The Student Room Group

Do we put too much pressure on young people with exams?

Around a week ago a video went viral of a UK YouTuber crying after struggling with one of her exams: https://metro.co.uk/video/students-cry-exam-pressure-1705644/

This sparked a lot of debate in the media about whether young people are examined too much and how it's negatively affecting their mental health.

Or is it just the fact that young people nowadays can't handle pressure and wilt at the first time of trying?

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I think people nowadays (talking very generically) do lack resilience, there has always been exams and everyone has to deal with stress in life. but it can have negative effects on mental health, some people put too much pressure on themselves and literally just revise 24/7 and don't do anything/ much they enjoy anymore
I think the problem is mainly due to our poor time management and partly peer pressure. I don’t see why people have set such high targets because it just leads to disappointment. Instead just see every failure as part and parcel of life
They're giving out so many unconditional offers nowadays so I'd say no students aren't under a lot of pressure for exams. My school is known as an average at best school and we have about 12 people with unconditionals.
Original post by Cubone-r
Around a week ago a video went viral of a UK YouTuber crying after struggling with one of her exams: https://metro.co.uk/video/students-cry-exam-pressure-1705644/

This sparked a lot of debate in the media about whether young people are examined too much and how it's negatively affecting their mental health.

Or is it just the fact that young people nowadays can't handle pressure and wilt at the first time of trying?


listen im fucxed i know for a fact i ruined my gcses, but crying that can never be me.
exams do make your life path easier but you can be succesful without them
i do feel like i was misguided my school made it seem like a walk in the park
Reply 5
We place children under exam conditions from very early years, have one of the most expensive university systems in the world, and yet our education system is nowhere near the best. Not everybody does well under exam conditions, I know I prefer coursework to exams even now, and I did my GCSE's 16 years ago. We're slowly being conditioned that university is a necessity to get a decent job, even though graduate jobs start at something like £20,000, which you could get working in a call centre... A lot of jobs now want/need you to have a degree but didn't 10/15 years ago e.g. recruitment consultant, HR work, some youth justice work etc. The entire system needs an overhaul from top to bottom.
I’m a student, I have just finished my A level exams . Trust me when I say it was stressful I seriously mean it. I get the whole idea that exams are important, they’ve been around for so many years . Passing your exams just gets you an easy path in getting a job and being stable .

But as a student we don’t only stress about our exams , we stress about other things as well that are related to it . Because I’m a year 13 student , I have stressed about my exams , my grades , university applications, whether or not I may be going to university at all , worrying about the consequences etc . This year I have had several meltdowns.

Nowadays a lot of teachers are leaving 6 form or colleges . I personally have experienced that, nearly 4 of my teachers from 2 subjects have left in the period of a year . My AS grades were A , B and C . But because lack of teachers and head teachers leaving especially in my school , this has put in immense burden and affect towards me and has increased my stress levels and anxiety .

My last exam was on Monday 18/06 , even though I have finished my exams I still am stressing . I don’t even know why ! . I guess stressing for my grades and what the outcome would be on results day is the cause .

Exams nowadays have gone REALLY hard . A level content is equivalent to university content , GCSEs have gone equivalent to A levels , and SATS have gone equivalent to GCSE . The exam board need to be a bit more lenient on students , they need to give us some sort of breather .

Weird thing is thought I had finished my exams , but clearly not because today I got an urgent email from my 6 form head . Stating that my entire class would need to come back on Thursday as the moderator has given feedback . Right now my anxiety has literally gone to the roof .

I feel like giving up and not do anything .
Reply 7
Considering a article was recently released about how Suicides by young people peak in exam season, yes. It’s ridiculous, back then exams didn’t count for as much as they do now. If you don’t have a degree now, you literally cannot get so many jobs, doesn’t matter how much experience you have. Also part time employment for young people is more pressure as employers completely just take advantage of us because they can. If you don’t work the hours they want they will sack you and get someone else, whilst still paying minimum wage. I think it’s too much

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/society/2017/jul/13/suicides-by-young-people-peak-in-exam-season-report-finds
Probably, but I doubt there is a better fair way to assess students.
yes its definitely too much stress for us students even if we started learning early even if we are top clever students and go to the best school, its a hell of a lot of stress
yes u do.
definitely the last point
Well put it this way: when the government talk about mental health, they only talk about the fact that so many struggle with mental health issues but never at all dare to mention the causes of these issues, including the harder exams- this is coming from a reasonably high ability student, who cannot imagine the pain of exams for those who struggle with high workloads, as I was only just able to cope
I remember preparing to finals, never whined though, but at the end after the exams I slept for > 30 hours straight without waking up - imagine going to sleep in the afternoon and waking on the next day in the evening - realizing it is 8 pm...And go to sleep again till the morning.

P.s. it was epic when I had two exams in two days and did not even sleep before the exam on the next day - and got the empty ticket (it means you get a mark without exam)
(edited 5 years ago)
Original post by Unknown....212
I’m a student, I have just finished my A level exams . Trust me when I say it was stressful I seriously mean it. I get the whole idea that exams are important, they’ve been around for so many years . Passing your exams just gets you an easy path in getting a job and being stable .

But as a student we don’t only stress about our exams , we stress about other things as well that are related to it . Because I’m a year 13 student , I have stressed about my exams , my grades , university applications, whether or not I may be going to university at all , worrying about the consequences etc . This year I have had several meltdowns.

