Any fellow Poolies looking forward to/dreading the fact that three letters on a piece of paper will decide our fate ?

i am - i get mine at 9am. Quite pleased that i dont have to wait all morning to get them

Hopefully there won't be any bollox from the media saying these exams must have got easier because more people are getting As. That always enrages me. We've put bloody hard work into this, make no mistake these are hard exams and when we pass them we don't get the credit for it.

here here. totally agree

Every year people work really hard to get the grades they get and then some boffins from the government or from the media take all the joy out the moment by saying they are getting easier

Which school are you from, Eggy ?

Brinkburn college

Rainham Mark Grammar School, here.

Took A-Levels in French, German and English Lit. Predicted BBB.

What about you ?

Biology, Chemistry and Maths
Need AAA to do medicine -but i'm not sure ive got them.

If you have internet access Kentish you can get the results at 00:00.


But i dont know if you have internet access.....

Only for Edexcel that, I took most of my exams with AQA.

Hope you get them Eggy - come on here tomorrow I'll give you my congratulations or commiserations.

I'd say more this.....

Are you kidding me Mutley - so we shouldn't give those people credit for passing them then.

Muttley's right, they are undoubtedly getting easier. Which of course they have to in order to fill the masive increases in number of places at higher education institutes.

See today's Guardian, page 6, "Research by Durham University suggests that most subjects have got two grades easier over the last 20 years - this means an A grade is the new grade C." Sounds about right to me.

Nonetheless, good luck and I hope you get the (inflated) grades that you all need.

I'm sympathetic to the kids doing these exams (can just about remember doing mine!), it can't be nice to hear the media going on about the A level exams getting easier every year. I have no doubt you'll have worked hard for them.

However, I refuse to believe that the results have got better for 26 years in a row, purely through hard work and determination.

Anyway, this morning they said they are going to introduce an A* as the universities need to know who is a clever little boy or girl, why not just make the exams harder, then an A will mean an A.

there's a shop in Murray Street with this painted on:

QWIDZ IN - SHOP HERE AND UR QWIDZ IN!!!

FFS!!!

PS that's the name of the shop - properly signwritten!!!

I used to think that they just gave A's away like confetti, until two years ago. My daughter has just completed her A levels and I was amazed at the amount of work these kids are expected to do. Nowadays almost every ( if not all) subject has a much wider base than it used to have. Modern technology, not least the internet, means that students have a much wider access to a particular subject. The expectations of the exam board reflect this. Most of us had to get on a bike and visit a reference library for our information in order to 'broaden' our knowledge on a subject.
Having watched the effort and time my daughter has put into her studies over the last two years, I have nothing but admiration for her and her friends. She achieved three A's in Maths Economics and Geography, which was her target. She is going to Newcastle University to study law ( another easy subject that has got easier over the years )
If anybody is under the impression that Maths exams have got easier they need to attempt a current paper rather than read a biased ( one way or the other) newspaper.
I have just returned from the school where I spoke to the head of the Maths department. His exact words to me were " It is so rewarding to see such excellent Maths results because, in my opinion, this was one of the toughest papers I have seen". He has been teaching A level Maths for 23 years, but hey what does he know.
Before anyone makes a judgement on these issues have a gander at the work these kids are expected to do and then have a bash at the exams. Yes the top universities are raising the bar. They have to because the kids are raising the bar.
Have a go at a paper................after all they are SOOOO much easier.

You might have had to work hard but they're a piece of piss compared to when I did them.

You even get to re-do coursework til you get the mark you like nowadays for fks sake.

Easy school yours Ripper, that was not allowed at my daughter's school, however you did make her laugh.

Difficult to guage what's going on with A levels. Students do have to put in an enormous amount of work to get results yet, at the same time, unis say they often have to do catch up classes to bring new students up to speed for 1st year degree work.
I think some A levels just cover completely different subject matter from the old exams. The new geography has nothing at all in common with the old.

Just got my AS level results (First half of A level)
I got 2 E's 1C and a U
And they are getting easier?
Dont believe that for a minute.
I got 7 A's at GCSE this time last year yet stil struggled this year.

The intellectual climate has obviously deteriorated since Parmo left!

All I can say is, if Leeds Poolie can pass a degree, exams must be a piece of cake.......
PS

I failed all of my 'O' levels and I don't think it ever stopped me getting that job in the civil service I so crave

It's a while now since I was at school.

They had a piece on BBC this morning about exams, one of the academic types being interviewed admitted that they get multiple goes at coursework and get to pick their best mark for submission to the exam board.

Are you telling me that they're lying?

it stopped you getting that job in Germany, tho


Erm, how's the job hunting? No-one seems to want to employ me at the moment. At least, not above the minimum wage

Everybody knows your as thick as pig shyte

Errrmmmm no it didn't, the fact I can't speak German was the reason, still not to worry, got an equally well paid job not long after in the good ole UK, the only down side is I have to spend 2-3 days per week in Brum

It definitely goes on. It's ridiculous. Instead of being encouraged to move on if you don't so so well at a particular assessment, you're made to re-do and re-do. After a few weeks of this, you might raise you're grade by about 2%
(tho the re-doing doesn't seem to happen in every subject)
That's not education, it's obsession, and a very poor way to treat kids imo

I'm going to Brum in early Sept, with my daughter for a uni open day. Might see you

I think they are different rather than easier. Having said that, my son got his results today and has got into his uni of choice and I can honestly say I rarely saw him studying at all, apart from the two or three days before his exams.

Mutley - The definitive proof that A-Levels are not easy.

I WAS PREDICTED
French B
German B
English Lit B

I WAS AWARDED
French C
German C
English Lit C

You think they are easy Mutley - TRY TAKING THEM !!!!!!

