If you are not doing well at school

and you are over the leaving age should you be asked to leave?

The question has come up again after the final year results came out. It comes up every year. All schools, not just fee paying schools, want to keep their results looking good. 

Some schools also have suspiciously high results. Are we really expected to believe there was a 100% or close to 100% pass rate? Did all those students do so well they obtained a place at university which was their first choice? We all know it doesn't work like that. Even the schools themselves do not try to pretend that happens.

But what about the other students, the students who are struggling? I went through school on the old Public Examinations Board or PEB system. There was Intermediate (sub-O level), Leaving (rather like the old O levels) and Leaving Honours (in standard rather less than A level but a bit above the O level grades). Very few students actually did Leaving Honours. You could get to university on good Leaving results or go to teacher training college. All you needed for what was then called "technical college" was a few Intermediate subjects.  

All this was of great concern to the Senior Cat when he was principal of several rural "area schools".  The area school stream was not a problem. It was like the then technical high schools in the city except that exams were internally set and marked. The PEB stream was different. The exams were externally set and you had to pay to do each subject separately.  Being relatively small schools compared with the big city schools the Senior Cat and his teachers always had a fair idea whether students would pass or fail. They could have suggested to anyone that they did not enter for any particular subject. I remember one boy who was really struggling with Intermediate physics saying he thought he would not pass. The teacher (who didn't know much physics himself but had to teach it) suggested he not sit the exam. The Senior Cat said, "No. He might just manage it. He won't need to do it again." The boy did get through on the lowest acceptable pass rating.  I remember all this because I helped him as he tried to do all the problems at the rear of the text book.  Doing that helped me pass the exam as well.

In some schools this boy would not have done the exam at all and it would have changed a lot of things. (He went on to do science at university and work in the wine industry winning a number of awards.)  

This is what makes it so difficult. Nobody wanted him to fail and failures don't look good on academic records but should that stop people if they want to try? Do we need to be realistic and say, "If you want to try then do try. Yes, you may not succeed but at least you will have tried. You will have had the experience. If you don't succeed then you can try again." There are very few instances where failing once is the end of the matter.  

A previous Governor of this state once told me that no Rhodes' scholar gets there at the first attempt. They always need to try at least twice.  Failing the first time is not really failure. It is a practice run for the real thing. Candidates who don't try again are never going to be good enough for that particular scholarship. 

It may be the same with some school examinations. Failure the first time around doesn't need to be a disaster. It can be a learning experience. "I tried the exam but I didn't really know what to expect. Now I do know and I can try again."

And if you don't want to do it at all? Shouldn't there be other pathways you can follow? Failing an exam or not sitting one at all should not be seen as the end of the world. Schools should be proud of all students who do the best they can. Does the overall result really need to count more than the individual one?