The emergence of many more higher grades in this year’s A level results has produced problems for universities used to a higher failure rate to achieve required grades.Ā Some courses at some universities are as a result oversubscribed and the Universities are having to make offers for the following year or encourage some other switching to try to resolve the difficulty.
I was a product of a different system for Oxford and Cambridge. Before or after A level Oxford and Cambridge set entrance and scholarship exams which they used rather than A level results.
The advantage of this system was twofold. The Universities were in full control of how many places they allocated and who would get them. The student if successful could press on to prepare more thoroughly for higher level study.Ā The CollegesĀ made their own judgements. Later as a young Oxford university teacher I became involved inĀ the marking process for the entrance exams. I was impressed by the system.Ā We blind double marked the papers, held conversations about all the ones where we disagreed, and used interviews to expose the issues where we did disagree about the achievement and potential of the candidate. We also sought to redress any unfair imbalance between students who had been well prepared by expensive schools for the ordeal and those who had not.
It looks as if some top universities are tiptoeing back to relying more on their own assessment of students. They need to be sure that the people they take can cope with the rigours and the independence of undergraduate study and are the best of the many who now achieve a grade A.
August 13, 2021
Looks like another grade ‘F’ for private Pike then…
August 13, 2021
Indeed the universities and employers have been failed as the A levels this year (and last) are almost useless as a measure of anything. Best to use the old real GCSE results or tests set by the Universities or would be employers. But about 3 out of 4 people who currently go to university would be better off learning on the job with day release or night school. Most UK degrees are not worth the Ā£50k+ of debt + interest, three years+ of your time and loss of earning. The last thing we need is even more people getting duff degrees and acquiring large student debts. Even more so if we/they are also to be forced to piss Ā£trillions down the drain on electric cars, heat pumps, hydrogen and other, ānet zeroā job exporting, religious insanity.
There was never any need to cancel the exams.
August 13, 2021
and will many students repay ‘the Ā£50k+ of debt + interest, three years+ of your time and loss of earning’.?
August 13, 2021
Best estimates are that about 50% of the debt will be repaid. Far better value for women as they tend to choose lower paid jobs, do more part time work and take career breaks – often for work life balance and family reasons. They might well only pay back as little as 25% of the student loans. So best to take them out and not pay them off early in general especially for most daughters.
August 14, 2021
Our country is losing billions of pounds because students loans are given to foreign students many of whom leave the country without repaying them. Some students donāt even attend the course. 42% of EU students are not currently paying back their loans. English taxpayers are subsidising foreign students including Scottish, Welsh, and Irish students. The whole system is totally unfair.
STOP all student loans for foreigners.
August 13, 2021
At least with student fees the individuals can feel they are paying their own debts, rather than the ones they inherit from the previous generation’s excess.
August 13, 2021
Except it is a soft loan and only about 50% will ever get repaid the rest will fall on other tax payers many of whom have no degrees. Plus only about 25% of UK degrees are worth anything like the money, time and loss of earning they take to obtain.
August 13, 2021
Or not paying their own debts, if the figures from the Student Loan company are to be believed.
August 13, 2021
Rishi Sunak says he and Boris Johnson are in ‘lockstep’ on the economy I see. Good but can they please do an immediate about turn and march in the right direction for a change?
We need far less government, lower simpler taxes, a huge bonfire of red tape, cheap energy, law and order with some real deterrents, cheap on demand energy, freedom and choice and no net zero lunacy – not the complete opposite please.
August 13, 2021
The problem could well be that the potential scholars of today have been told that they all deserve the right to go to university. What they were not told is the blood tears and sweat mentality that is required to realise the full potential of the courses and the university itself..
University education is a long haul depending on the degree course and the fact is that a number of students leave midstream.. The critical degrees are those in the areas and skills that will benefit the country and the student. Too many students end up with a lesser type degree and never apply what they have learnt into the work position or career they eventually achieve.
Maybe it would be better if during their formative school years children should not have their heads filled with such high expectations. to be able to learn life skills and form lasting friendships in being what they are children.
Too much peer pressure is put on the child, parent and teachers .Those with the capabilities for real success will always stand out. It happens in every wall of life.
August 13, 2021
In my opinion, Tony Blair has a lot to answer for in this regard. Most of todays āUniversitiesā were former Polytechnics.
