Flawed Education System Causing Unnecessary Stress

I have been thinking a lot recently about the stress caused by not only A Levels, but GCSEs and also exams in general. I believe the education system in the UK is flawed in a few ways. The main flaw is the fact that there are simply too many exams. With GCSEs, then AS Levels and then A Levels students are placed under a huge amount of pressure to work three years in a row. All the exams leads to more homework which places students under even more stress. Surely it's more important to develop social qualities than to sit isolated and alone working for an hour and a half each night? I'm basically wondering if anyone feels like the whole education system is completely screwed up and thinks that teenagers these days are put under too much pressure.

If you're working for an hour and a half each night then what are you doing the rest of the time? I agree that students are under a lot of pressure but that's just getting us ready for uni, which is then getting us ready for the real-world pressure of work. I think more emphasis should be put on good time management, dealing with pressure, and organisation though. I did an average amount of exams (11 subjects at GCSE, 5 subjects at AS, 3 subjects + 1 AS at A2) and I still managed to have friends, socialise fairly often, get enough sleep, play on two sports teams, complete D of E, go to music lessons, and hold down a minimum wage job at various points - I survived.

It is possible, but you need to have self-discipline and hold yourself accountable for things. By the time you're 16 you should be able to motivate yourself and be willing to put the work in for everything - it's never going to be this easy again.

TL;DR - I think it's screwed up, but not because of the OP's reasons - we (or parents) just need to teach time management and coping strategies for dealing with pressure.

And in recent years there has been a significant increase in anxiety and depression among teenagers and I believe this is due to the increased workload. Another thing about homework is at the end of the day the amount set ends up just tiring pupils out therefore resulting in worse performance. A few schools which have experimented with getting rid of homework have experienced very positive results including higher grades.

Sources for this? Also it could be argued that mental health conditions haven't increased, just awareness and therefore numbers of people diagnosed.

That is a plausible possibility, however I personally do not believe that is the case as a few studies have come to this conclusion.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2438421/Number-children-depression-rise-NHS-says-nearly-80-000-UK-suffering-mental-illness.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-19967037

Experts say cyber bullying and family breakdown is to blame for rise

Depression Alliance chief executive Emer O'Neill said: "We're still at the tip of the iceberg of what the figure could be."

She said more people were being affected by job losses and relationship breakdowns in the current economic climate.

However, she said there had been a shift in society's perceptions of depression and doctors had become better at diagnosing it.

I have been thinking a lot recently about the stress caused by not only A Levels, but GCSEs and also exams in general. I believe the education system in the UK is flawed in a few ways. The main flaw is the fact that there are simply too many exams. With GCSEs, then AS Levels and then A Levels students are placed under a huge amount of pressure to work three years in a row. All the exams leads to more homework which places students under even more stress. Surely it's more important to develop social qualities than to sit isolated and alone working for an hour and a half each night? I'm basically wondering if anyone feels like the whole education system is completely screwed up and thinks that teenagers these days are put under too much pressure.

You'd hate to be in the Japanese or Chinese school systems, then.

GCSEs are kind of a joke in that you don't even have to revise in order to pass them all with a B or above.

It's kind of surreal that it's only taken about 40 years for us to progress from a time in which merely passing three A levels was considered an achievement, to the point where ABB is considered only marginally satisfactory.

Edit: I think my Mum got into Leeds with DEE

I think it's pretty rare to be able to pass gcses with all Bs or above without revising or paying attention, especially in content heavy subjects like Biology or exam technique based ones like History or English Lit, I think that's more a testament to your own intelligence. (Or perhaps you got all above Bs because even if you didn't actively go home and revise, you remembered stuff from lessons?)

Also, considering the fact that the government student number cap at universities is removed for students with ABB because those are considered exemplary grades more deserving of uni places I'd have to disagree with you there.

Sorry but I find your comments completely mystifying. I think you get out of something only as much as you are prepared to put in. Maybe I'm lucky but I have not felt constantly pressured or stressed over the last two years. Exams rarely have any surprises, its not as if I walk into my English exam and discover the questions are written in cyrillac and about Russian authors. I chose my AS subjects because I was good at them and enjoyed doing them, likewise then at A2. Its been enjoyable and not really felt like hard work. Have you just picked the wrong subjects, eg ones you don't actually enjoy doing, to make you feel this way?

In one of the first lines of that DM 'source' it says



And from the BBC



So... nothing about school pressure there either.

That's fair enough, maybe it is just me. I definitely put a lot in, maybe it's just my school or something. Nah I was very careful to make sure I only chose subjects I enjoy doing, and I do really enjoy them. Looks like it is just me aha

Yeah sorry, this is the kinda thing I'm talking about, what are your views on this article? http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/3046915/School-scales-back-homework-to-prevent-depression-in-pupils.html