The DfE needs to stop the farce of compulsory Maths and English GCSE resits

[noblegiraffe]

Another year, another 124,560 students failing their GCSE maths resit and 99672 students failing their GCSE English resit.

Colleges have been saying for years that this government policy is a failure, that students are entered into cycle of resits and failures that does nothing to boost their confidence or enhance their qualifications.

If you get a 3 in maths or English GCSE you have to resit GCSE. If you get a 2 or below, you can take other qualifications like functional maths instead.

The government argues that GCSE is the key to opening doors and as many students as possible should be resitting to get that opportunity. But wouldn’t a qualification that they are actually likely to pass be better?

The resit pass rate for English dropped from 35.5% to 33.1% this year and for maths dropped from 37% to 22.7%. This is not an improving picture!

www.tes.com/news/gcse-results-english-and-maths-pass-rates-drops

I have put many many hours each week helping ds but with suspected dyslexia and dysgraphia it has been an uphill struggle.

Ds got his marks for English and Maths. Passed Maths with 70% but failed English with 29%. Although we think 29% is brilliant given he was regularly getting 4-9% on exams beforehand.

The way it is set up it if you fail English and or Maths you are presumed not to be able to progress further when as history shows people before were getting degrees and professional, vocational and trade qualifications and getting on in life.

As per my previous post

I have one relative who was illiterate. He ran his own business, he qualified in college as a plasterer but could turn his hand to most things. As for paper work. His wife used to get receipts off him and write out the invoices and quotes.

Before he was married a mate he bunged a couple of quid to would do it for him.

Nowadays college would not be able to teach him a plastering course as he hadnt passed English or Maths.

Frustrated he would have probably ended up either in prison or on benefits for life with no way out.

GCSE day same every student got 7 or 8's with odd 9's. Where are the great kids who get 1,2,3 or 4's or E,D or C at A level bloody no where. They are invisible, no one gives a shit.

But where are the kids who are crap at art, sports, music, etc? Everyone picks on academic success to complain about those who havn't reached top grades being unfair, but we carry on applauding our kids who are top at dance, music, sports, etc which is surely unfair on the kids who've tried but not done well at those pursuits?

...the difference between being able to communicate in writing at speed and being able to read, write, spell, and communicate with thinking time. Many autistic children in particular, but also dyslexic children and those with executive functioning difficulties, can do the second but not the first. The GCSE in English language requires the first. Life does not. Yes, I am completely with you!

The downside is 35% fail

The 35th percentile on IQ is 94, you can be perfectly normal intelligence and not do well at GCSE

The combination above is the problem. I am a veteran of SEN for my DC, believe me I know very well the issues.

If the main post 16 qualification is designed to fail 35%, those that did not get it will always be considered a faillure. If it is designed to fail a good proportion of those with normal intelligence, it is by definition designed to label them as second class, the losers. Nice euphemisms will not help.

If the design is to segregate into those that got GCSE and not, than giving Functional skills to those that got not just puts a euphemistic label on them. Society and employers will still consider them failures that are not 'suited' to educational pursuits.

When children with SEN, due to their disabilities, as oldbirdy and others describes rather well, fall into this loosing category it becomes discrimination by design.

The hole point of equality id to get the qualifications of the same value, not a second class 'badge'.

It is the design to fail 30% of children in perfectly normal range, where many children with SEN fall due to their needs that needs reviewing, not the introduction of second class qualifications, which already exist anyway.

The GCSE for all should be redesigned, and all children without learning disability (IQ

It’s not like sporting or musical excellence with concerts or competitions because with GCSEs, the whole cohort is competing on the same day.

It’s more like a marathon. We congratulate the winners, but we also congratulate everyone who made it over the finish line. People cheer the ones who do it weighed down by a heavy suit and acknowledge that achievement, don’t just turn away because the suit person wasn’t very fast.

Yes, they should resit. A basic level of maths and English is essential for everyone.
GCSE English Language and Maths aren't basic levels of literacy and numeracy.

It's sad that that the teaching profession thinks of nothing but leaving behind on the scrapheap perfectly capable children who were failed by the education system since primary and be unaccountable for this.
Not sure how you get to this
Most teachers on here are in favour of having a course for functional literacy and numeracy for those who need it rather than making them study a GCSE which is increasingly devolved from real life.