And why rename schools as āAcademiesā. Surely, no one is fooled.
August 13, 2021
Bums on Seats = Money
August 13, 2021
Reply to CG
Exactly remember “Education Education Education” and mis-spelt many ways since Educayshun, Educat-shun and the 2 Eds etc!
August 13, 2021
It’s all about copying the US.
August 13, 2021
CG
“Surely, no one is fooled”
But it”s fooled all the students many who think they are now better than past pupils, just because they have been to university.
August 13, 2021
Well when they changed the name of Polytechnics, Teacher training colleges and FE colleges to Universities it enabled them to say (sort of truthfully) “when we came in only 10% went to university now it is 30%” or whatever – all that with a simple name change!
August 13, 2021
Cheshire Girl
“In my opinion, Tony Blair has a lot to answer for in this regard ”
In fact virtually everything wrong is traceable to him. And Johnson for not putting things back they way used to be, and should be.
Blair has a lot to answer for.
August 13, 2021
Why train 4 times as many lawyers, 200 times as many Forensic Scientists and 10,000 times as many PPE types, Social Science or Media Studies graduates as there are jobs for them in these areas? More builders, plumbers, engineers and electricians would be far more use.
August 13, 2021
LL
Woke whimpy snowflakes don’t make for real Engineers or Builders etc, anyway.
They’re frightened of anything sharp, cold or hot and they don’t want to get their little hands dirty.
August 13, 2021
In my day A levels were A to E or fail. A to D grades then would be all A or A* this year. A levels should just rank people by percentile as compared to others sitting the exam and keep politicians like the hapless Education Secretary out of it. He has devalued A levels and hugely damaged the system for past students, the last two years of students and indeed for future students. Doubtless they will switch to 1 to 9 GCSE tupe of system (in a bizarre backwards order) to try to rectify the mess. Just publish the percentile they actually achieved.
School reports in my day said exam mark 72%, place in year 10th out of 65 for each subject. Simple, honest, direct and clear.
August 13, 2021
Regarding your last paragraph remember little johnnies feelings and nobody today is allowed to fail..
August 13, 2021
Not true. Many of the contributors to here are clearly failures.
August 13, 2021
Don’t be so harsh on yourself young andy.
August 13, 2021
Andy
“Many of the contributors to here are clearly failures.”
Wrong of you to say so.
Unlike you we are not obsessed with pensioner – hate, which can only have origins from a deep rooted sense of failure stemming from some kind of traumatic humiliation by an elder and thus wiser person. (who may by coincidence have been a Tory voter)
Why not get it off your chest ? Tell us what happened……we’re here to help.
August 13, 2021
I wish you’d stop talking about yourself.
August 13, 2021
Indeed I did once come 65th out of 65 in French I recall. A subject I had to pass at O level to get into Cambridge (even to read maths and physics). I did scrape through it just.
August 13, 2021
I take it that you would like to see upwards of 80% of our children labelled as failures at age eleven, so that the 20% or fewer can go to grammar schools, without quality teaching being “wasted” on the other 80%?
August 13, 2021
Not at all but some might well be more suited to other more practical and often lucrative training & skills. There should of course be opportunities to go to Grammar later at perhaps 13 and 16 if they can demonstrate suitable ability and want to. Many boys have little interest in reading Pride and Prejudice or To Kill a Mocking Bird at 14 or 15. I certainly did not and would prefer joinery, electronics or welding perhaps.
August 13, 2021
FuS ” nobody today is allowed to fail..” – – -only the govt – – repeatedly.
How many times has this party said “We’ll cut immigration if you vote us in power”???? – sorry – not a fail – never ANY intention to cut or stop it.
August 13, 2021
And on cue – on another site – a video clip of yet more arriving this morning, straight onto the beach – – The Channel is dangerous? – and controlled by radar surveillance?
August 13, 2021
A system where every university is setting their own entrance exams which would require pupils to sit multiple exams to cover several university options would be totally chaotic. Thatās what A Levels are supposed to be – a single set of standardised exams.
August 13, 2021
But this past 2 years haven’t been. Teachers marking their own work, what could possibly go wrong.
August 13, 2021
Teachers doing nothing – the schools where open, why couldn’t the exams take place
August 13, 2021
Wait for the details of teachers getting brown envelopes to help the chidren of well off parents get a better grade, It will come out eventually.
