Some mother do ave em

BTec grades pulled on eve of publication

Seeing some amazing tales of GCSE grade changes on Twitter:

Pupils entered for Foundation tier getting grades 6 and up, school who previously had native speakers on language courses but now don’t getting hugely upgraded, schools who entered weaker students in separate sciences for the first time getting grade profiles based on much more able students, etc.

And schools are only seeing the grades that we’re moved up…

Well I see this was another too-good-to-miss opportunity to empty public funds into the cronies’ pockets ..

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/aug/20/firm-linked-to-gove-and-cummings-hired-to-work-with-ofqual-on-a-levels

Wait ‘till it finally breaks who developed the algorithm… and how they are linked to the Vote Leave chancers at no10 & the Cabinet Office…

Maybe Dido Harding can run Ofqual too ?

Well, at our place most kids seem happy/relieved (except the BTEC ones…) and ultimately that’s what matters. I just hope some real reflection and positive change on a national scale come out of this for next year’s cohort and beyond.

I’ll not hold my breath though…

The Btec disaster is, for individual students, the worst of all the education ****, and it’s hitting the kids that need it the least, but inevitably it’s a side note because it’s not Our Kids and the parents of Our Kids mostly think college is for Their Kids.

Yeah lot less drama in my wife’s school and my daughter’s grades (different school) I think are a fair reflection of her abilities, bit up from her mocks but she’s the sort who would have would have taken the hint from her mock results and was putting extra effort in.

BTecs, cluster ****.

bit up from her mocks

Down for all of my sons and it has hit him hard an affected his immediate future.

Anyone thought where all these extra students suddenly being accepted on courses are going to live, or sleep, wirth social distancing in place on teaching areas and student hostels.add in some unios running so short of cash they may well go bust or have to merge with others doing the same courses resulting in job losses , its going to be a very testing time for all for the next year.

My lad is just going into Year 13, and wondering if there will be enough places on courses for his year going into uni in September 2021

Durham Uni are offering to pay students to defer to 2021 entry.

Durham Uni are offering to pay students to defer to 2021 entry.

That was the story that provoked the conversation, though Durham isn’t on his list 🤞

Down for all of my sons and it has hit him hard an affected his immediate future.

Sorry to hear that, wasn’t there supposed to be a triple lock so you basically could take the highest of the CAG grades, mocks and exam board award. Mind you they pulled the criteria for mocks hours after publishing it and haven’t issued the exam board grades for GCSE. It might be worth contacting the school if you haven’t already, just keep it polite, they are having to deal with a lot of abuse and threats at the moment (people threatening legal action, playing the race card, playing the SEN card etc.). It’s not the schools fault this all got messed up so badly.

wasn’t there supposed to be a triple lock so you basically could take the highest of the CAG grades, mocks and exam board award

I think that was watered down and then scrapped when they U-turned.

Students get the highest of the CAG and their calculated grades. Appeals are limited to admin errors or discrimination.

I guess there could be a risk that by ‘manipulating’ certain grades down a school could be selective on who it then allows onto A level courses, in turn increasing likelihood of good grades at A level in 2 years time?

mike, yes you are right, wife’s just confirmed it, I can’t keep up. I know the appeals process is limited, not stopping lots of parents kicking off though.

Slightly astonished they actually found a school willing to let him in…

.@NickGibbUK visited @ThomasEstley Community College in Leicestershire where he saw the new measures that are now in place to make sure students get #BackToSchoolSafely pic.twitter.com/jbAJEQoZpK

— Department for Education (@educationgovuk) August 21, 2020

Taylor says Ofqual's first choice was to hold exams, second was to delay exams, and third choice was to offer 'teacher certificate' – and says it was SOS that took decision without consultation with Ofqual that exams were to be cancelled and grades awarded

— John Dickens (@JohndickensSW) September 2, 2020

Still no BTEC Results here……

Struggling to get full details of the Education Select Committee meeting today – from headlines it seems like the Ofqual witness said “we warned the government that an algorithm wouldn’t be successful but they cancelled became anyway” and the chair of the committee (obviously not supposed to be independent?) has turned round and accused Ofqual of passing the buck and using the algorithm despite warnings?

That about sums up what Halfon said today on the radio. Ofqual shouldn’t have used the approach they said they didn’t want to use, but the government (Halfon’s Party) insisted they should.

Struggling to get full details of the Education Select Committee meeting today

This morning our @CommonsEd questioned @Ofqual about this summer’s exam results.

Read the transcript of the session here: https://t.co/inFEDTKNzI

— Robert Halfon MP -Working Hard for Harlow- (@halfon4harlowMP) September 2, 2020

Thanks Kelvin, will have a proper read later

It doesn’t matter what they do now they can’t make this fair.

