letter system or stay with the numbers? My sister will have one sitting GCSE'S 2018, 2020 and 2022. I wonder what I'll be moaning about on here by then?

I think it's wrong to suggest that parents shouldn't ask for marking to be reviewed if close to a grade boundary because markingissometimes inaccurate, mistakesaremade and even with a 'review of marking', some people are going to gain an extra mark which will put them over a grade boundary
I accept that and i have already said I liked the ability to put papers in for remarks.

I also think it has gone too far in recent years which is why i can sort of see why the boards have swapped the system.

What I don't get is when we as class teachers and heads of team had the data a matter of hours, parents calling up wanting to discuss the intricacies of UMS, why boundaries are a certain way, they want a remark etc. Or worse, stopping us celebrating with kids to:

• wave the results paper in our faces because they arent happy with an 8 (way to shoot a poor kid down)
• complain that intervention for their child didn't get them a pass and they need a pass (said child did almost 0 work)
• demand a remakr because their child got a 6 and it's not fair when other atudents in set 1 got a 9

(All true from me and my friends)

We do sit and go through results. We do sit and look at borderline cases. But we aren't actually at work on results day. We go in to see the students but we are actually on holiday and will do all the data processing when we are back at work. I don't think speculating is always really helpful.

AlexanderHamilton -
Re attainment 8 scores - I was looking at this and they would appear to have changed this year. A* is now 8.5 points not 8. A is still 7 points. B has gone down from 6 to 5.5.
Very odd.

For example, some schools are claiming a 5 is a B others a C. Am I right in understanding next year a 4 won't be a pass so that will make the 5 equivalent to a C?
They aren't true equivalents.

A 4 is a standard pass
A 5 is a good pass

Speaking as a teacher, I found the easiest way to get my head around it is to stop thinking about how they match across.

Grade 4 - standard pass. It's sort of like an old C, probably achieved by the old C/D borderline students. Will get you into post16 vocational options and workplace training. Can study A levels but probably not advisable.

Grade 5 - good pass. Really where most students should be aiming as it gives you the best shot at almost a level 3 courses. Probably the benchmark for studying a level courses. Most likely what top unis will want as a minimum.

Grade 6 - Secure good grade. Excellent preparation for a level. Lots of middle set students will probably end up here.

Grade 7 - Sort of the old A. Specs are harder but this is where your higher sets are working towards.

Grade 8 - probably top set in great schools. If it helps, it's loosely an A*. It's a bloody good grade to get.

Grade 9 - the best of the best each year. Grade 9 students are exceptional, not just in their school but within a national cohort (which is why as previous posters have said it's stupid to be issuing them in school). Crucially, a child being very bright does not guarantee them a 9, nor would it be reasonable to expect that of them because it is norm referenced

Maisy I think you suffer from very rude parents! I don't think I saw any last time I was in. Obviously not being a HOD I wouldn't be fielding those calls but I think if a parent was demanding a remark I'd be saying 'it's your money, fill your boots' unless it was a particularly stupid case where they were risking a grade.

AQA have decided not to give marks for some reason

that is very interesting, they always have done in the past.

Apparently some school leaders misunderstood Ms Greening's March announcement and thought schools would be judged on 9-4 too and are not very happy to find that 9-5 will be the headline!

All the local schools around here who announced their results to the paper put their 9-4 figure. There'll be raised eyebrows in January when the league tables come out!

Just spoken to DD who is at work. She hasn't heard from school re her AQA mark and was told by Head that it will take 2 weeks. How come other schools are just accessing them straight away?

Have the school misunderstood, MsHarry that you just want the raw mark and aren't asking for a remark? Does the head not know how to access the results online and is waiting for someone more knowledgeable to turn up when school starts back?

School ordered a remark for AQA English Language today. He's apparently 1 mark away from a 5 which having read below would be brilliant news for him.

Well, I wasn't allowed in to the school building as it was later in the day so waited for DD in reception. She went to see the person dealing with results queries and the head came along and asked about her results etc. DD basically said she didn't want to appear ungrateful as she knew her results were good but could she see how close she was as another student who was predicted much lower etc got a 9. HT agreed, said she wasn't being silly, took her candidate number etc. She said if it is close they would ask for review/remark and pay.

noblegiraffe
One of those was from my school.
The others were from friends at their schools.

