Do you think A levels will go ahead as normal next year?

[ITonyah]

Given how much education some (note the use of SOME!) year 12s and possibly going into year 13s have missed?

It is fairly simple to remove the practical elements of gcse and A level sciences as some boards already give the option of an alternative to practical paper instead of a practical. This could easily be brought in quite quickly.

That is supposedly very important until it comes to teens who need face to face learning and they they're just lazy and unmotivated and need to grow up and why do they need a teacher anyway

I know!

Almost certainly not the same posters, but I once.said on another thread that I'd probably have kept my reception age child at home for a year as at that age you can teach them quite happily at home. There was an absolute outcry about how I was sayong teachers did nothing, that I clearly didn't understand the importance of face to face school lessons at 5. But once they get to 15, apparently learning at home off the internet is fine!

@theisispieces - I agree with you, I made a similar comment earlier. It is a very worrying situation

The grade boundaries aren’t to provide fairness for an individual student, they’re to make sure one year’s results can be accurately compared with the next, over the whole cohort.

And if you’re worried about equity of opportunity, you should be worried about it every year. Some children sitting A levels have had hours of tutoring, an upbringing surrounded by rich vocabulary and great experiences, they’re taught in lovely buildings, with lots of contact time, supportive parents and all the equipment they need. Others are taught by non-specialists in schools that can’t attract teachers (I’ve known unqualified teachers teaching A level - and no, they weren’t experts in their fields deciding to dabble in teaching to give something back...), with reduced contact hours because of poor funding, sharing textbooks and in shabby classrooms, trying to work at home with no internet and in a bedroom with two or more siblings. No allowances made for them, though. Not now, not ever. If this is the first time you’ve realised the education system isn’t fair, you’ve not been looking very hard.

I think that's unfair gravity.

I think everybody knows the system has never been fair - why would people pay for education if they did not think it was giving their children something better than they would get in the state system? The point is that the way schools have managed COVID-19 will make the gap even wider than usual.

I think it’s awful that some students are getting zero tuition yet others getting online lessons. This is not a level playing field. The more money someone has the better chances they have for the exams (private schools all doing online lessons and can afford to pay a tutor etc)

Ds will have been out of school for almost 6 months when he starts Y12 in September, that is assuming he has got the grades he needs. Being out of school has made his mind up that once he has done his A levels, that is it, he is looking for a job, he hopes on the railways, hopefully training to be a train driver, he is only doing A levels because he can't start driver training until he is at least 18.

Life isn't fair, private school pupils get a shed load of advantages as do children going to grammars and leafy comprehensive schools surrounded by expensive hours and hours of tuition. The biggest thing that isn't fair through all of this is not private vs state, that's always been there it's now state vs state - why are some state schools stepping up and not others? You are deflecting from the point by looking at private schools.

Braketree it does very much depend not only from school to school how much online tuition children get, but also from form group to another. For example my DS is getting zero hours on online lessons in Chemistry whereas his friend in the same year group, at the same Sixth Form is getting 50% (one of her two Chemistry teachers is doing online).
State schools are letting teachers decide how to teach and are not pushing staff at all to keep a semblance of normality. Private schools on the other hand are offering a lot more as they try to convince parents that they're still teaching the kids.

Private schools only make up around 7% of children at GCSE. Grade boundary adjustments will sort out most of the state school children, the private system will have a minimal/small affect on things overall.

No

I was talking about A levels zombiefan where I believe the percentage is higher

A levels are a bit higher but its still a small minority compared to the numbers in state education.

NotABeliever - I didn't realise that, I was under the impression by reading comments from teachers on these threads that it was the school and SLT who were deciding what should be delivered and the teachers were only following orders. That makes a bit of mockery of all the teachers claiming mumsnetter are teacher bashing all the time then.

Surely it's logical that all schools are ensuring that Year 10 and 12 are keeping up to date, why wouldn't they! I really don't get it but as I've said, it is the schools that are letting the children down if they are not teaching.

I've queried this with the headteacher and she said some teachers were able to do online lessons and some weren't because they had childcare commitments or didn't have the technology. She said the ones that weren't teaching online were still setting work but my DS tells me that some teachers are not marking the work he submits, are not giving him feedback and are not checking if he's understood or not. Some are better than others. Yet in the email to the parents today, the headteacher had the guts to say that she's sent out a survey and many pupils believe they're learning more than before!!
I don't know how teachers can go an ask the government for a payrise after shooting themselves in the foot like this.

Quite annoyed with the school mine is in as they’ve just announced that the first week back in Sept (assuming they do go back) will be a formal exam week. So, August will be a write-off in other words because they’ll feel compelled to be revising. Just when social distancing measures could possibly be lifting too. These exams are intended to be in place if the ones that were supposed to take place this term (for purposes of the predicted grades) but they did still have online exams and still spent the whole of Easter revising for those anyway! I just think I they need a proper break from all this before next year. Hopefully, lots of people will complain.

I hope you all refuse to do that, it’s very unfair on the kids.

zefi
My DS' Sixth Form are s considering what to do about the assessments they were going to have around this time for the purpose of predicted grades. I do hope that they don't say what your school has! It would be so unfair to ask them to study with no support during the summer holidays after 3 months of very little tuition!!

Same here Zefi, and they would have an earlier start making the longest term even longer. DD has worked hard all year, she was expecting to do well in the end of year exams and take the summer off. She is now talking about revising through August.

They'll still have a month off with nothing to do!

If then can award actual A-levels based on teacher assessment, I don’t see whey they can’t give predicted grades in the same way. They are, after all, only predictions!

Lots of families will have holidays booked for August. It’s true that lots of these will have to be cancelled, but we don’t fully know at this stage. Do schools not realise how this kind of thing doesn’t only affect the student, but the whole family?

They just need a mental break. This lockdown is taking its toll and by August, if restrictions are lifting, they deserve to be able to get out and about and have a normal summer. Not another bloody month of revision and screens!

They can get out and about and have a normal summer, if that's possible. It's quite normal to revise in the holidays if you have exams coming up

@zefi that does seem very unfair - why can't they do the exams in the next few weeks? or do they not trust the young adults to do them at home? My DD has exams after half term, they have to have their cameras on etc. The longer they leave the exams the less time there is to make up on gaps/lost work. Are they doing some revision/exam prep them between now and end of term directly with teachers/pupils?