Time was when scoring 45 per cent in an exam meant you had failed it. Now it’s enough to give you a top grade. As the Telegraph reports:

‘Some pupils taking GCSE maths this year needed less than half marks to score an A-grade, sparking more claims that the exams were being "dumbed down". Exam board Edexcel defended its marking scheme which put the pass level for an A-grade at 45 per cent on its hardest paper, insisting the tests were "robust". Another exam board, OCR, said setting a pass mark of 16 per cent for a grade C on its higher-tier paper showed how difficult the exam was.'

‘Robust’? ‘Difficult’? Can anyone doubt that a) the British education system is in free fall b) notions of excellence, achievement, objectivity and fairness have been excised from that system c) the British education establishment, including government ministers who tell us that rising numbers of top grades mean standards are rising, is playing the rest of us for suckers?

Posted by melanie at September 20, 2004