A levels are failing to make the grade

Average A-level grades had risen each year, without fail, for the past 27 years. This amazing figure has just become 28 with the release of this year’s results. There are two possible explanations for this either A-levels are getting progressively easier year on year or pupils are genuinely getting better and better. The actual reason for this relentless rise in achievement is, though, irrelevant; both reduce to the same question: is the current A-level system in need of reform?

The primary purpose of exams is to discriminate between different levels of academic ability
and achievement. If they fail to do this, then surely the system needs to be questioned. This year’s pass rate is dizzying to say the very least, at 97.6%. Well over a quarter of all grades were A’s, at 27%.

Among the insistence that these remarkable figures are proof of genuine widespread academic achievement, universities are struggling to accommodate the myriad of students leaving school with the highest grades, let alone sort between them. Some, such as Oxford and Cambridge, have responded to this by having potential students sit their own harder exams. If the system were doing what it was is supposed to be doing—that is effectively differentiating between students whilst giving credit where due—these measures would surely be unnecessary.

Grade inflation is consistently denied by the government and those in charge of the
examinations, and we are being asked to accept that three times as many students last year possessed the necessary capability in their subject to merit an A grade than just a generation ago. However, some do thankfully agree it is an issue. One place outside Britain also using the A-level system is Hong Kong. There, the British system has indeed been accused of grade inflation, and the Hong Kong

A-level has since become more strictly graded, diverging from its British counterpart.
To give some international perspective, whereas 17% of all pupils taking A-levels in 2009
achieved the top accolade—straight A’s—in their exams, only around 5% of all pupils taking the French Baccalauréat achieved the mention très bien, that is, highest honours. This accolade corresponds to a general average above 16 out of 20, still nowhere near a perfect score. Perhaps it is therefore a certain mentality that is to blame: that the aim of education is to have everyone achieving at the highest level and obtaining the highest grades. But does this not make it very difficult to differentiate the best from the good, devaluing the qualifications themselves?

Efforts have been made to try and remedy these deficiencies, but to little avail. Plans to
introduce an English Baccalaureate were rejected by the government, but one measure that has been taken for this year’s results is to introduce an A* grade, supposedly allowing to identify the very best students more effectively. This seems to have had some success. However, it does not go to the root of the problem, which is more likely the A-level system itself: compared with the majority of European secondary academic qualifications, it is very narrow and imbalanced.

A varied education to an advanced level is important; however, under the A-level system
students are forced to choose too few subjects too soon, leaving them unable to study across a broad spectrum as is the case in the Baccalaureate system. The inclusion of so-called “softer”, non- traditional subjects such as sports sciences, D&T, photography, film studies and media studies at A-level is also devaluing the qualification: these subjects are considered easier than the more traditional ones, and many universities deem them unsuitable, which means that the true worth of such A-levels as academic qualifications is being questioned.

An interesting and viable solution is the introduction of the International Baccalaureate in
Britain. This qualification, modelled on the European and French Baccalaureates, examines in six contrasting subjects and includes mandatory philosophy, like in the French system. This is seen as a more academically challenging alternative to A-levels, and it unquestionably provides a broader and

better-rounded education. It is flawed however, for two reasons. Firstly, because there exists an easier alternative, people are encouraged to shun it in favour of A-levels in which they think it will be easier to achieve the top grades. Secondly, because its growth is driven mainly by private institutions, the already clear-cut divide between state and private education could develop further. This state-private divide has deep social and historical roots and is far from being exclusive to Britain. But the problems that we are experiencing with grade inflation and university congestion are much less pronounced on the continent, and even in the States. Is it not time to update the British secondary education system, in the image of other European countries whose qualifications are more challenging and rounded? Pupils would perhaps not achieve the same astronomical grades they have been used to, but what does it matter? — They would benefit from it enormously, and universities would once again be able to sort the average, the above average, the very good and the genius.