A level results

Before I continue with my post congratulations goes to all those who have recieved their A level results.

Has anyone noticed how those that open their exam papers live on TV always have good results. I can't help feeling that the schools know the results the students have and students with good results are picked to open their envelopes live on TV. I know that the universities & UCAS have the A-level results a week before students get results, and the schools know results when they are being placed into the envelopes.

Still I'm not too bothered - I've got my results and I'm off to university.

What happens is the TV news organisations get in touch with the schools to get pupils to open their results on camera. But the school, to benefit itself, will always choose the brightest students to show their school does well.

I got my highers last week, so I have all I need for uni. Going to do BA (Hons) Journalism.

The News Channel had an A-Level student in the studio this morning. Perhaps not the best of moves, as the guy was either nervous or plain monosyllabic.



They also crossed to a school in Leeds where a GMTV reporter was interviewing students who hadn't actually got the grades they needed. So I suppose that was a departure from the usual, then!

all A's for the students on Central News!

And for some reason, those shown opening their results on the news always seem to have a tendency to be very attractive girls....

I'm not going to complain about that

I briefly caught some coverage on my way out this morning. Sky seemed to have three students opening their results, one passed, one looked miserable as sin, and the other burst into tears.

Genius.

The two that failed presumably weren't.

A lot of my friends (and enemies) from schools around my area have appeared on BBC/ITV television today.

Certainly from my school, and not trying to blow it's own trumpet but it is one of the best schools in the South East, comfortably beating some Grammar schools, results in A levels were not amazingly hot today. Sure a lot of people obtained grades As and Bs, but a surprising amount of intellegent people gained mainly Cs and Ds.

Yes, this hinges on how motivated pupils are, but a lot of very motivated and very intellegent peers of mine were struggling to gain the top grades. Not just at my comprehensive school but friends at nearby grammar schools.

I am interested to see the spread of the top grades across the whole country, where they are located, and how densley.

And with the spelling above I'm shocked all the more at the my A level grade in English Lit.

Coverage of A-Level results tends to follow the same formula year on year, and IMHO it's a bit tedious. Hats off to the channels who try to round up a decent range of kids instead of the straight-As students that the schools want them to use (and who are likely to be the most confident and willing to appear on TV).

However, it tends only ever to be a one-day thing as far as the news outlets are concerned, and that makes it all a bit pointless - at the end of the day, who really cares how Joe Bloggs from North London did in his exams?

I'd like to see them take a handful of students with a range of results, follow them through the next stages (clearing, preparing for uni, rethinking their whole game plan etc) and then, on results day next year, speak to them one year on and find out how things worked out for them.

That's a good idea, that - although it's probably the case that the researcher who gets assigned to finding some sixth formers for a report isn't going to be in the same department by the same time next year..

Well whaddaya know.. three months ago, the 10 o'clock news spoke to some 6th formers who were about to do their A-levels, and then they spoke to them again today..