We have heard time and time again that grades on a piece of paper will not define you. That may be true, but these grades, these letters on a pulp of wood, do define our future. On 11th August 2020, we were presented with probably the most controversial results on behalf of Cambridge according to which students with Cs and Ds were awarded As and A*s but students with As and Bs were granted Es and Us. 

I am a student in AS. My result probably won’t matter at all because I can turn it all around by getting good grades in A2. But I too got grades that I did not deserve, and that did not make any sense. I got an A in Chemistry, a C in Mathematics, and a C in Physics. I can say without a speck of doubt in my mind that I did not deserve an A in chemistry. Throughout my school year, I did not get a grade higher than a B in my Chemistry exams. I did not participate in classes, and most of the time, did not understand anything. But despite my mediocre performance in AS, I got an A. On the other hand, I have been a top achiever in Mathematics throughout my academic career. Not only did I get an A* in Mathematics in O Levels, but I also got an A in Additional Mathematics. On top of that, in my AS I got As and A*s in school. But the grade I was awarded was a C. I do not know what “evidence” Cambridge used and what “standardisation process” took place but I do know from seeing my own grades, that this result was NOT reflective of what I actually deserved. 

I am not writing this to get my grades changed because they will not affect me. I am writing this article because I see all the students in A2. They have just lost their futures because of this unreliable, unfair and unjust grading system that Cambridge spewed up without a second thought as to how students will suffer. 40% of the predicted grades sent in by schools have been downgraded and not just by a couple of grades. I personally know people who were downgraded from an A to a D or even an E. 

In this terrifying and stressful time, in the middle of a pandemic, we not only have to worry about our health, but now we have to struggle to get into a half-decent university? We have to compete with students of FSC who got their marks doubled, and then 3% marks added to their previous results? Our efforts and our hard work for the past 14 years of our academic careers are being marginalised and being reduced to dust all because of grades that in no way whatsoever reflect our intellect or our capabilities but rather how our schools performed in the past years. 

What about those students that could not afford to study in an exceptional private school which had gotten near-perfect results since it was established? Maybe those students had hoped to study in a good university by getting a scholarship and perhaps because of these results they lost that scholarship or even their admissions. Maybe they can’t afford to reappear for their exams. 

We NEED our government to support us. We NEED universities to change their criteria, to compensate for this biased grading system that does not reflect our potential, our intellect, and our true capability. 

By Beenish Majd