The Cambridge Assessment International Education (CAIE) on Monday made a significant announcement that came as a sigh of relief for countless students.
The educational board announced that grades issued for June 2020 would not be lower than the predicted grade submitted by the school.
According to Cambridge;
if a grade that was issued last week higher than the predicted grade, the higher grade will stand.
Moreover, the CAIE has announced the grades for hundreds of thousands of students in Pakistan and around the world who sat during examinations under the grade prediction method.
What Happened?
This decision comes after students took it to social media to share their concerns. These students also pointed out that their grades were unfair and discriminatory.
On the other hand, Federal Minister Shafqat Mahmood, on his official Twitter account, tweeted about the news of CAIE agreeing to review its grading procedure for the recent O/A Levels results for Pakistan.
His tweet read:
As a result of our intervention conveying the anguish of our students, I have just heard that Cambridge has agreed to review its grading procedure regarding the recently declared results,
Great news. Our tireless effort has been successful. Cambridge has decided that grades for June 2020 would NOT BE LESS THAN PREFICTED GRADES SENT BY SCHOOLS. PLUS Where a grade issued last week was HIGHER THAN THE PREDICTED GRADE, THE HIGHER GRADE WILL STAND.
— Shafqat Mahmood (@Shafqat_Mahmood) August 17, 2020
We will issue new grades as soon as possible. We will also share the new grades with universities and admissions organizations as soon as we can in the coming days. We will post the new grades to Cambridge International Direct -CAIE
To overcome obstacles and work towards the betterment of children, schools were asked to work in collaboration with CAIE.
In April, we asked our schools to work collaboratively with us. WE know teachers worked extremely hard to gather evidence and work out predicted grades, and we have viewed a significant proportion of the evidence schools used to make their PREDICTIONS. -STATEMENT by Cambridge International
The International Baccalaureate (IB) has shared that it will make adjustments to the awarded results for Diploma Programme (DP) and Career-related Programme (CP) May 2020 session, where applicable. To do so, it will use predictive grades as well as coursework (IA).
Student Reactions
Due to the novel coronavirus pandemic, the examination system announced to suspend examination this year and introduce a predicted grading system based upon past performance and available evidence to issue certified certifications to students.
However, the announcement for an alternative grading system has to change after social media starts to lose their cool and started to spew hate.
However, plenty of students still have significant concerns.
Cambridge has announced they will give predicted grades but unfortunately some teachers have given bad grades just to oppose students..We need justice and 1-2 higher grade should be awarded #imrankhanjusticecie @BBhuttoZardari @ImranKhanPTI
— Abdullah Malhi (@AbdullahMalhi17) August 19, 2020
It is sad ke us cambridge students can get our grades right(by protests and getting our voice heard by the right people) but board students can't (while we were called cry babies for it lmao ) cambridge walo stand in support of ur board brothers na insafi unke sath kaafi Hui hai.
— Fatima | Pet stan account (@fatimamudasserb) August 19, 2020
Cambridge assured that we would be awarded with AS level grades and now just the opposite happened! @ucas_online @CambridgeInt #JusticeForPrivateCandidate
— Farin Farhad (@FarinFarhad) August 19, 2020
These students believe that the prediction system will cause their grades to fall and hurt their qualifications, causing many of them to lose their spots in universities and at chances of acquiring scholarships.
We have now to see what the future holds for examinations in Pakistan and how long these examinations will be based on predictive grades.
Stay tuned to Brandsynario.
