Re: The Politics Thread
The current system of exams is fundamentally broken. Exam results shouldn't be used to judge schools but a measure of individual performance, a purpose for which they are increasingly unfit for. Every year we are told more and more students pass, and with the top grades, yet at the same time the exam boards themselves are able to set the grade boundaries and have the power to scale the marks up or down.
Taken together, these two facts lead to an inevitable conclusion - exam boards themselves are directly responsible for the increasing number of passes and top grades. I suspect competition between exam boards is partially responsible, and there are rumours that exam boards are unofficially advocating their low standards to schools who are thinking about their league table positions. Ultimately, this is bad news for everyone, as the qualifications are becoming watered down. I've always found this extremely frustrating, as with more and more people getting top grades public confidence in the entire system is undermined, and I don't feel my exam results are anywhere near as meaningful as they should be.
From a personal example, a year or two after I took A level maths the structure was changed, the course consists of 6 modules, each examined separately. Under the old system, we had to take 3 "pure" modules (P1-P3) and 3 applied modules (statistics, mechanics etc). In the new structure, the 3 pure modules were replaced with 4 "core" modules covering the exact same content. Now A level maths students take C1-4 and only 2 applied modules. Looking further back, my parents have copies of old O level maths papers, which tested students on differentiation, a topic which isn't taught until AS level today.
Sadly, exams categorically are getting easier, and the sooner it is sorted out the better.