We're into the middle of August now, and that means that A-Level students have, after what must seem an age for them, got their results, and the GCSE students are about to get theirs. On the apparent up side, the pass rate has risen to 97.8%, 8.2% of which was at the top grade of A*, but on the down side over 190 thousand people had to go through clearance to try and get one of 40 thousand university places, and an expected 200 thousand people who wanted to go to university missing out. But are these really the high and lowlights to come from results day?
It is said so often now that it has become cliché that exams are too easy, and a figure of almost 98% passing seems to be damning evidence for this argument. However I do not believe this to be the case. I think that people are no longer being taught the subject, but being taught to pass an exam. With exams tending to ask similar questions year on year, and the restriction of the syllabus for some subjects aiding this it is possible to get an A in some A Levels by going through mark schemes and looking for the points that they reward, and then learning them. I know this works, I did it for one of my modules a few years ago and got over 90% in it. It demeans the qualification that many 17 and 18 year olds put a lot of effort in gaining.
I also think having such high rates are devaluing the qualification. Unfortunately, with teachers living by their percentages they will do what they can to keep it as high as possible, which bring me back to being taught to pass the exam. It may look great that they have so many A grades, but the actual amount they know may not bare sufficient resemblance to what an A grade student should know. This results in universities struggling to differentiate between them - the amount of places that require 3As or higher is significantly less than the amount of students gaining them - over a quarter of all A-Level grades are A/A* this year. We need more people failing, and fewer people gaining the top grades. In general everyone will experience some kind of failure in life, but without having any experience of having done so at school they may not react positively and that is a vital life skill. So overall, I think having the highest pass rates and % of A/A* ever is in fact not a good thing, but a bad one.
I also think that the huge amounts of people wanting to go to University is bad, so the 200,00 missing out is a good thing. Understandable, but bad. The reason I think it is understandable is that with the increase in the cost of going to University set to rise, the amount of people who would take a year out, or aren't sure are applying now otherwise the cost would be incredible. However too many people are going to Universities simply to have a student experience. This has become the overriding reason, whereas it should be that people go to University because they are interested in their subject and want to study it for 3 years. This attitude is a pet hate of mine, and I would dearly love to see UCAS interview everyone who applies through them to decide what their motive for a degree is, and for people who only want to go get drunk to not get through. However, such a system would be far too expensive and probably not work anyway. There are also too many Universities now, giving a huge surplus in graduates seeking employment. This results in jobs demanding a degree when it isn't always applicable to them. Not every qualification needs to be a degree, or needs to be a university course - I also think the old polytechnics should go back to that status too. As much as I want the population to be educated, university education isn't for everyone, and too many people don't realise it.
I know that my thoughts are probably against what most people believe, but in order to make the qualifications more meaningful I think they are necessary
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