Nathan ([info]snathe) wrote,
@ 2004-08-19 09:07:00
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Somehow I bet you knew there'd be a rant from me today...
WARNING: here be sarcasm. LOTS of sarcasm. And rantage too.

A-Level exam results time once again.

Congratulations and very well done to everyone who has passed their exams.

Remember though; you haven't actually done well - you've really only passed because the exams are getting easier.

Seriously, it's got nothing at all to do with the years of hard work at school and much less to do with the hours and hours of revision and preperation time that you've put in over the past few months; all those long nights bent over the revision notes and past papers were all for naught. Exams are of course much easier than they were 20 years ago so really, there's no point in celebrating and being proud about how well you've done.

As fitting for the occasion, I think it's best proven mathematically:

GBM'S FIRST RULE ON EXAM RESULTS:

The pass rate of any exam is inversely proportional to the difficulty level of the exam.
Therefore using the above rule, it must be the case that, as success rates rise, exams become easier.

SNATHE'S FIRST AMENDMENT TO GBM'S FIRST RULE:
The pass rate of any exam is directly proportional to the amount of criticism and twaddle spouted by 'experts' about the simplicity of exams.
The amendment can also be reversed: so using the above rules it must be the case that as success rates rise, the number of people complaining about the exams will increase.

WHY, in this country, do we delight in being so bloody critical and cynical whenever there's a piece of news reporting some kind of success? Why must these people IMMEDIATELY insist (and moreover, why do some of the people GET PAID FOR INSISTING) that standards are slipping? I somehow think that if, by some chance the exam pass rate had dropped this year, these same talking heads would all switch track and be saying "aha, pass rates are down, so our students must be getting stupider now."

I wonder...do these critics have children of their own who are receiving A-Level results today? If so, how do they react on hearing about their results? Are they full of praise and pride or do they go into journalistic mode and start the "they're just getting easier" mantra? I sincerely hope it's the former.

Show me proof - concrete, black-and-white, set-in-stone PROOF that the exams are indeed easier than 5/10/20 years ago and then yes, I'll rightly jump on the bandwagon. Until then, to all the critics insistent on rubbishing the exam students today, you are indeed entitled to your own opinion - but just for one day, why don't you just all shut up and actually praise these students on a job well done instead of pissing on their bonfires as you all seem to take so much pleasure in doing.

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[info]erming
2004-08-19 02:10 am UTC (link)
When I was studying for Chemistry A level back in 1991, our tutor gave us past papers to work through. He chose the past 20 years essay questions and you could see them steadily getting easier. The 1973? (might have been '71) paper was nearly impossible, then he said ignore 2/3 of the questions as that stuff is no longer on the syllabus!

Also a lot of the courses have switched to a very high percentage of coursework, which there are no guarantees that you produced the work.

There are also worrying numbers of people who are leaving school with atrocious spelling (watch as you now can spot many typos in this comment).

People are also switching away from the harder subjects. This is a major bummer for industry as they need more scientists / engineers and linguists (which are the subjects people aren't choosing), where as there isn't such a need for as many psychologists or media studies students.

It is still a lot of years hard work, but I remain very suspicious of the newer exams. And could I do this years Chemistry paper? Well probably not as I haven't done any Chemistry in the last 13 years, so I have forgotten most of it.

The papers have also changed over time. The earlier questions needed you to think about what they wanted, the later ones just asked you for the answer.

There is also a vast variation of difficulty between exams of different boards. The '91 Maths paper from Oxford and Cambridge board (which I sat) was a lot harder than the London board paper.

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[info]snathe
2004-08-19 05:04 am UTC (link)
Hmm...well, looks like it's time for me to go a bit of bandwagon jumping ;)

I guess I'm just too 'idealistic' in thinking that maybe it is only down to sheer hard work. Also it's now 8 years since I did my A-Level exams and I certainly haven't seen any exam papers since then so I don't know for definite that they *aren't* getting easier.

I think it's more the fact that this almost blanket opinion that the exams are getting easier is trooped out every single year which, even if it IS the case, I find downright insulting. I know how hard I worked for my A-Level exams in 1996 and I would have gone absolutely ballistic (and still would today) if anyone had suggested that I only passed due to an easy exam. The same goes for my GCSEs and for my final University degree exams (especially the latter because of what happened to me on my industrial placement in Germany)

Maybe I'll just have to agree to disagree with (what seems to be) the rest of the country's opinion. I've always liked to be individual anyway...