August 13, 2021
Exactly but government and politicians have made a pigs ear of it as usual. There was never even any need to cancel the exams.
August 13, 2021
Whose calling for that? Oxbridge always used their own exams where their courses would be otherwise over-subscribed through public exams.
August 13, 2021
We should take the opportunity to get rid of GCSEs completely, they are a waste of time. The standard has become very low and teaching for them is a distraction. Most other countries do not have a mid-stage public exam.
It looks like the grade inflation at A-level has been such as to make them meaningless also now. So perhaps itās best to do away with A-levels also and move to the international baccalaureate or an equivalent. It would be far better for young people to have a broader education and would avoid the situation, which in the modern world is becoming increasingly absurd, where people can give up all studies of mathematics and science aged 16 having attained the minimal standard required by GCSE, and be described as well educated.
August 13, 2021
Indeed.
My year – 5 GCEs could get you on a Royal Navy helicopter pilot course (after other assessments) I got seven GCEs at a sink estate school and was considered a ‘boffin’ – I went on to part qualify as a quantity surveyor before changing career.
A relative’s son with special needs has just achieved 8 GCSEs. When I say special needs I mean it. Retarded, without wishing to be unkind.
August 13, 2021
But I expect the poor lad is able to write his name on the paper. QED.
August 13, 2021
That āother assessmentā you mentioned; while I was scrutinising applications of undergraduates wishing to undertake a military career I noticed that a candidate had incorrectly spell the ‘county’ in his address, we asked him to fill out a another form and again it was incorrectā¦.He was bright so we discussed it with him, he said that nobody had ever pulled him up over it before ā everyoneās a winner, no red pens allowed in school
August 13, 2021
@No Longer Anonymous, A like wise observation, a long time friend of mine managed his GCE’s at advanced level and went strait into work from school. From his position as a tea boy in a City firm he became a Vice President at a US Bank by the time he was thirty. Then came back to the UK with similar position in the Major UK Banks. A degree? wasn’t needed or expected. Although to stretch himself he has since got on from Harvard.
August 13, 2021
@ Richard – if the aim were to provide a sufficiently broad education such that recipients could be deemed “well educated” there is a considerable risk that a great many would not realize their potentials. The inflexibility of the international baccalaureate type system means a weakness in one or two subjects may prevent progress that otherwise could be made.
Perhaps of much more significance to cope with the modern world to which you refer would be changing attitudes such that people cease to see education as something sought only in the school years but rather recognize it is a lifelong pursuit.
August 13, 2021
I think the system you and many others went through all those years ago would return, but we are now in different times, where WOKE thoughts and actions are crippling common sense actions, words, and deeds.
Must not upset anyone, or give them reason to be upset, or feel disadvantaged in any way.
Good grief it would seem you cannot even ask for a curry now without being accused of being racist.
Problem is we have had a huge variation in how schools have handled the pandemic, some heads have done well, thought outside of the box and been proactive, others appear to have simply stood back, waited for so called instructions, shrugged their shoulders, and said its all too difficult.
As for self marking, some people cannot even complete a fun quiz without cheating when marking their own answers, and the School league tables and their own conscience have perhaps encouraged teachers to be rather more generous with the marks where they can.
It will all come out in the wash eventually when students go on to take final examinations.
The ones I really do feel sorry for are those who have attended University for the past two years and who have been let down big time, with no tutorials at all, and having paid out huge sums on both fees and accommodation.
I think the universities have been a disgrace !
August 13, 2021
Some good points Alan.
August 13, 2021
Alan Jutson
Very good post Alan especially the last paragraph.
August 13, 2021
@Alan Jutson – good observation as always. If you never fail how do you ever learn? Alternatively if you never fail, you have never been pushed hard enough.
August 13, 2021
There is a ton of stuff wrong with A-levels and university degree courses. The government, with a massive majority, shows little interest in fixing any of it. (And that’s part of a pattern.) Here’s a shortlist of work:
(1) Stop A-level passes being awarded to those scoring less than 40%. (17% for Maths?)
(2) Apply forced-rankings to those passing.
(3) Stop awarding A*s, which diminish the As.
(4) Stop funding the university tuition of those with a couple of Es.
(5) Make universities responsible for the tuition costs of those who don’t earn enough to pay their debts. (I don’t want to.)
(6) Stop universities mis-selling degree courses in such subjects as ‘golf-course management’ – something that could be taught in a year or less.