We let parents in for ours other than at the first crush to line up when we openand it's lovely. It's so nice having worked with them for 2 years to thank them for their support (and they thank us which is always appreciated) and celebrate with their children.

How come other schools are just accessing them straight away?
A few options:

1. Somebody has been in and chosen to do that during their holidays (which they don't have to because we aren't paid for it - only pointing this out for comparisons between schools/ staff. Almost my entire team was in today. Many staff were away.)
2. The school has admin staff on year round contracts so they are in doing some of that
3. If 1 or 2, they were lucky enough to get onto eAQA before it crashed and nobody could get on.

All the local schools around here who announced their results to the paper put their 9-4 figure
Because 9-4 is the pass rate that facilitates students getting onto their level 3 options.

The cynic in me says they only brought in 'grade 4 standard pass' because they knew 9-5 on tougher exams would mean:

1. Their reforms looking bad
2. more students needing to resit at FE and they don't want to fund it because they're busy slashing school budgets.

I thought the new gcses weren't doing remarks? To stop private schools playing the system? When dd was at private school they got every bloody paper remarked despite dd being close to the bottom boundary sometimes! It was so stressful!

Showandtell
They aren't.

The way private schools game the system now is that they are allowed to do iGCSE English where they have coursework and are open book so students are allowed the texts with them in the exam.

If a state school did that course then they'd get 0% pass rate because the government decided that it wasn't rigourous enough to count in the state league tables.

So now you have kids coming out of private schools getting too grades on an infinitely easier course. Not the children's fault but it does give decidedly average privately educated kids the benefit of looking more intelligent on paper than their state counterparts.

*getting higher grades

DD got a mixed bag of results but has secured a place at college on the course she wanted to do with a resit required in Maths. Would love to know why the school decided at the very last minute to switch her very low ability set of just 6 pupils from Foundation Maths to Higher. She didn't know half of the stuff on the paper as they hadn't even studied it. What were they thinking? All got U. Leaving that one though because it is time to move on and look forward to a fresh new start at college and the chance to take Maths again and I think she will do much better there. We are all very proud of her and delighted she has passed English which was a massive achievement considering she can barely string a sentence together sometimes.

But here's the thing - she got a D in her Art. Her lack in ability in the academics is more than made up for in her talent in Art. In the general scheme of things it isn't going to make any difference to her getting a place on her chosen college course so I'm mindfull of doing nothing - but she is insisting that her folder was amazing and that her exam piece was nothing short of a masterpiece and that a mistake has been made.

After hours of mindbogglingly (is that a word?) boring searching Edexel for Raw Marks ,UMS Conversion Charts and Grade Boundaries I finally managed to work out that she is 3 marks short of a C. Art is by far her best subject she expected to get an A or A* so even if it were marked up to a C she would still be gutted. She is not the only one in her class - they have all been awarded much lower grades than they were expecting and so I am beginning to think a mistake has been made somewhere.

Thing is - Edexel charge £212 to have it reviewed There is no way DH will agree to pay that. Here's me worrying about Maths and English - Art was the last subject i thought we would have a problem with.

I bloody hate GCSE's. Oh! well I'd better get an email sent off to school and ask nicely if they will pay because we definitely can't. And then I'm hitting the sorry in advance for any typos and spelling mistakes - my glasses are broken and the piece of sellotape that is holding them together is making everything very cloudy

Well done to all our DC's and a huge thank you to all the teachers - including my own DD who is currently on a beach somewhere trying to recover before it all starts again in September.

Obviously don't know where you are Angelina but there was a problem with art at my DS's school too , I gather.

I think that the £212 is because its all CA and they will claim want too remark every pupil's CA.

It also means that all the pupil's have to agree to the remarking.

If the appeal is upheld you don't pay if it isn't you do

By the way, on the subject of remarks not existing any more, one of my A level students just got her D 'reviewed' up to a C. That's a remark by anyone's definition!

Remarks were only supposed to happen if the policies were not being followed, then remarks are allowed.

But it seems that it varies as to what actually happens.