Compute Science GCSE mess up

[fairyqueen]

Any computer science teachers out there got any words of wisdom for DD who has spent all term working on her controlled assessment? Just doesn’t seem fair to scrap it at this stage. Not fair to carry on either of course. www.tes.com/news/school-news/breaking-news/ofqual-says-marks-computing-coursework-should-end-after-widespread

selling answers for £5!

Crikey did he have any takers? Really that should be reported to the exam board who would most likely take it very seriously.

Why don't they make a CS practical exam the same way as Art and have an 6-8 hour 1 day practical?

They could be given say 4 scenarios to choose from, and not be allowed onto computers for the first 1.5 hours so they are forced to design.

I guess it would an invigilation nightmare as you would have to stop any conferring but would need toilet and lunch breaks. But it's got to be better than a spread out (un)controlled assessment where everyone can confer between sessions!

I'm with everyone else on this one - I know my daughter has nearly finishes her assessment and will be totally gutted because its her strength within the overall subject and we were hoping for an 8 or 9. I personally think that they should allow teachers to award marks with this part of the exam based on their knowledge of the student rather than totally disregard it- and then provide back up evidence. I'm just hoping news has not filtered through to her as yet so that I can talk to her later....

we've not started it yet (waiting till mocks are over), so at least none of the DC will feel like they've wasted time, if it ends up not counting in the final grade. Really tough on those who picked the subject knowing that the practical aspect was likely to be their strength though.

I wonder if there's any scope to judicially review this. Seems fair enough to change it for current year 10s (though even they have chosen the subject on the basis that the project counts, and might not have done otherwise) but to change it for year 11s is stupid beyond belief. Retrospective changes are usually frowned on by the law.

They should simply accept it this time round and change it for the current year 9s. I'm on the fence with current year 10s though as mentioned above, I think there is an issue there too, they're probably too far into the course to switch to something else.

I find this quite shocking.

If they let the Y11s carry on as they are, either you're accepting that thousands of kids have cheated and this will result in your DC getting a lower grade than they would have, or they have to spend so much time, effort and energy tracking down who cheated that they can't issue the results on time, some cheats will still slip through the net, people who didn't cheat will come under suspicion and possibly be wrongly penalised, and there might not be enough 'acknowledged genuine' exam results to be able to set valid grade boundaries.
Neither is really acceptable.

But there is no fair way surely then noblegiraffe?

The proposed solution is certainly not fair on the current Year 11s who have worked on this task studiously and without accessing any cheat sites at all. Children who may well now be penalised - they've spent hours of work on these tasks - preparing for it, and then actually doing the 20 hours. Time that, had it no longer counted, could have been condensed and the there side focused on more. And to take out a practical component from such a practical subject is incredibly damaging - not just to the children studying for it and who have chosen it for that reason, but also to the subject as a whole.

And part of this is the exam boards own doing. They could have foretold such a problem and but things in place way before now. A much bigger investigations needed. On those websites there will be a lot of information - firstly, is it all of the different tasks on there, for all of the exam boards? If not, which ones? If all, then how many unique access codes were actually made? The number accessed, though seemed high is most likely many repeated visits to start with - that could well, half, third, quarter the number. How many of those unique IDs can be traced? and where too? Then through moderation of the coding component - are the solutions exactly the same? Because with these tasks there are several ways to solve them.

Surely there has to be some comeback on the exam boards on this, fr more so on the students - the great majority of which who will have done this work without cheating.

Hula they did say in the consultation that they will be monitoring sites to ensure that the tasks are still completed and still allocated 20 hours.

The problem with trying to find out who posted or saw what on the internet is that it requires the compliance of the websites in question and there may well be some that can't be accessed by the general public.

Id also like an investigation to what scale this has been in terms of direct copying/cheating.

Because in the lessons there is not any internet access, under the rules. And they have work from completely blank file spaces with only their own notes available when they start.

So, unless these people have been allowed internet access in class whilst working, it isn't a case of straight copy/paste either. They will have had to read and memorise the code required. and then be able to write it as part of their project the next lesson. So, we need to see where these kids are accessing the sites - if they are in school, how is this happening? In the lessons - then this is a centre based issue as well and those centres need disciplining big style.

They need to be doing more though.

And we all know that if these components counted for nothing, although the 20 hours will have to be undertaken, they wouldn't have been spending quite as much prep time beforehand. These children are being penalised full stop.

I now there is no easy solution but, this for one kids, will be a nightmare and will make an already stressful year far worse. And it just isn't right or fair.

Im just so fed up with all the mess ups we have with the exam boards and the Government year on year.

