How does that normally work in the UK and how are they adjusting it now? From what I understand, it's a series of tests that students need to take to get into a university? Are they all taken at the end of their final year of school? And do you need to take them in all subjects? Or just certain ones (that you want to study at uni)?
PD
They are taken at the end of the academic year (Year 13 here) when the students are c.18 and they act as a university or Higher Education entrance exam. After age 16 (GCSE exams) school pupils here specialise in just three or maybe four subjects. It's not like the International Baccalaureate where you continue with a wider range of subjects, although some school here do IB or Pre-U instead of A Levels. I teach Pre-U History of Art and for many decades taught A Level History.
They (the govt.) made a terrible mess of it by basing the estimated grade on how well the school did in the past! Crazy as it discriminated, for example, against high achieving students at poorly performing schools. For example, a clearly very bright girl who had a place at veterinary college depending on her results of As or Bs was awarded C and D grades. She said that her life had been ruined. As a result of this kind of thing the govt. had to perform a U-turn and instead of relying on an estimated grade through an algorithm it decided, as it should have done in the first place, to use the teacher's estimated grade. As a result of this the results will be slightly higher than usual as teachers will tend to give their students the benefit of the doubt when predicting grades. However, no one's life will be 'ruined' by this. They don't trust the teachers and, in this country (England) decisions are made about education by politicians who have no experience of teaching or education and just want to advance their political careers.