August 13, 2021
(7) Stop whinging old people from constantly moaning about the brilliant achievements of our young people.
August 13, 2021
+1 Letās set our young genii, clearly far smarter than the rest of us, on solving the problems of our age. The national debt, cheap on-demand energy, immigration, ageism. Iām sure theyāll have everything sorted in no time.
August 13, 2021
WMC
Better idea:
Put them in a situation of having to change a truck tyre at night and with no jack, in -30 degrees C.
But to give them a chance, a shovel, entrenching tool, timber blocking, and winch are povided. See how bright they are then.
August 13, 2021
Andy
The last few days Andy you’ve made some really sensible and well informed comments, but this one ? No.
August 13, 2021
Cull all the soft student loans for degrees in silly or hobby subjects (about 75%) or people who are not in the top 20% of A level results (when they actually sit them A and Bs only or you resit). Use the money to give similar loans to suitable people who want to start businesses instead.
August 13, 2021
Sea_Warrior :
I definitely agree with your points above, particularly (5) as I think this would put an end to (4) and (6) and much else that is wrong with University education.
August 13, 2021
Gets my vote!
August 13, 2021
I also like to set my own tests for candidates who even have electronic engineering degrees. I find they routinely fail to understand basic circuit theory.
So what use what grades at A level the students have, if the universities can’t teach anyway?
August 13, 2021
Indeed much of university teaching is rather poor but then the median intake to universities (even before Covid) was only about D,D,E at A level so half were below this. I wonder if the Education Sec. will remember what A levels he got poor chap?
August 13, 2021
Iāve came across many engineering graduates that donāt know how to read a vernier caliper
August 13, 2021
Glen
……try this for a laugh, ask any snowflake ; what is a slide rule ?
Or try getting them to read a Micrometer – some run away, others think it’s a G Clamp.
August 13, 2021
And in other news well done Andy yesterday for exposing the misogynists and pushing back against the anti green lobby. To reason (or rather lack of it) that todayās technology and lack of infrastructure should somehow effect/influence what happens in 2050 is palpable nonsense.
August 13, 2021
My understanding is that Oxford and Cambridge still have their own examinations supplemented by interviews with the better candidates. They have also added an extra hurdle in the form of discrimination in favour of those deemed to be disadvantaged in some way. As for other universities it is difficult to see how they can make informed decisions just on the basis of teacher assessed A level results and without setting their own exams. It appears most of them will not set their own exams. Some, it appears, are even ready to pay applicants to defer for a year such is the rigour of the current system.
August 13, 2021
In the days when we were of school and university age, relatively few students went to university.
As a pupil at Maidenhead Grammar School, I doubt whether more than 15-20% of sixth formers went on to Uni. Despite gaining three good A level passes, I didn’t think it was right for me. Because of the low numbers, it was then relatively easy for universities to set entrance exams.
Since the misguided policies of the Blair Government The situation today is very different. I do not need to be a graduate to work out that, for 35-45% of pupils to go on to Uni, the academic ability required of those given a university place, on average, has to be much lower than it was in the late 1960s. As a result, the academic rigour of degree courses at the second and third tier universities has obviously had to be adjusted downwards.
The Russell Group need to maintain their academic standards in order to retain their position in the world rankings and, given the rampant, uncontrolled grade inflation evident over the last three years, should be requiring all potential candidates to take entrance examinations.
August 13, 2021
The plague obviously presented yet another golden opportunity for the implementation of yet another long planned agenda.
ALL MUST HAVE PRIZES
No exams!
A nearby teacher refuses to remonstrate with local anti social kids for fear of reprisals in school ( true). Think of the pressure to give good grades without exams.
August 13, 2021
In my day one sat the Oxford and Cambridge “seventh term” entrance exams in the winter term after ‘A’-Levels. This was the probable origin of the “gap year” where there was a gap of several months before the start of the university term in the following autumn.
The system was, I think, later changed to a “fourth term” exam in order not to disadvantage pupils for whom the possibility of travel or taking up short term employment was problematic. The assessment at this stage of the pupil’s progress was probably rather less useful because he was in the midst of working through his ‘A’-Level courses. On the other hand, those who failed to gain a place, could gain admission to another university in the autumn of their ‘A’-Level year.
