A level results day looming

[ChoppyGirl]

Originally Posted by WhereIBelong

Ours was the same ... predicted grades are best predictions on a good day made over a year in advance of the exams. CAG is what the teacher thinks you will actually achieve, were made a few months ago, based on much, much more evidence.

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Yes this is correct, the predicted grades are used to apply for a place at university and this is based on your best day usually. For the medical and vet courses this was assessed in October. The CAGs are made up with a lot more criteria: course work, mocks, homework, mini assessments etc and was created April time plus. This was strict criteria set out by the exam boards so they are fair across all schools. Teachers have to have evidence to back this up.

We have a waiting game now. DD was originally given AAC which meant she missed her first place university. Her CAG grades were A* A A which meets the requirements. UCAS automatically deferred to her insurance choice, she hasn’t declined it but hasn’t registered on the course yet. She emailed her first choice stating she was appealing on 13th(they had a dedicated email). Now we have to see if her first choice offer her a place for this year or deferred to next.

[soooexcited!]

I'm confused DS first year of 6th form was predicted a B in criminology got a B on results day now downgraded to C he is not happy. On the plus side DD partners grades have been regraded to ABBC.

[tinytots]

Originally Posted by ChoppyGirl

Yes this is correct, the predicted grades are used to apply for a place at university and this is based on your best day usually. For the medical and vet courses this was assessed in October. The CAGs are made up with a lot more criteria: course work, mocks, homework, mini assessments etc and was created April time plus. This was strict criteria set out by the exam boards so they are fair across all schools. Teachers have to have evidence to back this up.

We have a waiting game now. DD was originally given AAC which meant she missed her first place university. Her CAG grades were A* A A which meets the requirements. UCAS automatically deferred to her insurance choice, she hasn’t declined it but hasn’t registered on the course yet. She emailed her first choice stating she was appealing on 13th(they had a dedicated email). Now we have to see if her first choice offer her a place for this year or deferred to next.

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Fingers crossed for you. Hope it goes you DDs way

[mrsdjh]

Originally Posted by ChoppyGirl

Yes this is correct, the predicted grades are used to apply for a place at university and this is based on your best day usually. For the medical and vet courses this was assessed in October. The CAGs are made up with a lot more criteria: course work, mocks, homework, mini assessments etc and was created April time plus. This was strict criteria set out by the exam boards so they are fair across all schools. Teachers have to have evidence to back this up.

We have a waiting game now. DD was originally given AAC which meant she missed her first place university. Her CAG grades were A* A A which meets the requirements. UCAS automatically deferred to her insurance choice, she hasn’t declined it but hasn’t registered on the course yet. She emailed her first choice stating she was appealing on 13th(they had a dedicated email). Now we have to see if her first choice offer her a place for this year or deferred to next.

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Hope she is successful.

[ChoppyGirl]

Originally Posted by tinytots

Fingers crossed for you. Hope it goes you DDs way

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Thank you x

[ChoppyGirl]

Originally Posted by mrsdjh

Hope she is successful.

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Thank you- she said if she offered a deferred place at her first choice she will stay at her insurance as she doesn’t really want a year out and is keen to start.

[ely3857]

Originally Posted by caj

Isnt that where the strict moderation kick in? Its rate from moderated grades, which happens year in year out anyway are usually 99% accurate. It's a hidden, necessary (and at times tedious) part of a teachers job at every level.

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I genuinely don’t understand your comment.

My point (which I accept was made a couple of comments ahead of the one you responded to) is against sitting an exam at the end of two years that’s worth 100% of your grade. These few hours can make or break your future and is so much unnecessary pressure on one single event. Aside from this years shambolic affair, I’m asking if a rethink is long overdue on how students are officially assessed. Children are continuously assessed from the moment they enter education with frequent official assessments made in-house for primary years. Surely it wouldn’t be too much of a shock to the system to implement a similar official nationwide strategy to high school.

[butterflymags]

Originally Posted by Nimbus

Are you trying to say that 75% of students have lower grades than predicted because they had "a bad day at the office"? That's a lot of pupils that had bad days.

Yes, its possible that will be the case for some. But, if the teachers had predicted things correctly, it should equally be true that some students will have a "good day at the office" and do better than predicted. That isn't the case though and hasn't been for many years.

Basically, teachers tend to predict the best case scenario, not the most-likely case scenario. And that's the problem here.

That's the same in previous years just as much as it was this year. In fact, it was worse in previous years. If anything, the teachers assessments and the final results were actually closer aligned this year than previous years.

I would argue that what the algorithm has done is taken the overestimated "best case" predictions and standardised these to produce more realistic final grades and something that is more aligned to the spread of grades achieved in previous (and future) years*.

(* and I say that as a parent of a child whose teacher assessed A-level grades have been downgraded)

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No, I’m not saying that, of course there are various reasons for the gap in predicted grades and actual. I haven’t a clue how far out normal predictions are but these were not normal predicted grades as there was more assessment criteria for the CAG (My middle DS is a maths teacher). My point was an example of how unfair the algorithm was when deciding where a child fitted in each grade based on an order ranking. This didn’t replicate normal circumstances be that ‘a bad day’ or the usual setting of grade boundaries.
Anyhow my views are all irrelevant now, I can sleep tonight knowing that my sons GCSE results on Thursday will be based on an informed input rather than an algorithm.

[Nimbus]

Originally Posted by butterflymags

Anyhow my views are all irrelevant now, I can sleep tonight knowing that my sons GCSE results on Thursday will be based on an informed input rather than an algorithm.

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Well, it would've been based on informed input (which seems to overestimate things slightly in some cases) and an algorithm. Not just an algorithm.

Similarly, previously it was based on how well the pupil did in an exam (or exams) plus a different algorithm. Exam results were always normalised/standardised (whatever you want to call it).

I'm happy because this raises my daughters grades and makes her happy.

But I do wonder if the algorithm had done the opposite and had raised the grades of 39% of pupils rather than lowered them, would people have been quite as happy to remove the algorithm?

[gl20]

I see that the surplus of students over and above the number of uni places available (since reverting to teachers predictions only) are being encouraged to defer to next year. So got a whole lot tougher for students due to sit their A'levels next year.

I agree with Nimbus's comments above. Over-predictions isn't new (in my A'level year (1991) only 2 out of 60 of us exceeded our predictions) so just going with what the 'informed' teachers said isn't going to work out well in the long run.

What would surely have been a better idea would be to allocate each school their allotted/standardised grades (adding a bit of grade inflation as per any other year and to help placate matters) and got the teachers to asign them, thereby avoiding teachers setting a high expectation that then couldn't be managed well. Also, whichever method was to be used, could they not have done this sooner, thereby giving time to work through outliers and resolve well ahead of term time starting? There were no papers to mark, so why wait so long?