Return of the 'O' level
 

http://news.sky.com/home/politics/article/16250644

About bloody time .My son has just completed his exams and i must say they are an absolute joke ,it is almost impossible to fail them he had one exam remarked untill he reached the required score for a pass

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-18529471

quite agree

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

Good. It'll mean we get less people who are blatantly plain stupid holding important positions :p

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

How many are in the cabinet :D

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

Just wait until someone sues or something because a school suggests their child takes the lower exam

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

Oh here we go again..another change that will take a lot of money to implement with great promises that it will bring back a golden age of education..:rolleyes:

The only way to do that is to bring back the cane..Because that was what made my generation behave in class whilst we studied for O-levels.;)

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

There's no doubt in my mind that GCSE's are far too easy when compared to the old 'O' levels but I don't see why that problem can't be adequately addressed by simply raising the bar in terms of what's taught at GCSE level and the standards required to pass. :confused:

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

I agree, after all, what's in a name? What you call it irrelevant, it's the standard of tuition and difficulty of the subject matter that should be the deciding factors. I took O levels at school and years later was helping my Niece with her GCSE homework. I was appalled at the gulf between the two standards.

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

The REAL reasons education is failing is that there is a lack of discipline in the classroom and teacher morale is at an all time low with their status reduced year by year.All the solutions suggested are political party dogma inspired and are never supposed to be long term solutions because every 5 pigging years there is an election at which Education is kicked around as a political football.

Until Education is taken out of the political arena and dealt with by all parties concerned as an ONGOING cross party issue there is no way there will be any improvements that stick.

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

I took a mix of O and CSE and there was a difference between the two, not only in terms of content but form. The O''s were more essay based and the CSE's shorter answer forms. With CSE '1' being O equivalent it allowed people like me who struggled with essays (dyslexia and grapho-motor) to get the O's to to A's and on to university.

We need to start to raise the bar again and bring in differentiation even at higher levels so our qualifications mean something internationally rather than trying to climb the silly percentage of people with degree's tree.

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

We also need more vocational education,then we wouldn't have to import people with specific skills..

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

This a good thing, but will they bring back the 11+?

(What we also need is investment in education, both higer and lower, but thats another topic)

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

Ooops

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/...ve-scrap-gcses

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

So, no change there then. Is Clegg clinically insane? Education in this country has been deteriorating for decades to the point that school leavers are semi illiterate and innumerate. Nevertheless the likes of Clegg seek to ensure that the decline is perpetuated and quite possibly furthered. I despair for the future of generations to follow. Utterly bemused :mad:

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

With all due respect bringing back the O-level is just a sticking plaster,pull in the votes,tinkering with the system kind of suggestion that ultimately cannot fix the education system..Only a complete overhaul will do that after a long,hard and considered consultation(cross party) which ultimately would be considered to be far too expensive to even contemplate.

Doesn't matter which government is in control they all come up with ways that are designed to gain politically without actually really making state education any better. :(

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

O levels were dreadful qualfications. They tested nothing of any value. All they tested was your ability to regurgitate a fairly predictable set of key facts.

Good at problem solving? Good at working together in a group? Good at doing stuff (instead of knowing stuff)? Good at finding stuff out rather than memorising a tiny proportion of it? Good at applying what you've learned to real life scenarios?

If you answered 'yes' to any of these - well, no-one would ever know if you took O levels. Because they measured none of the above.

If you think about the skills you need to get through life and perform jobs in 2012 Britain, then O levels are about as far away as those skills as you can get.

Believe me, I was one of the last group in the UK to take them. I very quickly learned that I didn't need to do any work whatsoever for three years. I just memorised a small number of key points, regurgitated them into essays, and got good results.

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

I agree completely. I've lost count of the number of people I've spoken to who did well at their exams, but struggle with quite basic concepts a year or so later.

Just to add my 2p to the debate, what is the problem with re-taking exams? If you are not very good at something, shouldn't you keep trying until you get it? How many of us managed to pass the driving test first time around?

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

It took me 2 times to pass the theory and only one to pass the practical.

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

And would you say you are a worse driver than someone who passed the test first time?

Re: Return of the 'O' level
 

since '0' levels and cses's weren't meant to do any of the above i'm not surprised they didn't .There purpose was to provide a good basic grounding in certain chosen subjects .The pupil would then either leave school with a basic knowledge of a subject or go onto further education in those subjects where they where expected to ,work in groups ,find things out ,etc.Nowadays ,as in my sons case ,he was "re-assessed" in geography to make sure he attained a pass mark ,not a resit as such just re marked in such a way that he gained a C grade