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(Anonymous)
2004-08-21 03:46 pm UTC (link)
Psychology and Media Studies are always wheeled in as examples of 'declining standards', usually by people whose only knowledge or expereince of those subjects is through elitist folklore. I'd be happier if traditional subjects, like Philosophy and Eng. Lit., are also included in the annual whinge. If people are going to moan about Media Studies, why is an intimate appreciation of Shakespeare, Chaucer and Foucault so valuable to society? It is not, but that the usefullness of Shakespeare is never questioned reveals the elitism inherent in this argument.

As far as the old Chemistry papers are concerned: yes, they are going to be difficult if most of the material is no longer taught.

JP

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(Anonymous)
2004-08-19 10:22 am UTC (link)
Hello Nathan... It's Steven (Sharp)

We had this rant in work today. From what I can gather, there are a number of reasons why pass marks are getting higher. It could be one, or a number of these reasons. They are:

1. People are getting more intelligent. Doesn't seem likely. It suggests that someone born in 1980 is less intelligent than someone born in 1981 (on average) who themselves is less intelligent than someone born in 1982 and so on.

2. People are being better educated. Certainly, this is a possibility, though it does suggest that a teacher working in 1980 did a better job in 1981 and 1982 etc etc. Certainly possible. People get better at their jobs.... by and large, but this would suggest no retirements therefore.

3. The number of people being entered for the exams, as a direct percentage of those who *could* enter the exams is declining as schools enter only those who WILL pass. Say in 1980, ALL A-level students where entered but on 1990 only the top 80% are entered because the last 20% will fail anyway and why drag down the pass rate? Certainly a possibility but I've no figures at hand to gauge this.

4. The exams are becoming EASIER TO PASS. Not easier (thought that might be the case) but easier to pass. This could be as a result of modular nature of the exams, making the exams easier or direct mark inflation.

I can't really see any other explanation other than those four. And let's be honest. If we suggest either 1 or 2, we are saying (effectively) that *WE* are stupider than the people sitting them now or that the people that taught us are worse than the people teaching now.....

Hmmmmmmmmmm.....

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[info]snathe
2004-08-19 12:10 pm UTC (link)
Hmm, there is one other possibility too, which you failed to mention (and most of these 'experts' seem to toss by the wayside anyway). It may seem way too simplistic and obvious to be mentioned, but I don't think any of your 4 points above cover it:-

5) Students are *ACTUALLY WORKING HARDER* to prepare for the exams and are putting in the long hours of preparation and revision needed to pass the exams, hence leading to bigger pass rates?

I remember, certainly at GCSE level, that all our teachers pretty much scaremongered us into preparing for our exams and went on at great length about how important they were and how you needed to put in the preparation to pass etc etc..and (like a fool maybe) I believed them and worked my arse off. Same again at A-Level. University was different but I still worked myself to the ground because I was concerned how what happened on my placement year would affect things.

As I said above, maybe I'm just too blinkered to see it and am living in my own idealistic world.

But...just humour me for a minute here. If, by some fluke of nature, the A-Level pass rate goes DOWN next year, are these 'experts' all going to start criticising our students and divert their criticism away from the pass rate figures and say that they're not as good or are they going to keep stumm on the matter because they can;t argue any differently?

I certainly noticed this last year at the time of the GCSE results - the overall pass rate was down and all these 'experts' stayed strangely quiet on the topic.
Coincidence, or possibly they realised that the same old hackneyed argument they'd been blurting out for the past X number of years didn't actually hold true this time and they didn't have a good back-up plan? It'll be interesting to see if the same thing happens next Thursday.

(I know I'm very much in the minority here and it's pretty much pointless me trying to argue it but it's a topic I feel very passionately about and will defend to the death).

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(Anonymous)
2004-08-19 03:37 pm UTC (link)
The 'working harder' could equally be a factor, though, from what I've seen of the youth of today, and also thinking back to my school days, there are as many scum about today as there were back then. Of course, we could never prove or disprove the working harder element. It'd be impossible.

