All entries for Friday 22 August 2008

Making the grade.

Writing about web page http://news.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/hi/newsbeat/newsid_7575000/7575406.stm

I found this video linked from somewhere on the BBC News website. 8 DJs took GCSE Maths and the video shows them getting their results. Only one of them passed and they got a C with a mark of 28%. At 1:53 in you can see the boundaries for C through to A*. The cut off point for an A grade is 51%. 51. For an A. If you are barely more than half competent in GCSE level Maths then you get an A. For A*, the mickey mouse grade supposedly designed to distinguish the high achievers, the cut off is mere 65%.

Maybe I'm demonstrating a gross lack of understanding of how exams work but I find these figures quite appalling. How can 51% merit an A?

Apart from anything else it means the grading system is heavily bias towards those with low marks and high marks get little reward. If you get 100% you've effectively wasted 35% of your effort because you'll be given the same grade as someone who only got 65%. If grades were done away with and people just got given their percentage score instead then the person with 100% comes out looking a lot better than someone with 65%. And rightly so.

Mike Willis : 22 Aug 2008 13:30 |  Comments (5) |  Close comments |  Report a problem