Monkey Tennis

Just shut down the supply for the house. Stay safe etc.

What do you need to lift it for?

The element in our oven blew yesterday (Cue Kenneth Williams probably). As no proper man could come out to fit it, I had to buy a replacement and fit it myself. I managed to do it. For someone as useless as regards such matters, this represents a colossal triumph.

Is it not schools that are considered concordant (or not) rather than faculties or departments within them?

You seem to be missing my point, deliberately or otherwise. I don't see how your first sentence ensures fairness for dear old LS at all. His level of inferred attainment, as judged by his individual class teacher, will be considered in the context of how well that teacher's colleagues (in different subjects but the same building) have traditionally performed this function. There are arbitrary elements to that surely? Most years, pupil performance shapes the wider attainment picture; this year it'll be required to fit it. I don't want to overstate it. I know that pass marks etc have always got shifted around to ensure a wider pattern is conformed to. It's been based on actual performance in the past though, a luxury that won't exist this time. I can foresee micro sacrifices being made, to ensure that something acceptable on a macro level emerges.

The point isn't to do with whether our lazy sod should have worked harder, earlier or not. The point is to do with the fact that our lazy sod's twin who attends a neighbouring school, has a different chance of having his identically optimistic estimate stand, based on nothing to do with the work either has produced.

We're both surely familiar with the lazy sod with a half decent brain who gets an act together in May, having displayed little that was encouraging beforehand? His (for it's usually a he) chances of success this year will be reliant on an estimate that must strive to recognise this "inferred" as opposed to "demonstrated" attainment. If he attends a school - perhaps one with 100+ teachers, that generally gets this stuff right, he's more likely to have that estimate stand than he might be, should he attend an institution where the staff have a more erratic record.

Yes, but they'll struggle to show evidence of the "inferred attainment" which is allowed to colour an estimate.

Well yes but that's a concern. Individuals are at the mercy of factors like the degree of concordance historically displayed by their entire school, rather than by the teacher making the estimate. There's scope here for lots of very flawed little pictures being pieced together to create a satisfactory looking big one.

Yes, the steps between submission of estimates, and finalising of grades, are clearly going to involve number crunching and are designed to ensure that 2020's ultimate results don't look way out of line. Within that though, I'm sure that there will be plenty of individuals who are not well served.

A further difficulty in England was that some universities were offering 'conditional unconditionals', the condition being that the candidate picked that university as their firm choice. That is unethical and reflects the 'bums on seats' direction that much of higher education has been dragged in. Unconditional offers have always been a Scottish feature of course because by the time most apply, a round of Highers has already been sat. We're getting tighter guidance just today, on how to frame estimates, and what the SQA will then subject them to, before arriving at final grades. These estimates apply at all levels though, and are quite distinct from the predicted grades offered to UCAS, typically back in around October.

I would have thought so, but apparently they can't proceed with the process "in a safe and secure manner". They claim to "have taken this difficult decision to be as fair as possible to all National 5 learners".

Why yes, because there are clearly only two ways to attend football: Either in the fashion outlined above, or when steaming drunk. Good point.

Yes, I heard that the other day. Predicted grades are a bit daft in a Scottish context because they come so early in courses, but UCAS require them. In the rest of the UK, they've assumed exaggerated significance, because some universities have taken to making unconditional offers to kids who have yet to sit any A Levels. It's not really on and probably won't last as a practice.

Well external SQA marking, even of N5 coursework which has already been collected from schools, is not going to happen at all this year. A strange sounding decision, but there we are.