My eldest is just starting Y12. What chance full GCSE exams this year? We are working on the assumption it will be Teacher assessed again and treating every piece of work/test with that in mind.

SQA, at the moment, are working as though it will all be back to normal including time heavy assignements. The only thing they’ve done is reduce some of the time in the exams but there is as much content to get done in less time. (in science it is effectively 3 units all examinable and 1 assignment worth 20%).
If there is a back up plan they’re not sharing it.

Schools are making it effectively continuous assessment with regular tests which is diccicult as they need to be quarantined for at least 72hrs before marking.

I got my letter/contract today to do verification of schools so there may well be more rigorous checking of what schools are doing from SQA.

I got my letter/contract today to do verification of schools so there may well be more rigorous checking of what schools are doing from SQA.

No child should be assessed without 100% blind marking.

No child should be assessed without 100% blind marking.

Which is what happens under normal circumstances (with exception of appeals) but we’re not in ordinary times.

Don’t know about others but when I mark tests I have no idea, in the main, who’s test I’m marking. As it’s marked page by page not paper by paper.

Which is what happens under normal circumstances (with exception of appeals) but we’re not in ordinary times.

There is a VERY disturbing narrative being brought in even referring to exams and exam results…
“This morning our @CommonsEd questioned @Ofqual about this summer’s exam results. ”

Best summed up as “we completely ignored Ofqual but they are to blame for us not following their advice”

This is the same government sent infected pensioners to nursing homes but couldn’t schedule some relatively safe exams? Even if they had made 4 sets of exams and had to moderate across them at least the kids would have got the chance.

Now I’m seeing a political (not teachers or Ofqual) leaning towards teacher assessed work.

Exams were easy to have put on. School with say 60 rooms would have been able to socially distance 300 pupils easily. The staff were out anyway and could have invigilated other subjects.

It’s why even when we were told everyone out staff couldn’t believe exams wouldn’t go ahead. With really 2-3 weeks left of teaching in Scottish schools before exam season. Some way of using the answers to assess over all ability would have been possible given papers are marked electronically.

onehundredthidiot quite agree, the decision to cancel exams was knee jerk, senseless and not made with any thought to the future. I think they thought it would be popular and it made them look like they were doing something decisive.

I’d be extremely surprised if exams aren’t run next year after this mess, short of a catastrophic increase in uncontrolled Covid there is no reason not to. Delaying the exams into July is a bit of a non starter as well (no time to mark properly,get university admissions sorted, staff on contracted holiday, kids on holiday) better off holding the exams normal time and accepting they haven’t had the normal study time. Use the normal moderation process that does work to bring the grades back up to normal levels. Works every other year.

<Pedant mode>exam papers are not remarked under normal appeals, the process is reviewed, statistical checks done of the person who marked it etc., marks are added up correctly, a full remark is a different thing and costs more/<pedant mode>

I think they thought it would be popular and it made them look like they were doing something decisive.

Or they didn’t want to look at the costs of extending/shifting the term and exam schedule… never mind funding nationwide mixed or at home learning. They chose their own cheap option, rather than any of the options the exam boards and ofqual suggested. It just happened to be the kind of thinking that chimes with Cummings, at a time when he and Gove were running the country while the PM was missing (well, not working, even though they claimed he was in charge of everything still).

I strongly hope full exams happen next year… but to ensure all pupils get the teaching required between now and whenever they happen is going to require a lot of work beyond just asking teachers to be flexible… a lot more work than running teachers’ assessments though an algorithm your mates dreamt up.

In Scotland exam courses are 160hrs which just isn’t going to happen but that’s not taken into account, at the moment. Any school shutdown will have a massive impact. I’d love the higher ups to share the plan bits that’s dependent on……

To me partial shutdown leaves just exam years in but politicians are knee jerk. Which is frustrating as there’s plenty of time to plan and publish.

Some way of using the answers to assess over all ability would have been possible

Yeah something radical like an exam that gets marked?

School with say 60 rooms would have been able to socially distance 300 pupils easily. The staff were out anyway and could have invigilated other subjects.

Not to mention leisure centres, dedicated test centres… FFS even if they were at different times and had to have different papers that’s a whole lot fairer than just guessing.

There were 101 ways the kids could have had their fair shot… and to be honest it doesn’t surprise me the current English government thought it was all to much work and instead chose the option that removes any and all other options later but I am rather surprised the SNP didn’t find a way…

I’d guess that there was a whole lot going on and too many unknowns. Easier to call it early there are obvious issues with that.