We have SATs papers leaked, exam boards getting papers wrong, the wrong texts and sources referenced in questions, wrong texts taught, GCSE and A level questions leaked, marking mess ups, you name it. Every year there are some kids who are messed about. And it isn't fair. It just shouldn't be happening. We are supposed to be a good country with a robust qualification system - yet year on year mistakes, often preventable ones, are made.

They've done it before, Hula, the speaking and listening assessments that were binned at the start of Y11 in 2013 were also worth 20% of the final grade. They won't prioritise students' hard work over the integrity of the qualification.

You're right, it's shit, and exam boards are paid a fortune for these qualifications.

It is. And its always the poor kids who suffer as a result.
I have no doubt that the marks will be scrapped and the kids hard work will be for nothing, and they will have the marks suffer as a result in many cases. But the Government won't care about that - individuals don't mean anything.

Trouble is - whatever happens now - there will be no true 'fair mark' allocated. The written exams benefit those who are best at the theory side, and losing the practical component puts those who excel more in the coding area at an unfair advantage now.

So, swapping it doesn't work either BUT there is now no solution will ever give a true fair grade. Some may well now do better as a result of the loss of the coding component, some will do worse as a result.

The problem with trying to find out who posted or saw what on the internet is that it requires the compliance of the websites in question and there may well be some that can't be accessed by the general public.

In addition to that, a lot of the examples mentioned in the Consultation came from International students posting the solutions/asking for help online. OFQUAL have admitted the scale is too big to control and therefore have had to go down this route.
They couldn’t organise a piss up in a brewery.
Every CS teacher told them this would happen, at every stage of the new 9-1 but they didn’t want to listen. Interesting to see what decision they make on 8th January.

DD is now aware. Her Cs teacher let them know today - dd finishes hers this week. I was sure it would come better from her very calm teacher than for me - ill and stressing. As ever, dd is far more pragmatic abut it all than I am. So much more relaxed and chilled. She says that at least she really enjoyed doing it, and that theres nothing she can no do to change whatever decision they come up with. She's says its annoying as she was looking at getting very high marks in it which would have helped pull up her final grade, as its the part she does best in. She did then add that if her grade in the summer is lower than what she'd hoped at least now she has a good excuse - hmmmm!

In the distant past, I remember the oral element of my French O-level was graded separately to the paper examined part. I would think this might be a good solution in this case. Pupils would get a grade for the exam that employers would take notice of and a grade for the controlled assessment that they could take pride in if it was honestly achieved and would give some motivation for those who have yet to complete it. They might get a 7-7 for Computing on results day rather than a mere 7.

Equally, the very dishonest might be rumbled by their 4-9 result.

DS did his last week but a few weeks ago school changed from edexcel to AQA due to board problems.

Told DS and he's very happy as he thinks his course work wasn't very good.

Is this the result of the Edexcel computer science issue a few weeks ago? It was found out that information for the project was available online so all schools using Edexcel had to start another project. Sounds as though the second project won't be counting either!

I don't know. Dd isn't doing edexcel I don't think.

One thing to say, any time spent coding is not a waste of time. Ye it is crap if it is not included in the exam but they still have the experience of coding.

Having said that lots of students do copy and paste. If I give them an example to use followed by 'try this yourself' I often include some code that doesn't fdo much - counts to 10 or prints a blank line to screen. If the student's work comes back with this still in it I know it is not their own work.

Maybe something like giving students a program to debug in a shorter length of time, or 5 x 2 hour slots with different tasks would be an option for the future.

Will this affect all exam boards?

Didn't something in English happen like this? I remember DD did something possibly an oral got an amazing mark then they decided not to use those marks; she was gutted

sashh - but they wouldn't be able to cut and paste if not accessing the internet in the lesson, as per the rules. If they are accessing outside of the classroom, they'd need to be remembering it to type it in later. If they are using the internet to fid the answers in class then that is a centre based issue and a big one at that.

appuskidu - it would appear so, yes.

katy mac - yes, though it was more than just the oral part I believe. It was a 20% competent again I believe. They still do the oral component now but again, it doesn't count. But equally they don't spend 20 hours on it either. Shame it doesn't countt really as DD got a distinction in hers, but that doesn't count and it isn't recorded in any way either I don't think. I know when I did mine when GCSEs had just started we got a letter grade for the English lit exam and a number grade for the oral component.

Thanks everyone. The reason I said I think it's unlikely that they will let her withdraw is that the only arguments we have would equally apply to the whole class. I think if it was just her who had an issue it might be different.

I will see how the mock goes in January and maybe speak to the school after that.