GCSE English Language is the worst of both worlds in my opinion. It doesn't have the same amount of interesting content as A Level, but isn't a functional literacy qualification either. It's a bizarre 'skills based paper where a student's grade reflects their ability to write about unseen 19th century non fiction and churn out a newspaper article in 45 minutes.

But it would seem cake is going to continue to show their own ignorance and lack of understanding. I'm sure in time any challenge to their view will be presented as teachers thinking they are gods and they're all mean and stick up for each other.

I believe in A level a E is still a pass, so why is a G-D or a 1-3 classed as a fail in Gcse.

It's a pass at Level 1, a C+/4 is a level 2 pass.

5 G or 1 grades at GCSE will allow you onto a level 2 course at college

Why can't there be a GCSE in functional every day maths?

I've always said there should be an arithmetic qualification. I think if there was then some children who were borderline getting a good maths pass might be entered for arithmetic rather than maths and it does close doors to further science study.

I agree with the principle of bringing everyone possible to a better standard of English and maths.

1. Not everyone will have that possibility
2. They need teaching from the basics to find where the gaps are
3. It shouldn't be a sprint
4. Needs to focus on day to day life applicable stuff!

Noble, education is not a marathon, which is a totally optional extraordinary sporting competition. It is a compulsory upbringing and preparation of children for life, giving them qualification certificates, which give them a pass or a stop for opportunity for further higher education and employment.

Failing 30% by design because of their SEN and disabilities is not right.

Grades 1-3 are passes.
The government arsed up the new GCSEs when they decided to label some of the passes, totally unnecessarily. Think it was Nicky Morgan who did it.

But you are right Noble that the system fails those children over time, since Reception. When parental social advantage is boosted by setting year 1 children into 'ability' tables and leaving those with disadvantages and undiagnosed SEN further behind since year 1.

The system delays SEN diagnosis and provisions further down the line, when they explode at the end of primary. But by that time the child has anxiety, low confidence, behavioural problems and a backlog of gaps. Children on autism spectrum and with dyslexia are disproportionately affected by this.

I think my preference would be for all students to continue studying maths up to age 18, then there wouldn’t be this cliff edge of ‘you didn’t do well enough to give it up’.
The Smith report said that we don’t have enough maths teachers for this though.

Grades 1-3 are not passes. This is hypocrisy. If the employers, colleges and universities demand a 4, then 1-3 is a certificate of failure. Renaming it functional skills is a further hypocrisy.

A true pass should have equal value in all circumstances for all children. Not segregated into first and second class.

I think my preference would be for all students to continue studying maths up to age 18, then there wouldn’t be this cliff edge of ‘you didn’t do well enough to give it up’.
That would work, but of course it needs to be be in English as well and teachers should be trained.

Grades G-D were also passes - Level 1 passes and they allowed access onto lower level college courses.

If everyone passes a course and all those passes have equal value regardless of performance then what’s the point of it?

cakes
Of course level 1-3 are passes, they get a certificate and it's not a U.
This isn't enough to progress to some FE and HE courses, but it isn't a fail.
Where would you draw the line? some dc will gain functional skills certs which is fine and will get them a job and Level 2/ 3 college courses.

My students from the lower levels would never have been able to gain places on A level courses, or even the access courses for academic subjects as they were just not bright enough at these subjects, but functional skills opened up doors at a lower level and employment.
A two or even three tier education does work if we don't go around telling kids they've failed.
Functional skills enabled me to teach, I'd already gained an Hons Degree

and PgCE with 180 points at M.ed level. I couldn't pass a Maths GCSE if my life depended on it.

See, I'm at it now, it's bloody conditioning again.
I should say the level 4 we are told is a pass.

if the main post 16 qualification is designed to fail 35%, those that did not get it will always be considered a faillure. If it is designed to fail a good proportion of those with normal intelligence, it is by definition designed to label them as second class, the losers. Nice euphemisms will not help

But as I have pointed out in days gone by not having maths/English was not a barrier to getting qualified in professional careers.

