The 'AQA' an exam-setting body, has said that it is planning to intrduce a new 'Super A star' grade to recognise the performance of particularly able students.
When I was at school, the grades were A to E for pass, and F to H for fail. Now we shy away from even referring to failure and seem to have lost the appetite for grading students sensibly. We give them 'projected' grades long before their exams and even 'target' grades throughout their school lives, effectively pigeon-holing them in a way that was never done in the past. Again, when I was at school, an 'A' grade was the aspiration of all, now the children aspire only to meet the target set for them by their teachers - what sort of lunacy is this ? We heap pressure on them in ways never thought of when I was a child. Pupils are even made to sit sub-standard exams, in which the highest attainable grade is a 'C', so as not to put them off by giving them the real exam which they might struggle at.
All this nonsense is simply to avoid facing the fact that some children have different abilities to others, and that some will inevitably do worse at certain subjects than others. Why can't we just admit this fact and work from there ? Rather than do this, we continually inflate the top of the grade scale, first with 'A stars' and now with 'Super A stars'. Logically, we should be looking at a return to the former system, in which top performers gained an 'A' and the grades then descended through 'B' to 'F' and beyond but no, this would cause distress to those awarded the lowest grades so we keep the myth that every 'F' has the same value and, instead, extend the top end of the scale.
I know 1984 has come and gone long ago, but not even George Orwell could have imagined this type of madness.
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