Nowadays a lot of teachers are leaving 6 form or colleges . I personally have experienced that, nearly 4 of my teachers from 2 subjects have left in the period of a year . My AS grades were A , B and C . But because lack of teachers and head teachers leaving especially in my school , this has put in immense burden and affect towards me and has increased my stress levels and anxiety .

My last exam was on Monday 18/06 , even though I have finished my exams I still am stressing . I don’t even know why ! . I guess stressing for my grades and what the outcome would be on results day is the cause .

Exams nowadays have gone REALLY hard . A level content is equivalent to university content , GCSEs have gone equivalent to A levels , and SATS have gone equivalent to GCSE . The exam board need to be a bit more lenient on students , they need to give us some sort of breather .

Weird thing is thought I had finished my exams , but clearly not because today I got an urgent email from my 6 form head . Stating that my entire class would need to come back on Thursday as the moderator has given feedback . Right now my anxiety has literally gone to the roof .

I feel like giving up and not do anything .


Nobody will ever understand the stress of a level exams, unless you have been through it. I have one more A2 exam left, and it has been hard. I tend to not stress about exams but the amount of weight I have lost (it may seem funny and OTT but it really isn’t) due to stress has been phenomenal.
Original post by Cubone-r
Around a week ago a video went viral of a UK YouTuber crying after struggling with one of her exams: https://metro.co.uk/video/students-cry-exam-pressure-1705644/

This sparked a lot of debate in the media about whether young people are examined too much and how it's negatively affecting their mental health.

Or is it just the fact that young people nowadays can't handle pressure and wilt at the first time of trying?


Yes, exams have always put pressure on people.

In my opinion exams should play a small part in testing a subject most of it should be coursework and exams should be fact recognition where appropriate in the form of MCQ’s
Original post by lcc86
We place children under exam conditions from very early years, have one of the most expensive university systems in the world, and yet our education system is nowhere near the best. Not everybody does well under exam conditions, I know I prefer coursework to exams even now, and I did my GCSE's 16 years ago. We're slowly being conditioned that university is a necessity to get a decent job, even though graduate jobs start at something like £20,000, which you could get working in a call centre... A lot of jobs now want/need you to have a degree but didn't 10/15 years ago e.g. recruitment consultant, HR work, some youth justice work etc. The entire system needs an overhaul from top to bottom.


You wouldn't get a starting wage of £20,000 in a call centre. They don't pay particularly well.

Everything else you've said though👌
I have never felt pressured from anyone, teachers, lecturers etc
If anything, i put the pressure on myself to achieve higher than needed.

Also, people really do lack resilience nowadays. The smallest thing and they'll complain, moan, take things to heart etc.
Reply 18
Time pressure is the worst. You know what I find strange? In an exam like English or economics you’re racing against time, you don’t have time to structure your answer effectively or review it at the end, yet in a subject like maths, you can easily finish with 15-20 minutes to spare.

Which I don’t understand because I can see the usefulness in maths being a race against time, the time it takes to compute calculations is a mathematical skill that can and should be developed (keep practicing and you’ll get faster). But racing against time in English or economics, why??? Why not give students the chance to read the information carefully, absorb it properly and give their best answer? Practicing essays can only improve speed to a certain extent before quality is compromised, an extent that’s probably maximised at GCSE/AS.
I hold a master's degree in electrical engineering from an accredited uni [here in the US]. Until i was half way thru graduate school, i had NO idea how to study for an exam. My dad never finished 8th grade, and me mum finished high school, and then took a secretarial short course. That was the extent of my exposure at home to academia. NOBODY, all the way through my school and uni years explained how to be a student. Nearly all of my classmates were in the same boat, except for a very few, who seemed to get straight A's, without working at all. I found out by accident, that the closest competitor in the 'all A's' group had an IQ that was 17 points lower than mine. I was getting C's and D's, and she was getting all A's. Inexplicable!!

I finally figured out, in the middle of grad school, that while i was studying and learning lots of stuff, most of what i studied was NOT on the actual exam - so i was wasting most of my study time - i might as well have been playing video games. The technique i developed was to target the instructor's lecture. I kept track of how much time they spent on each topic, and how much work they did - just talking about it, drawing on the board, prepared handouts, viewgraphs with an overhead projector. Each of these was more work, so i would assign a 'work factor' number. Just talking was a 1 to a 3 (for example). Drawing was a 4 to a 6. So if the instructor spent 3 minutes talking about it, and then 6 minutes drawing (medium complexity drawing), i would multiply the 3 minutes by 2 (medium complexity talk), and then add 6 minutes times 5 (medium complexity drawing. The result was 36 for this lecture section. I would add up the results for each time that particular topic was mentioned to get the 'total score' for that topic. I then ranked the topics in decreasing order - from highest to lowest.

The problems involved in these topics would take enough time to solve, that the average student could not do more than 4 or 5 in one hour - which was the time normally allocated for an average exam. I would take the top 7 or 8 topics in my ranking, and make up a problem for each one - trying to include everything that i'd seen in those types of problems in class and in the book. I then made sure that i could solve each of these problems without "breaking a sweat". The first time i did this, i hit the guy 100%. I had every problem on the actual exam on my "practice" exam. It took me 12 minutes to do the hour exam - plus another 5 minutes to check all my work 3 times. I used the same technique for the rest of my remaining graduate school courses (5 of them). The worst i ever did was hitting 70% of the exam questions. Several times i hit 100% again. On average, it took me about 15 minutes to do the 1 hour exam. Now, years later, i understand how my classmates in high school were getting A's whilst never seeming to study. Of course, they would never have told me what they were doing, because they didn't want me to start doing it too. Best of luck!!

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