My “seventh term” in 1970 was easily the most enjoyable period in my secondary education and the preparation for the exam allowed the candidate to roam pretty much at will over his chosen subject. The examination papers offered a broad array of questions and the aim was effectively to ask the candidate what he had studied, why it was interesting and what conclusions he could draw.
The purpose then was to assess the extent to which the candidate was intelligent, inquisitive and open to ideas, qualities which can be found in every generation but which the current examination system with its insistence on cramming a syllabus smothers.
If one compresses the entire cohort of pupils into a PowerPoint approach to a subject, it is hardly surprising if the grades are similarly compressed.
Reply When I took the exam in term 4 you could also offer to do the same exam in term 7. I wanted to get on with it.
August 13, 2021
By way of reply to the reply – well done. We 7-termers were more modest in our aspirations and no doubt jutifiably so.
August 13, 2021
I have some experience of a degree course in one of the newer universities on the South Coast which offers a marketing degree. A few years ago, the head of department asked me if we would allow the students to use our business as a final year project where we would act as the client. We readily agreed because it would be useful for us and help them.
Over six months we attended monthly meetings and received marketing prosentations in between.
Working directly with the head of department was an experience. She had had a long and impressive career in marketing before her appointment and was entirely attuned to the needs of the future employers of her students.
The small amount of time the students actually had to attend the course was a shock and at least a third of the course frequently failed to turn up, even then. It was evident to us that the standard or the intake was nowhere near good enough. We privately appraised the course and out of 25 students, we thought that we would want to employ only two of them to conduct our marketing and would offer no more than ten of the others any kind of job. The rest were, frankly, a waste of space.
The university had plans to move the department to another building that needed to be acquired. Our lady wanted to move it to a nearby office campus and operate the course as a real workplace with regular hours and reduced holidays. The idea would be to give the students a realistic experience of what it would be like to actually work at an advertising agency. We thought that this would give her students a real advantage when it came to obtaining a job in the industry.
The academics in charge or the university were horrified at the idea and rejected it out of hand, not least, I’m sure, because it was proposed to reduce the course to just two years. A year or two later, our friend gave up the post and returned to industry running her own consultancy very successfully. It was the university’s loss.
I have always thought that for the vast majority of courses, except the most academic courses, this approach would be a real improvement and would greatly benefit the students and future employers. With fees at Ā£9,500 a year, a reduction to two years for most degree courses would be a huge advantage.
It will never be allowed to happen, of course, and universities will continue to be expensive, outdated and inefficient organisations that serve their customers very poorly. For many future occupations, degree courses would best be operated as modern apprenticeships.
August 13, 2021
+1
August 13, 2021
Education is only what suits those in charge at any one time.
Manipulated and tweaked to suit the job market.
Send the kids out to stone the crows when it suits and then to compulsory school when they are wanted to run the Empire or commerce.
Maybe when there are no jobs you donāt need education?
Or when everyone is an equal drone you donāt need exams?
Equality! Fairness! š¤®
August 13, 2021
The focus of our education system is still geared to university
GCSEs are no longer a stepping stone to first employment or an apprenticeship itās the door to another year in education and 6th form college completing A levelsā¦.and A levels are just the second step to university
Career officers and employers arenāt welcome in secondary schools ā theyāre now reserved for the employment fairs at university
It was a political decision to promote an academic education over employment and vocational training in the 1990s and it will take another political decision to change it backā¦something this government will never do
August 13, 2021
Do universities assess foreign studentsā ability to manage their courses and, if so, how?
Does the Government put any limits at all on the number of CCP students that can attend our universities, particularly those on stem courses?
August 13, 2021
There was a time that University was about finding the best of the best. Individual entrance exams were there for the same purpose. Once the integrated exam procedure arrived it provided the idea of the A grade was to indicate the top 10% only, then when that got distorted so a star was added to indicate the similar.
Then came the Socialist misconceive interpretation of equality, so now every one deserves an A star grade. It missies the point on every level. Universities need to push the best of the best for the benefit of all of us. If they cant get the best of the best – all education suffers, all degrees get devalued.
Equality in the Socialist interpretation is just weird. Yes we are all born equally and we should all be given the opportunity to reach our full potential. Full potential in the human race is not identical, we are all different and every one is capable of things that others are not. That is different from the Socialist teaching, now the millennial expectation that every one has the same right to be ‘entitled’ to things that previously were earned.
