A Levels are Meaningless. Can you honestly Disagree?

Patrick7777

Do you know Ally Rowell? She is a good friend of mine who goes there.

Yep, she was in my house, we won house netball together.

(Before everyone thinks that's really weird, house netball is like a fun one off tournament every year that guys and girls do)

Reply 203

Ella_belle

Thought so.

It was either that or St Pauls Girls, and I was pretty sure you were a boy :smile:

.

That's true. St Paul's Girls, incidentally, is where I had my mock interview for PPE.. interesting, but nowhere near challenging enough to mimic the real thing.

Reply 204

Profesh

20

Stephen Hawking would, in his heyday, have attained 100% (and, therefore, an 'A' grade) in any remotely numerical test of aptitude you could give him, without preparation of any kind. If he were considered to be the only "true 'A' student" (to use an incredibly fatuous term), and everybody else's academic stature were demarcated accordingly (relative to his perceived genius), I daresay that the University of Oxford would have been a very lonely place.

A-Levels were never conceived with prodigies in mind. If what you desire is qualification (or, more accurately, quantification) for the sake of itself, join M.E.N.S.A.

Reply 205

Profesh

Stephen Hawking would, in his heyday, have attained 100% (and, therefore, an 'A' grade) in any remotely numerical test of aptitude you could give him, without preparation of any kind. If he were considered to be the only "true 'A' student" (to use an incredibly fatuous term), and everybody else's academic stature were demarcated accordingly (relative to his perceived genius), I daresay that the University of Oxford would have been a very lonely place.

A-Levels were never conceived with prodigies in mind. If what you desire is qualification (or, more accurately, quantification) for the sake of itself, join M.E.N.S.A.

Hardly. You speak as if he is the most brilliant, and ONLY mathematical genius, since Euclid.

Reply 206

Profesh

20

Platocrates

Hardly. You speak as if he is the most brilliant, and ONLY mathematical genius, since Euclid.

With respect to A-Level, I doubt he would need to rival Ramanujan to warrant full UMS. (Then again, the exams of thirty years ago are reputed to have been 'harder'.)

Reply 207

Profesh

With respect to A-Level, I doubt he would need to rival Ramanujan to warrant full UMS. (Then again, the exams of thirty years ago are reputed to have been 'harder'.)

Gosh, you cannot help yourself with 'harder' can you, is it one of your cravings?

For those who had forgotten:

Har·der
n. (här"dẽr)

(Zoöl.) A South African mullet, salted for food.

:biggrin:

I jest...

Reply 208

kellywood_5

17

Just wanted to say that I agree completely with kizer :smile:

Introduce an A* grade at 540/600, make AS and A2 separate qualifications with a separate grade for each, release UMS marks as well as grades to all universities, abolish resits and make AEAs more common. Easy ways to improve the system without drastically changing anything.

Reply 209

thanks for the support!

Reply 210

kellywood_5

Just wanted to say that I agree completely with kizer :smile:

Introduce an A* grade at 540/600, make AS and A2 separate qualifications with a separate grade for each, release UMS marks as well as grades to all universities, abolish resits and make AEAs more common. Easy ways to improve the system without drastically changing anything.

Amendment: Abolish copious resits, allow one, also one for each year i.e. no as resits in A2.

Why have A* if you're going to release UMS marks? That makes no sense. Also, why would you need A* if you're going to make AEAs more common?

Reply 211

Platocrates

Amendment: Abolish copious resits, allow one, also one for each year i.e. no as resits in A2.

Why have A* if you're going to release UMS marks? That makes no sense. Also, why would you need A* if you're going to make AEAs more common?

A* is a different level of qualification - it's just neater than having to write out loads of numbers. At GCSE there are A*s and they still release information about english and maths module marks.

AEAs are designed to stretch the top 10% of applicants. Currently 23% of grades are As. That means AEAs would differentiate between the A* group.