I might as well add more about the exams. The other problem with exams is that.... well..... it's political! Seriously political. We have to bear in mind, that at the end of all this, as well as 18 year olds (and some 17 year olds) getting their A-levels, it's also a reflection of government education policy. With a General Election looming, probably next year, why give the Tories muck to throw at Tony Blair? Might it not be better to massage the figures now before the election rather than release the truth and end up with Michael Howard saying, "AND THIS GOVERNMENT'S SHABOLIC POLICY ON EDUCATION HAS RESULTED IN A DECLINE OF 5%.... etc etc (to a mere 91% say)"

Of course, there is, I think, politics in this all. I will recite the tales of the ACA. This is the Chartered Accountants exams. Back in the early 1990's, there were 12 exams to pass. Seven at the first level and then five at the second level. They operated, by and large, on a 'Sit all your level all at once and if you fail ANY of them, you fail THEM ALL!'.

Then in the mid 1990's, they cut it down to 7 and 4 and allowed you to fail ONE at either level and retain the rest (fail two and you lost them all).

By the end of the 1990's, they had altered this. The first 6 (no longer 7) you had to sit at once but, subject to one cavaet, you kept what you passed. The last 4 you could retain up to TWO provided long and complex rules were met.

That's when I sat them.

Since then, and much to my annoyance, they now have six and THREE AND if you have an Accounting degree (I do), you can skip two of the first level. You now have only SEVEN exams to do and there is NO LONGER any chance of failing them all. If you pass a exam, you keep it. There are no possibilities of having to resit exams already passed like there were until 2001.

So, are these exams getting easier? Well yes. Only the other day, I said to Katie (girl three years below me), "You've done Tax already Katie.... This Section 419 tax. Do you have to have the directors loan account cleared by nine months?"

Katie looked at me blankly. For those not in the know, Section 419 is a tax section that... and let's be honest... is something a good accountant SHOULD LEARN AND WOULD know about. I tried again....

"You know. Tax on overdrawn Directors Accounts" I continued, thinking maybe she didn't know the section (I don't always).

Katie continued to look blank before saying, "We don't do that anymore."

I'll rest my case.

There is more..... the problem is is that it's all political as well. The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (hereafter ICAEW) are under pressure from the large accounting firm (KPMG, PWC, Ernest and Young etc) to teach the students as little as possible. The more time a student spends learning and resiting, the less time they can be out earning the partners money to play golf on Fridays. It would make sense to make the exams easier to pass to do this. The best way to do this is to chop parts of the syllabus out and remove rules about failing them all if you fail one. Admittedly therefore, they spend LESS time than I do in college... but only by one week a year (I spent 11 weeks in 2000... Katie spent 10 in 2003 which is her equivalent).

So where does that all lead us? Well.... probably that, for ICAEW exams... they are getting easier. Arguments here about people 'working harder' hold no water with me. I know of people from the 1970s (our partners) who sweated blood to get these exams. People today do the same (or equivalent as there is less to learn). I wouldn't go suggesting that they work harder today than ten years ago, because it just isn't the case.

Of course, the ICAEW deny this, but let's be honest, I think it's creeping in here as well. Back in the mid 1990s, first time passers were a rarity. By 2004 so far most of our students have passes all of the few exams they've had to sit.....

Anyway... let's stop before I pop a vein....

Steven

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*sigh*
[info]snathe
2004-08-20 12:53 am UTC (link)
Well, it would seem that I'm living in my own rose-tinted dreamworld then. You're right, the rest of the world is right, I'm wrong.

Now I remember why I don't like having strong opinions on anything.

*me goes to sit on fence for rest of life*

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Re: *sigh*
(Anonymous)
2004-08-20 10:05 am UTC (link)
No. Having your own opinions is good!!! It's important. It's just I don't agree with this one.

This is a free society. You can say what you like. And let's be honest, does it really matter whether they are getting easier or not? Employers will be the judge of that!

Steven

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My turn = : )
[info]beccasaurus
2004-08-23 01:31 am UTC (link)
*steals evil uncle Nathans soapbox*

I just wanted to say that I think 3) in the list above about only entering those candidates you think will pass is the reason for the high exam marks and increasing numbers passing.

I have long thought this. When I did my GCSEs (rather craply I might add as I wasn't 'allowed' to then do A-Levels) I was forced to _fight_ to be entered for maths (which I admit to being shit at). Because my grading would be low and that would affect the school. The point is if as a school/college you take the stance of not entering your students who are liable to get a D or less in examinations then the percentage will automatically go up.

Don't forget funding/fighting for students issues (especially in FE) that make this kind of practice very popular indeed.

And yes the syllabus has changed dramatically and that means examinations taken now are _not_ comparable to old examinations.

*gives evil uncle Nathan his soapbox back*

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