Degree Courses and Universities have now been devalued they loose the credibility of being first class seats of learning. With a Degree a student will now go out and face the same competition for jobs as those that bypassed the system, with the same earning potential, same promotional ladders potential. We ALL loose
Lets get real the teacher assessment can’t assess who good their pupils are in comparison to ALL other school leavers. The reality is we now have a system were the teaching profession gets to say to themselves and us ‘look how good I am’ – the pupil gets to pay for it for the rest of their life by being sent up the wrong avenue.
August 13, 2021
The UK education has over time and by a weird doctrine become distorted.
A while back I employed a lad that had come over from Jamaica with great GCE Advance level grades he wanted to train as an Accountant. However, these GCE’s that are awarded by the Oxford and Cambridge Board here in the UK for some reason were no longer accepted in the UK. Long story – short, while he worked for me he went to night school sailed through the new style grading system and got his accountancy training position and is now doing so very well. He was a lot brighter and more intelligent than UK schooling generally seems to produce while suggest they are at the same standard
August 13, 2021
We mustn’t loose site the some Universities are just there to make money, there appears to be no real interest in equipping students to thrive and excel in life – after all these new kids are of course ‘entitled’ so will be given anything they desire.
Some Universities are not in themselves providing value for money to us the taxpayer – so why call them universities. Yes I know students also pay, but the taxpayer is still the main supporter. Anyway a good employer will all ways ultimately refund Uni Fees. Its the students with the little bit out there that degrees that also sort of loose out -then again their income will never be great enough to tip the over the threshold for repayment.
Education should be about releasing a pupils full potential. In that what is a bit out of step is suggesting there is a synergy between education and being bright – very rarely do the 2 come together
August 13, 2021
We should go back to the old system. And abandon tip-toeing. When will we get back to decisiveness in England, the idea that every view must be satisfied continues to drag us down to tne lowest denominator.
August 13, 2021
The Oxbridge system is more like the superior US public and private university system. A US university gets to set the standard of entry and is not dependent on “A Level” qualifications that they have no quality control over. A system that tends towards the lowest common denominator that puts bums-on-seats to maximise university revenues. The US system is expensive but 3 out of 5 undergrads get significant bursaries and discounts. You don’t apply to “read” specific subjects you apply to just get into the university; you pick your subject later.
“When transport and other living expenses are factored in, College Board estimates the following ANNUAL budgets for [US] undergraduate students in 2018/19:
$17,930 (two-year community college)
$25,890 (in-state students at a four-year public college)
$41,950 (out-of-state students at a four-year public college)
$52,500 (private non-profit four-year college)”
August 13, 2021
BTW. It appears that this Redwoodian Denialists site, has stopped posting about the non-existent climate change; and, the non-existent Covid virus! Regardless of the evidence from global witnesses of both.
Please explain to us remainers, your current thinking, so we can take the piss out of you for the next decade at least; including the next General Election, should we actually be allowed to have one in what is increasing looking like a one party state.
reply How absurd. this site covers both the virus and climate change matters regularly
August 13, 2021
In other news acorn the Conservatives are 11 points ahead of Labour.
August 14, 2021
That wasn’t the question Mr Speaker.
August 14, 2021
You fantasied about the opinions of people who post on this site and by making those assumptions you were trying to connect this to the current government.
You are in a minority.
A minority who vote for a socialist Labour party and a minority who voted to stay in the EU.
And your one party state comment is just a demonstration of your frustration as democratic votes don’t go your way.
August 13, 2021
Update from āThe US retreat from Afghanistanā 11th Aug
My friends in the Islamic middle-east and gulf countries report happiest and joy that the Taliban have taken control of Afghanistanā¦.I am sure this delight is reflected amongst many muslims and other Islamic countries
Its only the western democratic countries that are concerned about the Taliban takeover
August 13, 2021
glen cullen :
“ā¦.I am sure this delight is reflected amongst many muslims….”
If the Taliban take control of Afghanistan it will surely appeal to those who are unhappy with European life and would prefer a move to a country that lives by Sharia Law and 6th century ways.
August 14, 2021
only the ‘people’ who declare they are male. How many do you imagine will want to go there if female?
August 13, 2021
The Afghans are worried too, so much they are fleeing the country in large numbers. Anyone who can is getting out.
