Stephen Drill: UK Year 12 students avoid exams but face uncertain university placement future
The pandemic has been declared the biggest crisis the UK has faced since the Second World War, yet the country who lead the charge at Normandy now can’t even manage their A Levels.
Opinion
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Winston Churchill towers over British life.
PM Boris Johnson wrote a book about the wartime leader, and the coronavirus pandemic has been declared the biggest crisis the UK has faced since the Second World War.
I had dinner at St Paul’s, a former school in Hammersmith now converted into a hotel, where Churchill, King George VI and then General Dwight Eisenhower discussed the daring D-Day invasion of France that was the turning point in that conflict.
It’s a beautiful red brick building, which is now surrounded by ugly modern structures, a clear sign in London of where the bombs fell because the ones that were rebuilt went for substance over style.
In 1944, Britain, with the help of the US, were able to land 156,000 soldiers on the beaches of Normandy and ultimately turn the war.
You would have to be wondering what Winston would be saying as he smoked his cigar and drank a brandy about the response to the current crisis.
The pandemic response has been more like the fall of Singapore. And this week, university placements and school exams have put the icing on the cake.
The British government scrapped exams for students during coronavirus and let teachers predict what grades they would have got based on their previous work.
It really was the year to be a teacher’s pet.
Unsurprisingly, teachers were generous with their markings and there were more As than ever before.
The Education Department then thought it would be a smart idea to plug everyone’s grades into a computer, then spit out new grades, with a cap on the percentage of As allowed.
Like an episode of Little Britain, the computer said no.
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It was based on where people lived, so some bright students who were in poorer areas were penalised even though they would have earned good marks.
Now, the computer has been thrown in the pool and everyone gets an A, which has meant that there are not enough university places for everyone.
Some universities, including Durham, have offered to pay students thousands of dollars to take gap years and guarantee them first choice of accommodation in 2021.
It would be an attractive option, at the very least because freshers (orientation week) has been banned due to social distancing.
But with coronavirus racing throughout much of the world, the backpacking trails may also be a tricky option.
The big test for the UK will be when schools are due to open next month. Education Secretary Gavin Williamson has his head on the block, and if they fail to open, it’s likely the guillotine will drop.
If Boris Johnson, who is on holidays with his fiancee Carrie Symonds, wants to be remembered with some of the fondness of Churchill, he will need the school bells to ring, otherwise the UK economy will struggle to bounce back.
stephen.drill@news.co.uk