11 Plus Exams Forum

Does anybody think these errors have caused real problems, or should the students just have got on with it, and got over it? Fortunately, my daughter has escaped the errors, but I might not be best pleased if she'd have been involved . I'm also not sure whether giving full marks to everyone for an unanswerable question is sufficient, what do others think ?


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Thankfully we are several years away from this but I would be incandescant if it had happened to me (back in the day ) or my DC. I can only imagine how much time a student must have 'wasted' on the unanswerable question and how, particularly an able child, would have been distracted throughout the rest of the paper by niggling doubts about it. It is sometimes all too easy to apportion blame but in this case I think it is well deserved. Those kids will never know whether they might have performed better given a fair shot and no amount of adding marks will recompense them for that. Grrr.

I think it's terrible too, and for the examining board to say that they will make sure no-one suffers is just plain silly. Anyone who has ever done exams knows that you can get bogged down on one question. If that question has no correct answer it could ruin the whole exam, as well as shattering their confidence.

Absolutely....I can't think how grades can be awarded fairly at all...because each student is different and will have reacted differently to this kind of stress. It really gives you no confidence in the examination boards at all

How awful for these poor students. I agree that no one can know how this may have affected each child. I simply can't understand how these mistakes weren't picked up.

Unfortunately, I already have doubts about the accuracy of the marking of exam papers. Three of my son's close friends had papers remarked following their GCSE results last year and all three had been marked incorrectly.

It is definitely worth having a paper remarked if you are close to a grade boundary and you were expecting better. It costs a few pounds but the fee is reimbursed if the mark is wrong. My son did dual science GCSE and was awarded BB,and he was gutted. After returning to school in the September he discovered he was really close to AA, and we had it remarked. Two of the three papers were awarded quite a number of extra marks and he was comfortably AA.