Once the Taliban are in control, it will be back to Al-Qaeda training camps and terrorist attacks on the West, and an increase in the narcotics trade.
They are already enslaving young women as trophy brides for their fighters.
Harsh Sharia law will be imposed on the ordinary people, whilst the Taliban do as they please. Definitely one law for them and another for the oppressed.
Their religion doesn’t redeem the heart, and they use it as an excuse to justify their evil.
August 13, 2021
Dave Andrews
Agree entirely, but the argument should be taken to Bliar, who engendered the problem.
August 14, 2021
Where are they fleeing too ? They’re surrounded by Islamic countries and China…and they’re all supportive of the Taliban
August 13, 2021
I heard on the radio yesterday that one of the reasons that the affluence attainment gap has increased and the grades were higher overall was that all the material was published on line and specific marking guidance was also published. This I presume means that more affluent/ educated parents could take the material and use it to ensure their children were well prepared informed by precise guidance on what was required to get marks. Does that point to a general failure in the quality of teaching, or just an issue with online teaching? In my view we should bring back grammar schools where anyone could get an excellent education based on their ability rather than their wealth.
August 13, 2021
On line learning has revolutionised the acquisition of information and ways to use it . No longer do we have those big mouthed teachers trying to humiliate us ” your as dull as dishwater” no longer are we accused of not listening ,or taking the flack for someone else’s bad behaviour as the old fashioned teacher had her back to the class, no longer are we penalised for asking questions that the teacher cannot answer or knowing something not taught by her/ him.We are not frightened of not doing as well one year as on line universities offer good courses and can be completed at a later time . It is freer and an exciting way to learn ,
At the age of 70 I am learning 3 different languages . I would not have been offered this choice at school as I had been pushed into an area where others thought I could manage well and illogically a course where I managed a 92% pass in an exam was discontinued.
August 14, 2021
Hopefully you are tackling GuÄnhuĆ (mandarin), Hindi and German (even Russian)? It would be good for someone to explain in their language where they are going wrong.
August 17, 2021
sign language may suffice .
August 13, 2021
Major-Ballsup started the rot by telling the techs they could become universities. Bliar continued the degradation by calling for 50% to attend ‘uni’. In order to produce the numerous candidates for higher education, the academic content of exams was watered down. The for profit examination boards were more than happy to churn out exam papers consisting of multiple choice questions that could be mechanically marked. The for profit unis were more than happy to put on cheap and useless degree courses to enable the non-academic to achieve ‘degrees’. With so many attending universities the students and unis had to become self-funding. The proper universities solved the problem of offering expensive STEM courses by packing them with foreign full fee-paying students to the exclusion of the English.
What a mess the Tories and Labour have made of our once much-admired education system at both the secondary and tertiary levels. No doubt, bright people like JR will always achieve entry to Oxbridge if that is what they want but that is not the issue; the issue is that children are not been taught other than to be able to pass examinations which have been designed to be assessed by machine with all content which might require an examiner in human form to intercede, removed.
For goodness sake put the clock back to before the malign interventions of Tory and Labour education wreckers. Some things are too important to be turned into a Tory money-making racket or a Labour all-shall-have prizes free-for-all.
August 14, 2021
What is a proper University !? what an antiquated , biased , elitist perception …Learning at a high standard is for all . A university is called a university by the staffs’ qualifications, the amount of research based work completed,overall standards in comparison to older institutions and a broader outlook for excellence in all subjects. Academia is not simply theory anymore for those who want to sit on their backsides and read all day , it is for real life.
August 16, 2021
The Technical Colleges did not set their own exams. They ran courses to enable their students to sit external exams. These ranged from vocational courses to HNCs, HNDs and Honours degrees. A student getting a London external BSc was exactly equivalent to that of a student attending a London University college because he took the same exams. Employers were very happy to employ the graduates of Technical Colleges because they knew what they were getting.
August 13, 2021
Government has been obsessed with university access, as we all know, for thirty years. It leaves many thinking that not getting there is a failure, another thing we all know, and grade inflation to get them there has had a serious effect on individuals and the country widely, to the extent that the ignorant are now running the country. They are everywhere. They can’t spell, they avoid difficult words and they can’t speak the language or pronounce words correctly, and that includes Ministers.
