Creative Commons licensed photo courtesy of Flickr user jackhynes.

Every year for the past 27 years GCSE results have gone up and a quarter of A level passes are now at grade A. One might think this was a chance to congratulate teenagers in their achievements but conversely the better the exam results the more they are ridiculed as meaningless. How can children win when they are constantly described as a nation of hoodies and morons and then, when they show their abilities it is used as further ammunition against them? Whether or not exams are getting easier is not the issue, if marking was properly differentiated by percentages then we could still pick out the best and brightest but more and more children are getting A’s so it becomes hard for universities and employers to separate the wheat from the chaff. It is not the fault of the children who can only take the exams they’re given but a fundamental fault in the education system that exams have ended up this way. We need to stop scorning the younger generation and try to fix the problems at hand.

Filed under: education on January 13th, 2010