From: susher@vax.oxford.ac.uk
Newsgroups: soc.culture.british
Subject: <None>
Date: 8 Sep 92 09:50:32 GMT
Organization: Oxford University VAX 6620

In article <1992Sep7.220551.10677@news.Hawaii.Edu>, gerard@caliban.soest.hawaii.edu (Gerard Fryer) writes:
> In article <1992Sep6.143944.9594@cl.cam.ac.uk>, ag129@cl.cam.ac.uk (Alasdair Grant) writes:
> |> 
> |> I'm surprised Americans haven't heard of A-levels, as they are used  
> |> (like the Baccalaureate) quite widely outside Britain, to allow students
> |> from backward countries to get a recognised secondary qualification.
> |> In Australia I did a general maths A-level, which was at least a year's
> |> work beyond the Australian Pure and Applied Maths high school certificates
> |> I did later that year. The British universities who regulate A-levels make
> |> a lot of money overseas, I think.
> 
> This may indicate a double standard.  Do you know whether the A-level
> exam in Australia was the same standard as the exam prepared for home
> consumption in Britain?  I suspect that the Australian exam was at a
> significantly higher level.
> 
> Here's my experience, admittedly aeons ago (late sixties).  In Malaysia
> I took the University of Cambridge GCE (overseas) exam - supposedly the
> equivalent of O-levels (the A-level equivalent at that time was the HSC
> - higher school certificate).  Then I went to England and spent a
> couple of months at Hendon Tech (actually at an annexe in Burnt Oak) in
> preparation for the University of London GCE A-levels.  It seemed like
> a bit of a gamble to take the exams little more than a year after the
> "O," especially as I had been out of school for most of the interim.
> In panic I bailed out of Chemistry so I could concentrate on what, for
> me, were the important subjects: Physics, Pure Maths, and Applied
> Maths.
> 
> Ha!  I needn't have bothered.  The London A-levels were nowhere near
> the standard of the Cambridge overseas GCE (in Applied Maths, my best
> subject, I wasted much of the time searching for hidden tricks, then
> realised with disgust that there weren't any; the entire paper was
> fourth-form level).  I felt as if I had wasted my time.  Two friends
> from Malaysia who subsequently came to London felt even more cheated -
> they had soldiered on to take the Cambridge HSC in Malaysia the usual
> two years beyond the GCE, and so found themselves a full year behind
> me.  Not only that, but a large proportion of their first year work
> (one was taking Physics at Queen Mary College, the other Maths at
> University College) was a repeat of stuff they had studied in school.
> 
> There were two possible explanations: either the Cambridge standard was
> much tougher than the London, or the overseas standard was much tougher
> than that applied domestically.  One of my English friends provided us
> with his Cambridge A-level questions.  In comparing these with my own
> London A-levels we did find that the Cambridge questions were harder,
> but only marginally so.  The real eye-opener was comparing the
> Cambridge A-levels with the Cambridge HSC.  The HSC was systematically
> harder and covered a broader range of topics.  Our conclusion was
> inevitable: the overseas exam was intentionally made more difficult to
> screen out uneducated wogs.

The Cambridge exams were well know for being far tougher, but it depended upon
the syllabus (sp?). Most of my 'O' level papers (Cambridge Local Examinations
Syndicate) had on the top of the paper a pre-able which said that it was both
for the 'O' level and for the overseas exams, my 'A' level papers were
similarly marked. (Maths, Physics, Chemistry)

I know that some of my friends in other schools had different syllabi (sp?),
all the papers seemed to be easier than the ones I did. The Nufield Board exams
were by far the easiest, in fact it seemed that the 'A' level Nufield exam
paper was only up to the standard of my 'O' level papers. So much for
standards.

> 
> I am English but in Malaysia I had been coopted into the Chinese
> community.  For my two Malaysian friends, both Chinese, I could not
> return the favour; England's xenophobia was too strong.  Comparing the
> examinations appeared to be the last straw.  In my friends' eyes it
> demonstrated that the English are racist and here I was, no longer a
> foreigner, obviously English.  They damned me too.  The friendship
> decayed.
> -- 
> Gerard Fryer  (g.fryer@soest.hawaii.edu)     | One despairs of ever explaining 
> School of Ocean & Earth Science & Technology | research to those who need
> University of Hawaii at Manoa                | explanation, for ignorance is
>                                              | impregnable. - Keith Mather.

Steve