August 13, 2021
Sir John, if the Russell group are serious about maintaining admission standards, they will surely need to do something like what you describe. On present form, teaching unions and government ministers they’ve apparently captured will cause this A level fiasco to be repeated each time there’s a seasonal respiratory disease outbreak in future.
Then again, if post-furlough the famous green revolution doesn’t produce all the jobs expected of it, perhaps government policy will be to keep driving student numbers higher and higher, to keep them off the unemployment register. Then the Russell group will do as they’re told. As will the other universities, of course.
August 13, 2021
In France and Belgium, which have suffered comparably to Britain from Covid deaths – Belgium a little more, France a little less – final year secondary exams have gone ahead in 2021.
The reason probably has to do with their decision to let children attend school for most of the autumn and winter. There were closures but the number of days lost was far less than what was inflicted on British children. And for what?
In Spain, schools hardly closed at all, and a large study carried out in Catalonia showed very litle Covid transmission in schools (El Pais 15/4/2021).
But are we Brits going to learn from foreigners?
August 13, 2021
The public sector unions and the progressive left lobbyists have total control over all public policy Tory government since Clarke brought Margaret to her knees.
The NHS control the Tories. The NEU control the Tories on all areas of education policy. The race lobby control the Tories.
The party I used to vote for believes in NOTHING except self-promotion
The Tory party today is nothing more than a career vehicle for Oxbridge types and they will sell us all down the river to protect and promote themselves and their party
I saw Patel today. Libertarians and true Tories should shiver in fear. This government has become a true force of authoritarianism. The evil of Identity politics has consumed Tory Ministers and now imbues all policy
August 14, 2021
Bingo.
August 13, 2021
On the rare occasions when I have employed people, I test them. Exam passes are meaningless. Quite thick people can get high marks if they swot enough. Very bright people often do poorly in exams for a variety of reasons.
August 13, 2021
I think your suggestion elsewhere Sir John that more emphasis should be put on apprenticeships as further education. The armed forces used to do superb apprenticeships. I joined the navy as an Artificer Apprentice and learned a tremendous amount both theoretically and in practice. Finally got my physics o-level too.
I imagine with the services being severely reduced, apprenticeships will also have been much curtailed.
August 13, 2021
For at least 70% of students, an employment-based apprenticeship would be a far better route to a successful career than an expensive degree course with little relevance to the world of work.
In the 1960s, Sir William Lyons instigated an innovative apprenticeship scheme at Jaguar cars.
His apprentices spent time in every part of the company and it was so successful that boys who one would normally have expected to go to university, including some that were privately educated, signed up.
As a result, Sir William was able to promoted from within and eventually, many of his senior managers were once boys who had been Jaguar apprentices.
This is the kind of scheme that should be encouraged, not Mickey Mouse degrees of dubious value that do little but load the student with debt.
August 13, 2021
ChrisS
What you describe is an exact outline of my apprenticeship within the motor industry starting in 1964.
A full 5 year indentured apprenticeship which was signed agreement by myself, my father and the Company.
Indeed after my official 5 years I was allowed to continue to attend technical college for a further 2 years (one day and one night a week) in order to gain even higher qualifications, to get ready ready for management.
At the time I thought apprenticeships were cheap labour, but after a few years I recognised that I had actually had superb training, in a whole range of departments, learning a huge variety of skills, in almost every aspect of engineering, and that knowledge and training has served me well during my entire life so far.
August 13, 2021
Well written article Sir Redwood, but in my opinion not as important as the predictable outcome of what Blair and Bush engendered, and what Johnson lacks the guts to call them out for.
August 13, 2021
Two fighter jets zoomed low over the fields behind my house today. Risky having the whole of the RAF in one place, I would have thought. Not many apprenticeships in the services these days.
August 13, 2021
Mike Wilson
“Not many apprenticeships in the services these days.”
Yet the RAF & RN are running apprenticeship recruitment programs.
August 14, 2021
You probably mean ‘trainers’ unless they were ‘fast jets’ chasing Russian intruders? I doubt that!
August 13, 2021
“They need to be sure that the people they take can cope with the rigours and the independence of undergraduate study and are the best of the many who now achieve a grade A.”
Quite so. But if they do manage to return to taking mainly the brightest undergraduates, they also need to make sure that they recruit university teachers who are capable of coping with the rigour and independence of young minds that will not suffer the patronising jocularity, woke mediocrity and superficial scholarship that characterize much university teaching – and btw, always did.