Argumentative Essay CW

Pressure of IGCSE’s

A close friend of the family was expected to receive high grades in his GCSEs. As the courses drew to a close, the pressure to succeed intensified from his teachers and parents. Barry became more withdrawn as the exams ominously approached. On the first week of exams, rather than attend school, he chose the local ‘pitch and putt’ golf course. Barry continued to do this until the school and his parents realised his absence. He was given counselling and the opportunity to re-sit but the same thing occurred for the second set of exams. The pressure was the main contributor to Barry leaving school with no qualifications and a lengthy spell in a psychiatric unit. This is just one of many people who have been effected by the pressure of school exams and each year the pressure increases causing students to feel the strain. Is it really worth putting students through exams for qualifications if the side effect is Mental Illness and Stress…

In the U.K. GCSEs are a compulsory academic qualification that school students aged 14-16 must take in their chosen subjects and must include the core subjects of Maths, English and Science. At the end of year 11 every student takes an end of course Examination. The grades achieved by each individual student dictates their future, deciding their next path academically, for example, sixth form college, University or work. Without a ‘passing grade’, it is highly unlikely that the student can continue into University and study further their chosen subject.

Universities are becoming highly competitive with who they accept onto their courses; universities are looking for unique, intelligent, academically high achievers to enter into their programmes. Sixth form colleges are also becoming more selective on the students joining. Entry requirements range from 4-5 GCSEs with grades A*- C, however selective colleges would now like students with at least 6 A-grade GCSEs and as a result of this competition, students feel the excessive pressure from peers to achieve.

GCSEs are believed by some educational specialists to be a good indicator of how well a student will perform in further education. This belief is not held by everyone; it is difficult to believe that with much research showing that humans have ‘multiple intelligence’ every student should be judged similarly.

Another factor to consider is the young age of students making subject choices and life decisions which will affect the next sixty-seven and a half years of their lives. Making these decisions will affect their pensions and their future generations place in society, this may seem ridiculous, but the average life expectancy in the U.K is presently 80.5 years.

Aged thirteen, a child is still five years away from being able to vote, marry without consent or purchase a mortgage. We would never consider to ask a thirteen year old to decide on a ‘life partner’ and find it ridiculous that they financially tie themselves to a property for the next twenty five years. If such a world existed, we would hope that there would be a chance to re-consider their decisions but we do not even allow children to change their subject choices for GCSEs. They have to continue, there is no opportunity available to re-consider those decisions.

Aged fourteen, having studied for a year, there is still no consideration for change. The only option is to deliberately neglect a subject, causing a negative classroom situation or drop a subject, both options leave a pupil with feelings of failure.

Other educationalists would argue that a better solution is progressive testing of knowledge throughout the student’s secondary school life. This enables an enriched understanding of where each individual is growing academically. This way of learning is used successfully throughout Europe and one such style is the International Baccalaureates MYP programme.  This way of learning does mean that the students have more assessments yearly, however it is a favoured style of education by students as they can change their end of year grade throughout the course by improving their assessment grades, this makes the students on MYP courses feel less stress and pressure. I believe that this style of education should be used globally as student’s pressure levels and school suicide rates increase annually.

The increase in pressure for exams is causing students to become overwhelmed by stress, leading to mental illness in young people. A charity called ‘Young Minds’ has a 24-hour helpline specifically for under eighteens in the U.K. In 2010 they had reported six thousand three hundred and three calls in that year from the six million children living in the U.K in that year. However, 42% of those calls were about the topic of school and coping with the pressure of the exams.

The fact that these exams are causing people to be ill should indicate that something needs to be changed. However, with teachers constantly telling students ‘you are going to fail if you don’t pay attention’ or ‘there is no way you can pass at the rate you are working’ is not helping. If these exams continue in the future then the least that can be done, is to create a positive environment towards and around students. Schools are supposed to be enriching the lives of young adults enabling them to succeed, not applying a set of rules that only some pupils can use successfully.

Hearing negative comments, has a detrimental effect on working well, students instantly doubt their own ability to perform well and gain top grades. Children have the right to blossom and develop their individual special skills in areas were they excel, but if we misguidedly focus purely exam grades we are losing the chance to create a future generation of intelligent, unique, happy individuals. I believe the way forward is to stop all the pressure of exams and to focus on developing a wealth of individual talents.