I think, particularly in Maths, the current A Level should be brought forward and sat in place of the GCSE for Set 1/Set 2/motivated students; maybe other subjects like the sciences as well. GCSE revises a lot of the stuff you do in KS3 and so people who pay attention know the majority of the GCSE syllabus before Y10 and 11. It's a bit of a waste of time so I believe we should at least replace Higher Tier with AS exams. Maybe we could have an entry level qualification covering current Foundation Tier, a new Standard Tier covering GCSE stuff from a C/B-A*, a Higher Tier covering AS standard so more of the curriculum can be assessed and in doing so encourage understanding over drilling and key focus questions, in addition to an Extended or Advanced Tier covering current A2 stuff. We could then take topics dropped from A Level to slim it down, maybe a few basic university topics and other key core/applied areas of the subject and make it into an A Level- Further Maths would replace Maths and the new Further Maths would be developed like all the other A Levels. Doing A Level Maths as a Year 10 student, I can say the challenge is about right (and there is Further Maths for challenge) unlike the GCSE I may have had to carry on studying for for another 2 years.