A level results: a fateful day for students and politicians
We all know what happened on results day for A levels. Scotland’s shambolic system was devastating for disadvantaged pupils but was also a sign of what was to come elsewhere in the UK. There’s no denying, it was all a mess… but the story is different in each devolved nation.
When A level pupils open their brown envelopes which contain their future, there is always a feeling of dread, hope and anxiety. This year however was very, very different. The fate of our futures was not in our hands. We did not have exams to prove our abilities. Therefore, we were putting total faith in our teachers and the less than organised exam boards. The result? Some tears of joy, some of despair. As I said, a different, but at the same time all too similar story of confusion across each devolved nation.
Labours Keir Starmer was very quick after the English results to lash out at the government and demand this and that, but, he forgets that his party has a worse story to tell in Wales. Before the U-turn on the 17th August which would allow all students to receive their teacher predicted grades, 36% of grades in England were downgraded but in Wales, 42% were.
First things first, this process has never been done before. Never has there been a time were grades were not awarded by exam performance. Everyone, inevitably, was bound to get it wrong. The problem was, in my opinion, the exam boards were cautious about the apparent over optimistic grades awarded by teachers. That’s where things initially went wrong. Yes, there may have been favouritism among teachers but who knows how students work better than the teachers who see them every day? The exam boards’ obsession with keeping to the statistics have ultimately cost grades and amplified confusion amongst students, prior to the new approach.
What should’ve been done differently from the very beginning? The use and extreme reliability upon statistics. We are too governed by them, by the numbers. If we could turn back time, we should ditch them all together. The teachers should have submitted grades to the exam boards with comments, the examiners should have then looked over pieces of work submitted to them, include past exam performance, and then award the grades, allowing the teachers to have a say while ensuring fair grades for all. This should have been done from the start.
What can be taken from all of this chaos is that there undeniably is a fundamental error in our education system in Wales. Arguably it is worse in devolved nations than in England, regardless, something has to change. As I have said in the past, the education system simply doesn’t work. We need to be bold enough to change the entire system and set it free. Schools that are independent of local authorities, on average, perform much better. We need to set our schools and teachers free and unleash a real education revolution, not just in Wales, but across this great United Kingdom.
Owen Edwards
"Gavin Williamson" by UK Prime Minister is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0