name='Pat123' said:
It wasnt GSCE..

haha.. It was AS which is the one after GCSE. I got full marks in GCSE n all haha. And im not meaning to sound up my own arse, but most people out there couldnt pass an art A-level, people dismiss it as easy which really p***** me off..
Tbf ide disagree with what was said. GCSE are required to get into college, subsequently into university and without them.. where would we be? Granted people choose to leave education, and uni isnt for all, but for many people GCSE's are their first 'Real' exam.
Indeed the thread did evolve to GCSEs.
The whole problem is, and no1 really gives an eff about it, but universities were meant to be a place where the smartest of the smartest (including the richest of the richest in some cases, but hey they got the grades too - so who cares) went to further their education.
The majority of places required 3x A grade A-levels to get in. This is when an A was more infrequent. 3x B grades, and ur in "college", Cs and below amd ur off to polytechnic or resitting. D and below - no chance, just resits.
Those days a Physics A level meant more than a French A level. My A levels were easier to achieve than the previous years. Indeed, if WE got any grade in A level - it was a pass. To not be graded was a fail, like N or U as it was.
Eventually they made all the polytechnics universities, and swallowed the colleges. U now goto college. There are no longer vast casms considered between Oxford and lets say Liverpool or Cardiff, even, as a degree. Sure there are bigger universities still, I think 4 or 5 are considered top ones now, rather than the 2 classic ones.
Now u have a degree, no1 really gives an eff if u got it from what used to be called a shed that was part of a college belonging to a polytechnic. This is an extreme ofc and a big generalizations.
U do tho have a situation where instead of the highest achievers in a school are looked at to goto university. Every1 is considered it as their pursuit after school. A massive % of those coming out of school now go on to study degrees compared to those considered high achievers.
The govt had to remove grant funding b4 they could massage this into the system. To make grades easier to obtain would have meant the education bill would have gone through the roof and continued. Making them burden the debt and allowing the majority to goto university to get into debt, it a good money spinner for the future.
Easier to obtain ? U need to speak to an old-school lecturer to appreciate how much they used to have to teach and have the student retain compared to what they don't need to know now as either an equation sheet, dates, formula, course work (which is a fudge in itself), or sometimes open-books are provided for a final.
We spent the 1st day of physics A-level ripping dozens of pages out of text books of things we didnt need to know that the previous year did. A demonstration I feel of how the lecturer felt.
I took an O-Level early, merely cos they were being phased out and the teachers thought them that much better than GCSEs. In Math I got a B. The following year I got a A++++++++ GCSE - a complete waste of an exam. Not a waste in terms of what it is, but in comparison if u understand.