A level grade "boundaries" leak

[CardiffCitySince1927]

As a person who took the test. It is solid. Don’t comment unless you have tried the paper. It is a lot harder than back in your day

[Gofer Blue]

As a person who took the test. It is solid. Don’t comment unless you have tried the paper. It is a lot harder than back in your day

Whatever the degree of difficulty was "back in my day" (mid 1960's) all I know is that to get one A grade at A level was quite an achievement and to get three A's was almost unheard of! You would have been looking at a 90%+ mark in each subject. I am not denigrating the achievement of today's youngsters at all, as it is not their fault that the standards have been dumbed down over the years and finally the education authorities have realised that something had to be done. Unfortunately it may be that the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction and the exams are now so difficult that they have to reduce the pass mark to compensate! Hence my comment, what a farce.

[Pedro de la Rosa]

Whatever the degree of difficulty was "back in my day" (mid 1960's) all I know is that to get one A grade at A level was quite an achievement and to get three A's was almost unheard of! You would have been looking at a 90%+ mark in each subject. I am not denigrating the achievement of today's youngsters at all, as it is not their fault that the standards have been dumbed down over the years and finally the education authorities have realised that something had to be done. Unfortunately it may be that the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction and the exams are now so difficult that they have to reduce the pass mark to compensate! Hence my comment, what a farce.

If anyone should be annoyed, it's me who got an average of over 95% in my Maths A level. I've now only got an A instead of the A* . I really don't care, also this "standards have been dumbed down" is rubbish, look at what young people are achieving now. If an exam board writes a paper that is outside of the curriculum (which has happened) it is deeply upfair to judge someone on it.

[Gofer Blue]

If anyone should be annoyed, it's me who got an average of over 95% in my Maths A level. I've now only got an A instead of the A* . I really don't care, also this "standards have been dumbed down" is rubbish, look at what young people are achieving now. If an exam board writes a paper that is outside of the curriculum (which has happened) it is deeply upfair to judge someone on it.

If that is what has happened here, then I absolutely agree, that is just crazy. Is that how they make an exam harder? Once again, what a farce!

[xsnaggle]

As a person who took the test. It is solid. Don’t comment unless you have tried the paper. It is a lot harder than back in your day

How do you know it is harder. Has basic mathematics changed noticably in the last several hundred years?

But shirley 51% should be a minimum pass mark in any written examination. If something like 53% is an A whats a bare pass FFS, 20%?
You could almost get that by accident!

[light up the darkness]

How do you know it is harder. Has basic mathematics changed noticably in the last several hundred years?

But shirley 51% should be a minimum pass mark in any written examination. If something like 53% is an A whats a bare pass FFS, 20%?
You could almost get that by accident!

I agree It just doesn’t add up

[Pedro de la Rosa]

How do you know it is harder. Has basic mathematics changed noticably in the last several hundred years?

But shirley 51% should be a minimum pass mark in any written examination. If something like 53% is an A whats a bare pass FFS, 20%?
You could almost get that by accident!

They use, wait for it, maths, to work out the boundaries. This way, a certain number of people get an A, B, C, D etc. That way, if an exam is unreasonably difficult, it doesn't impact those doing the exam. Also, with the number of past papers being available online, exams vary a great deal more than they did 10 or so years ago because they need to.

Mind you, there's people in this thread whining about the younger generation being thick, while making multiple basic punctuation and grammar mistakes. You couldn't make it up .

[ivandobsky]

They use, wait for it, maths, to work out the boundaries. This way, a certain number of people get an A, B, C, D etc. That way, if an exam is unreasonably difficult, it doesn't impact those doing the exam. Also, with the number of past papers being available online, exams vary a great deal more than they did 10 or so years ago because they need to.

Mind you, there's people in this thread whining about the younger generation being thick, while making multiple basic punctuation and grammar mistakes. You couldn't make it up .

Indeed. It's a bit like how City used to work out away ticket eligibility prior to dumbing it down for Reading.

[Croesy Blue]

How do you know it is harder. Has basic mathematics changed noticably in the last several hundred years?

But shirley 51% should be a minimum pass mark in any written examination. If something like 53% is an A whats a bare pass FFS, 20%?
You could almost get that by accident!

If you can't understand how grading on a curve works and makes sense maybe exams aren't for you anyway?

If someone gets an A for 53% it's because the highest mark on the exam would have been in the 50s because the exam had questions that were harder or outside of the curriculum. It's to limit variation of difficulty between the different exam boards.

It doesn't mean it's getting easier to pass, the same percentage of people would have passed and got the same grades as any other year. That's how grading on a curve works.