The government should have trusted schools on A-levels

On Friday 20 March, I had an email exchange with a friendly professor at a top university. He confirmed that his prestigious course is heavily over subscribed. The course makes offers to double the number of students for whom it has places. Entry grades are set exceptionally high and only 60 per cent of places are taken by students who actually hit those grades. The remaining 40 per cent go to the nearest runners up. It’s a system of rationing and provided enough other factors are stable and the mechanism rigorous – it works.

A-level exam grades are currency. They can be traded advantageously and they have a crucial role as gate-keeper, allowing ‘the right students’ into university or appropriate training and careers. Hence my enquiry. For those of us who make it our business to be present at school for every results day, it was clear that cancelling the exams because of the pandemic would raise a serious question: How will we know who ‘the right students’ are now?

In late March schools were asked to set grades for their students and did so systematically.