[YLUG] GIS A JOB!

Fri Sep 3 10:48:41 UTC 2010

>If you believe the media O' levels are the exams 16 year olds used to do b4 they started making exams easier to pass :) >im sure thats not he case but makes a  story every year to fill a few hours of airtime 

I did O' Levels in Summer '87 when I was 16, then a couple of resits in Nov' 87. Technically, what I did was called 16+ You did one exam, and got two certificates. An O' level grade A to E, and a CSE grade 1-5. An O' level C and above was considered a pass, whereas a D or an E was the same as a CSE grade 2. A CSE grade 1 was classed as an O' level grade C, but no higher. CSE's were what you did if you were thick, and a CSE grade 3-5 effectively meant you turned up for a few lessons and the exam. If you want to get really olde schoole, you did O' Levels if you went to the Grammar School, or CSE's if you went to a Secondary Modern. So my parents tell me ;)
I went to Malton School, and Malton Sixth form also (big mistake!) but the year below me was the first lot to take the new GCSE's which gave you a grade of A-G. A grade D is equivalent to a CSE 2, E 3, F 4 and G 5. I have no idea what an A* is! ;) So, many people that did retakes in Summer '88 had to do totally different sylabuses etc for a year and course work, and naturally did much better than when they had taken O' levels. Malton Schools Exam results for the first GCSE year, summer '88, was the schools best ever, and the Sixth Form had it's biggest intake ever for A' Levels that September as so many people were getting grades A & B (previously the requirement to do an A' Level), so they had to make the A' Levels easier since the step was too big. Fact! 
I did A' level Physics, and Maths and we had to learn all the formula, or be able to work them out from first principles, where's everything was given for the GCSE lot. A mate of mine did GCSE Physics as he's chose not to do the O' level but later found out needed it for what he wanted to do after A' Levels (RAF). All he did was borrow the fourth and fifth years notes read them up 2 weeks before the exam; didn't go to a single class and got an A! It was basically - find two terms in the formula sheet, and third's your answer! Same for Maths, formula sheet for everything, which I guess is more akin to real life. All the formula are out there for reference; you just need to know which one to use. 
It was similar when people from my year did A' Level resits in Summer '90. We'd compare the previous years papers, and the new ones were much easier. People were getting grades N (nearly passed) in my year, and B's and A's the following year! It's wrong really, because of the way it works. The top ten percent get A's the next 20% get B's next 30% get C's (or something like that), so that if it's a harder exam, there's not a fixed pass mark. Typically if you got 70% of the paper correct, that would get you a grade A. but if it was a hard exam, that could go down to 55% or so. A' Levels are the hardest exams you will ever take though, as the papers are set by an external governing board, whereas when you go to University (or Polytechnic in my day if you were thick) the exams are set by the course tutor so they examine you on what they have taught you, not what your teacher at school thought an external examining board was most likely to examine you on. Also, by the time you've got to University, chances are that you've decided what you want to be do in life, and choose a course you are interested in, so it will not seem as hard, because you're interested in it.
Of course, the easiest O' Levels were in Nov' '87. Since the ''brainy'' GCSE lot could not take some of their exams early as they shad tudied different sylabuses! Naturally, the only people taking O' Levels in Nov. '87 were people that were doing retakes so the calibre of student was not as high, as there were no spring chickens doing their exams early, so the pass mark grades were lower. The exams were just as hard, but the pass marks were lower for that last time.
The irony is, that A' Levels are practically useless in the real world, other than as a guide to your calibre, and a requirement for University. If you want to go to work at 18 years old, you're better off doing a BTEC at college which will prepare you to work at age 18. I left school at 18, spent two years working as an Electronic Systems Technician at Spectra-Tek (basically designing, making, maintenance and setting up simulation equipment) whilst I decided whether I wanted to do Electronic Engineering (Hardware) or Software Engineering at Uni. and I didn't use anything at all I had learnt from my physics or maths once in two years! 
>and yes Im in the 40+ grumpy old men bracket now. The most lied to generation in history

 Okay; rant over! I'm not bitter ;) Although, it does piss me off that I only got a grade B in Computer Science at O' Level, whereas, my sister was the year below me and got an GCSE grade A! Even though, her project was absolutely useless, and I had to re-write it totally for her from scratch. Naturally, with course work comes the opportunity for plaguerism... These days, you  can just go on the internet and re-gurgitate whatever you can find on wikipedia if you want to pass exams.
I've recently done an NVQ Level 3 (Equivalent to 3 A' Levels and will get you into Uni) in Music Tech. and whilst it's possible to pass the course by just regurgitating what you can find on the internet, you can get so more if you download the module requirements, and it basically says, to get a distinction you need to be able to show and prove that you understand x, y and z, so you know what grade you're going to get before you even hand anything in! My parents are intellectual snobs / scientists, and ridiculed me saying I was wasting my time studying music at college; arty farty etc. but I'm obsessive, so I really put my all into it, and you get out what you put in.

>we should be living on the moon now and meeting aliens and have my home heated by atomic fuel to cheap to meter

Dancin' on the moon drinking piss! ;)
Laters, from Aleks.-- Alex Jorvik, Viking - Digital Musician +447966062067 - Www.Matrixism.Me.UK

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