One-third of students reach 16 without a good pass in maths. As Simon Jenkins points out, most will endure a cycle of unsuccessful post-16 resits (GCSEs harm our young people. Ministers should have the guts to abolish them – and start again, 20 March). But it is wrong to call maths obsolete – financial literacy is impossible without a solid foundation in maths, to say nothing of the skills needed in a tech-driven economy.
Rather than abandoning GCSE maths, we need to do more to support the so-called “forgotten third”. Improving early secondary education in the subject and introducing a short course GCSE focusing on the fundamentals would be a good start. Jenkins’ suggestion of abolishing GCSEs is neither desirable nor practical. Enacting such a change would eat up capacity in a system with little to spare.
However, reform is needed. As the OCR exam board noted last year, there is an overreliance on exams at 16, and much of the curriculum is overloaded and outdated. OCR has called for fewer exams – alongside a streamlining of the curriculum in places and more subjects such as digital literacy and climate education. We were pleased to see the curriculum and assessment review’s interim report reflect these calls. The most effective way to make things better for students is by improving and building on the solid system we already have.
Jill Duffy
Chief executive, OCR exam board
• I took my GCSEs in 2018. I was a capable student, getting the highest grades in my comprehensive school. I went on to a first-class Oxford degree and now a PhD. GCSEs should have been made for me – someone who loved learning and had high academic ambitions, who could think on the spot and learn lots by rote. However, I spent my GCSE year with constant nausea and emetophobia. From a neurodevelopmental perspective, GCSEs come at the worst time for students, a time when there are so many competing pressures, and students are at higher risk of mental illness. The exams don’t even have any purpose any more given that education is compulsory up to 18.
Nothing in my academic career – Oxford interviews, finals at Oxford, the gruelling process of applying for PhDs – has ever been as hard as GCSEs were. If they didn’t work for me, who do they work for?
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