Exam remarks

Bit of a spat between OFQUAL who blame the rise in remarking as a tactical device from schools and the Private Heads association which rejects this and states the issue is the poor quality of marking standards.

The figures are startling. The number of A level and GCSE remarks have more than doubled in the past five years, whilst the percentage of grades changed has held steady (at around 19% of challenges).

Beaumont School believes both sides of this debate are correct. Schools are getting better at advising students as to how best to approach a decision to remarks. However if the marking standards were better there would not be the huge number (77,400 in 2014) of grade changes. Certainly, in the world outside education, a near 20% fault rate in its product would soon render a business extinct.

There is, of course, an equity issue here as well. The cost of remarks might be prohibitive for some students on low household income, so a further divide in education outcome based on financial status may well have opened up, and be growing each year.

Choice of A levels advice from universities

The Russell Group of universities offer some additional guidance about the current status of AS levels and their view of Core Maths in their FAQ section at the bottom of this link:

http://russellgroup.ac.uk/for-students/school-and-college-in-the-uk/for-teachers-and-career-advisers/

Worth keeping up with, though, still, every university, including the Russell Group ones, develops independent policies that suit themselves.

Valuable experience

This is the time of year when an increasingly broad range of enrichment opportunities, mainly for Year 12s, get promoted. Already we have seen local legal work experience, science lab work from GSK and various lecture series programmes to sign up to. Now we have the Balliol College Floreat Humanities extension opportunity opening up for its second year. By early January the university taster course season start sin earnest with the London University Taster Programme.

Never has there been more competition for university and higher apprenticeship places, but never also has there been so much support for the pro-active and focused students.