That means that some people will have results that look like this:

English: A*A* (AS result, A2 result): distinction (at AEA)

History: A*A*: distinction

Maths: A*A*: distinction

Which right now looks exactly the same to unis as people with results like this:

English: AC: pass

History: BA: fail

Maths: AA: pass

See how different they are? But right now, the distinctions the first candidate has aren't that important to admissions tutors because the exams aren't universal enough, and both candidates would have AAA at A Level.

Remember, none of this requires any kind of wholesale change to the system, just presenting the information in a different way.

Reply 212

imageofreality

Why make the two separate? if A-levels are getting easier, then why not go back to how they were, all the examinations in the second year? or weight the years so that the second year, if worth more of the whole than the first due to it being harder.

And i agree if you do introduce UMS marks (like they are doing next year? i heard rumours about the universities hearing them after your As levels...) there is no need for an A* or A++++ grade!

This would also make it fairer at the lower end, for what is the point in differentiating between a handful of marks (20-30) at the top end if you dont do it at the lower end, personally if someone with 20 more marks than an A got rewarded with an A+ but i was 30 marks over a C yet i got nothing to show for it i would be slightly miffed.

If you introduce AEAs commonly then yes A-levels would become meaningless, however dont you think the knockon effect would be that the AEAs would become easier to become more acessible to everyone?

Reply 213

^^

Firstly, the point of the proposal I have made is to get the most information about candidates possible without changing the infrastructure of the system, so I haven't considered going back to all the exams in A2 year. Having said that, I think there are three good reasons not to go back to that:

1) having public exams taken just before applying to uni gives the universities a lot more to go on about a candidate's suitability about a particular course. I am against making everyone apply post a-level.

2) Making people do loads of exams at one time seems unnecessarily tough on teenagers. People doing 4 A Levels will have about 20 exams to do in a very short amount of time. This means people will do worse for no good reason, IMO.

3) The whole point of the AS system was so people could do 4 or 5 ASs, then drop ones they didn't like so much/found harder. It is right people who drop a subject after a year (most) should be recognised for their achievements in that subject.

I don't really understand the opposition to an A* grade - it is just a clearer way of showing a new benchmark of achievement. By your logic, why have grades at all? Why not have loads of numbers? Because they are cumbersome, so having a grade is neater, and gives people something concrete to aim for. Besides, it would make it easier for unis to give offers based on grades at A* level, if they so chose.

I don't want AEAs to be accessible to everyone, the whole point is they are aimed at the best 10% of students, to differentiate those at the very top. I would suggest everyone who gets an A* at AS should be put in for them automatically, and those with As can do them if they choose. No need to make them easier.

Reply 214

To be honest, I think a lot of this debate is steeped in snobbery.

I am guilty of it myself to an extent, in all honesty though, I don't care if exams are getting easier. People not up to intellectual standards will be found out sooner or later.

Reply 215

But the point is to make it fairer to get into the top unis. At present, with so many AAA students, it's a lottery for a lot of course at a lot of unis. If we can make it much clearer who is the best and who isn't, what's the problem? I don't see what snobbery has to do with it.

Reply 216

kizer

But the point is to make it fairer to get into the top unis. At present, with so many AAA students, it's a lottery for a lot of course at a lot of unis. If we can make it much clearer who is the best and who isn't, what's the problem? I don't see what snobbery has to do with it.

Are there so many AAA students though? Or is it the perception from this site?

Reply 217

Well, 3000 people roughly get accepted to Cambridge every year, and 5000 get rejected, and go on to get 3As or better. So, yes.

EDIT: 9.5% of A level students get AAA or better. Which means there is no differentiation among the top 10% of candidates, where there needs to be for the top unis.

Reply 218

kizer

Well, 3000 people roughly get accepted to Cambridge every year, and 5000 get rejected, and go on to get 3As or better. So, yes.

EDIT: 9.5% of A level students get AAA or better. Which means there is no differentiation among the top 10% of candidates, where there needs to be for the top unis.

Out of how many students exactly?

And what are the stats from say, 1994?

Reply 219