Some of the most intelligent people I know don’t have English or Maths O Level but have professional qualifications (which they would have been barred from taking today)

It still isn't a barrier, you can go onto FE with nothing, yet we still call people "F"
You can still take professional qualifications with nothing, well you could about 10 years ago when I took mine.

But as I have pointed out in days gone

Those days are gone. It was based on the class society where those 35% were supposed to be manual labour. Universities were for the rich and manual jobs were plentiful and reasonably paid.
It was also the time where people with disabilities and SEN were outcasts in asilums.

Now we live surrounded by technology, overwhelming amount of information. Robots are supposed to be doing repetitive manual tasks and poor people in developing world can do those jobs with much lower wages. The GCSE graduates are supposed to sort through the flow of information, make critical judgements, make right decisions at their level. They need to be adaptable, trainable so they could be gainfully employed in 30 years where AI will run most menial jobs.

Where would you draw the line?

At the 80 or 70 ish IQ. Qualifications at 16 should not be segregating into second class citizens. The A levels could be more selective and there could be many multistep alternative routes.

Why this obsession of drawing a line? Why at 35% where IQ is in average range? This is ideology that discriminates by design against smart children with SEN who have spiky profile and specific needs that were unmet.

Children with SEN with good abilities and potential for FE and HE should not be failed by this system. There should be a floor of 4

Are you suggesting that everyone should just be handed a 4 regardless of ability in order that they can get onto courses that they can’t access due to not having the required skills?

if the employers, colleges and universities demand a 4, then 1-3 is a certificate of failure. Renaming it functional skills is a further hypocrisy
Sigh...
But it wouldn't be renaming grades 1-3 functional skills.
It would be a separate qualification with different content.

So functional skills English used to be comprehension, literacy, SPaG, transactional writing etc. English for life.

GCSE English Language involved close language analysis of 19th century diary extracts under times conditions.

For a borderline child which is better for them:
A) A strong pass in functional skills that means they are able to access next steps?
B) A grade 3 in English Language where they can answer a basic formula for a 19th c reading question but not in any depth. They don't have really good functional literacy for life?

I'm totally lost here, it doesn't matter whether we call the lower levels functional skills or a GCSE pass.
What does matter imo is being honest with kids about their future educational and employment prospects.
levels 1-3 in Maths means that you aren't exactly going to be a top mathematician or anything else that requires a high level of Maths ability. You won't go on to study A level, or further Maths.

It doesn't mean you are a "f" and have no prospects at all.
We need to be telling our kids this, celebrate what they do achieve and support them in what they are good at.

Functional Skills are an acceptable route into many FE courses, there really isn't a problem.

I just had an interesting chat with my dd going into y10 and not blessed with Maths ability.
We are packing for return to school and in go the CGP books for Maths and Science, with a huge sigh.
She feels like she has failed before she starts and she has 2 years of this. No matter what I say she's so down about it and knows she will make a level 4 if she works through the night sometimes.
no child should be under this pressure and again "conditioned" into feeling like this.
As you are aware this attitude doesn't come from home, but it's surprising what they pick up from school and friends.
I tell her to put in extra effort in the things she is average/ slightly above average in and try her best in other subjects. to me there is no use in using time and effort to try to get better at something you just can't do.
I know I'm probably wrong though, but I'd rather be wrong than have her life ruined for 2 years.

RomanyRoots
The problem is that schools used to be able to offer level 2 functional skills to students to help them progress onto appropriate level 3 courses at FE.
Then the government decided they would no longer count them in league tables so any child who got a good grade on functional skills but didn't have a GCSE English would be marked as a 0 for schools (which has lots of implications).

Now what happens is that all students have to sit GCSE English Language, the government removed tiers so every child sits the same paper and then if a child doesn't get their grade in GCSE they have to resit whilst doing their level 3 course or the FE college will only take them to do a level 2 course (again whilst they sit the same GCSE course).

Speaking to friends who teach resit English at FE it sounds like a nightmare, there's no support like in schools, they get a cohort for 1 afternoon a week and most of the students see little point in being there. The college's have to pay back funds if the students don't get their grade too so the teaching happens ans costs but some colleges are ending up with hefty bills to repay the government.

All this because someone in Whitehall decided all students should sit the same paper analysing unseen non fiction from a few centuries ago.