Common scoring scheme

capers123 · Post by **capers123** » Mon Apr 28, 2008 5:45 pm

I've heard that negotiations are underway between Shire Hall & all the grammars for there to be a common & uniform scoring system for next year.

As you all know, whilst currently the same paper is used, each school then tends to treat the results differently. Each is standardised against the cohort of children taking the exam at that school, some schools combine the scores of the two papers, others set a pass mark for each paper.

The idea is that next year, the scores will be standardised against the whole Gloucestershire cohort, so a score of say 230 will be valid for all of the schools.

Let's hope these negotiations bare fruit - life will be a lot easier. The downside is it will be easier for parents to rank the schools according to their intake "my school needs a minimum score of 250 to get in - yours only needs 230"...

Guest55 · Post by **Guest55** » Mon Apr 28, 2008 5:47 pm

Perhaps they could go the whole way and have a common 'pass' mark like Buckinghamshire does

capers123 · Post by **capers123** » Mon Apr 28, 2008 6:40 pm

Guest55 wrote:Perhaps they could go the whole way and have a common 'pass' mark like Buckinghamshire does

Not sure if that's under discussion, and I'm not sure if it matters that much. You could then get really odd waiting lists.

Guest55 · Post by **Guest55** » Mon Apr 28, 2008 7:54 pm

It works much better like this as distance from the school decides the rank order not the score - fairer to everyone.

gloucestermum · Post by **gloucestermum** » Mon Apr 28, 2008 8:39 pm

I think I read somewhere-probably in schools admissions forum minutes-that they propose to use a pass mark of 210 for both papers added together(although still being discussed!

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capers123 · Post by **capers123** » Mon Apr 28, 2008 10:03 pm

Guest55 wrote:It works much better like this as distance from the school decides the rank order not the score - fairer to everyone.

Ah. Distance is likely to be quite some way down the list of criteria when selecting. If they do set a pass mark for all the schools, then they will still only take the top 120 or 90 or whatever, then it's onto the waiting list.

That said, distance to the school would suit my family well. And really upset those from Swindon / Bristol... In some ways it could be argued to be better as in 'local schools for local children', cutting down on shipping children around the country twice a day, and still give an appropriate education for most of them.

Guest55 · Post by **Guest55** » Mon Apr 28, 2008 10:15 pm

The system changed in Bucks three years ago to distance rather than score - it was done to cut travelling and to make it easier for parents to judge which school they might get a place at.