My missus sister got 3 A's and a B. seemingly flew through them, she is a clever sod mind!

lets not taking anything away from anyone doing exams, you can only take the exam thats put infront of you, its not fair to say its easier at all, its not like anyones gunna say ere take this away and get me the 1977 version, much harder that.

Also at college you have the distraction of lasses and drink putting you off your stride.

C. you werent trying hard enough to cheat

d.You are slightly dippy

No fecker seems to think the success rate could be down to students working harder than they used to

But that only proves either:

a. you werent as clever as your teacher thought.

b. you are a lazy bastad.

Surely?[/quote]
C. you werent trying hard enough to cheat

d.You are slightly dippy[/quote]

Thank you Sussex, but you didn't pass that Rochdale examination did you...

A and B I assure you were false, couldn't do any of C and the less said about D the better.

I'm telling you that it doesn't happen everywhere, and my daughter's school is an example. Resits are different, we have always had resits. In fact the guy next door to me told Katy this morning that he resat Maths and Economics AND HE IS OVER EIGHTY. Not new that is it.
You get different opinions from different people. None of them are lying. Each will choose what they want to believe.
As I said earlier.....have a go at a modern paper. If you then think they are easy then fair enough. I have and I don't.

Not entirely Dibbs.There is another option.
Could it also prove that the exams were actually harder than was expected.

Isn't this the same argument as the one, 'in my day, the winters were colder and the summers were hotter'? People will never agree on this subject unless they have direct experience of the work that the young people today have to put in. Gone are the days when you could skive all the way through your Lower Sixth and only put the effort in in Upper Sixth. These young people are tested every few months, each result going towards the final grade. Maybe this is 'easier', but is in no way less easy than having to remember everything for one final exam in Upper Sixth, the work content is definitely in more depth and the range of resources expected to be accessed is wide. As Tick has said our daughter is going on now to study law, are her exams in this going to be easier, just to accomodate her 'easy' A Levels. The regurgitated arguments each year about exams getting easier make my blood boil. I am sure that there are plenty of young people out there who are at this moment desperately contacting universities to find places as their grades were not quite good enough, and more who will miss out all together and are at this moment re-thinking their future, I am sure that they all think that their exams were easy too!

It's all relative though, isn't it?

I think everyone is concentrating on the wrong argument. It is not that exams are getting easier. This has to be looked at in a wider world. Take it to the extreme, a million years ago the wheel hadn't been invented, once it had, did all those people who hadn't thought of it say that the people who came after had it easier? Of course they did, though probably most of it came out as 'ugh'. Two hundred years ago when people were struggling in poverty and had no chance at education at all, did that make them more, or less intelligent? The point is that they did not have a chance to prove it one way or another. These young people today are being given the opportunity to put their brains to more use than ever before, they are being given chances to fulfil their potential, whether or not they take the chances they are given is up to them. There is enough evidence about the increase in gangs, knife use etc to prove that not all people take the chances given to them, surely we should not knock the ones who do? Let them have their day, don't spoil it, please.

Relative to what????

Let me put this to you.
Let's assume my daughter only got three A's because the exams were easy.
That would mean she is going to university to study law WITHOUT the ability to take the course in.
Is that fair?? To deliberately give a person three easy A's and then let them struggle to cope.
Or are we also to assume that the law degree she will be studying for is also easy? Does anybody actually think that law exams have got easier?? If anything they have got harder.( not my opinion, but that of a lawyer ). I certainly wouldn't encourage her to go in out of her depth.
As for achieving three A's, apparently only ten per cent of A level students achieve this, so ninety per cent don't.
Another little stat......to get an A you need 480 points. My daughter got 478 in one subject and was awarded a B. If the standards were slipping I am sure the examiner could have got her another two points which amounts to 0.01 per cent.

Er, relative to loads of things/factors. The rise in the number of higher education places, the rise in the standard of education demanded by employers, the standard of education offered by the private and state sectors etc. I could go on all day because there's so much involved when you look at it in the broadest sense.

The proportion of A grades awarded has increased from 12% in 1990 to 25.3% last year and probably higher this year. Statistics like this make me question what is going on because it's a dramtic increase in the proportion of A grades and no mistake.

Well, anyway, many congratulations to Miss Tickhill and other bunkerites who got the grades.

I agree with the people who're saying that the exams might not, generally, be easier..but I do think some courses aren't as good as the old A-levels in the sense that they don't cover as much stuff. For instance, by the time I was my daughter's age I'd done a vast range of fiction, drama and poetry in English lessons. That's what 'doing English' means, as far as I'm concerned. It's quite common now to spend more than a single term studying ONE novel, with the result that the pupils have nothing like the breadth of knowledge in the subject we had. (And then of course, they're examined on that one novel, and coached to look at specific themes rather than how to develop their own response)
Again, in history, whole eras are just missed out, and specific topics offered at random...the French Revolution, say, or slavery or 'women', and no attempt is made to present a coherent picture of history.
This is one reason why, as I said, universities have to bring students up to speed when they start degrees....they simply haven't covered the required ground and therefore can't move onto the next level straight away. Apparently this is true of maths and sciences as well.

That is correct and you are right to question. However you need to ask all parts of the question. One part that a lot of people leave out is the one about increasing standards, both in teaching and the ability of students. When you see second after second being cut off the Olympic times every four years do you question the clocks or the timekeepers? Or do you accept that every newcomer to the scene wants to do better than the last guy? Cheating has to be taken into account in this area as it does in exams. Also there is more pressure to do well. It's called progress and it is relentless. What we are actually saying here is that the kids of today aren't as academically sound as we were. What a load of bollocks that theory is. They are light years in front of where we were and there are more of them. As our lass pointed out, it has a lot to do with opportunity. In my day only the elite or the well off went to Uni. Let's go back to that eh???