There should be a GCSE in “grade boundaries”

Everyone in the UK is awarded grades that could determine their future based on grade boundaries. But I bet less than 1% properly understand how grade boundaries are set and I think that’s a very safe estimate.

There are news articles every year filled with misinformation due to people not understanding grade boundaries. “Only 55% was needed to get and A!” shouts the Daily Mail without any mention that the exam may have been harder than normal.

Even some teachers don’t properly understand them. There is a community of teachers that I’m part of who celebrate when an exam is easy and complain when an exam is hard even though a similar number of students would have got an A however hard the exam is. Yes there are some students who do better when an exam is easier but there are also some who do better when an exam is hard.

Before students sit their GCSEs, it should be a requirement for all schools to explain to students how grades are awarded. This would help ease stress when a student sits and exam that they found harder than a past paper.

If anyone wants an overview then here’s one from Pearson:

https://qualifications.pearson.com/en/support/support-topics/results-certification/understanding-marks-and-grades.html

(edited 10 months ago)

Reply 1

Talkative Toad

Volunteer Team

Yeah, lots of students trying to guess what the grade boundaries for an A/A* will be this year.

I think that it's better to aim to get X amount of marks/percentage in paper X no matter what, rather than trying to predict grade-boundaries. e.g. aim for 85/100 marks in OCR A A-level Physics paper 1&2 if you really want an A*. Rather than saying/thinking, "I want/need an A*. What do you think the grade boundaries will be for an A* this year, based on this exam and previous year's grade boundaries?".

My teachers said chase marks, I think, not only grades. Have the mindset of "I got 60/100 in this physics paper, how can I chase and gain more marks?" rather than having the mindset of "I got a B in this Physics paper, how can I get an A?".

This is only my opinion, though.

Reply 2

hotpud

Original post by Notnek

Before students sit their GCSEs, it should be a requirement for all schools to explain to students how grades are awarded. This would help ease stress when a student sits and exam that they found harder than a past paper.

I was talking to my wife about this as we listened to Radio 1 today talking about another campaign on mental health. What I actually think we need to do be doing is building resilience into students and explaining to them that stress caused by exams and waiting for results is perfectly normal and not some mental health issue that needs to be alleviated. She is in the ridiculous situation where the results for a piece of work the have done at uni have been delayed to spare the mental health of some students - presumably the students who didn't put any effort in. Ridiculous.

We seem to be going down a rabbit hole of trying to protect everyone from everything forgetting that the real world is stressful and causes anxiety and depression and that for most people, these experiences are normal and just part of life. I hate to use the "When I was a lad" term, but we didn't have anxiety or depression. You got nervous and worried a bit but it all came good in the end and if it didn't - well, you did something else.

So no - we don't need to change anything. Sure, some teachers don't get it but at the end of the day you still need to do your best and if you don't get the top marks, there is a lesson in there somewhere which probably lies along the lines of you either didn't work very hard enough or you didn't work very effectively. Better luck next time. Welcome to the real world - the real world where it is sadly 1% who are the best, and not 20+% as in education who get the top marks.