AQE Exam Results

Ex-Spendaholic

Well I would imagine that all places are deemed "provisional" until the process is complete. That is why they cannot give a cut off score at this time as that could all change. For example cut off could be 98 at round 3 and then in round 4 that could move to 100. I would imagine the kids with the really high scores eg 113 and above should all be relatively safe as I would think it unlikely that there would be people in rounds 4, 5 and 6 who have been turned down by their first 3 preference schools. :eek:

This of course is all my own understanding or misunderstanding as the case maybe of how the system is working.

As I said last week I was told by a Principal that I could be confident on my child's score of 104. There is of course no guarantee at this stage and for all I know my child's application could currently be sitting in his 4th or 5th choice school (please god no!) :eek:

kingston_2730

Ex-Spendaholic wrote: »

First 3 rounds of applications have been done, so there are potentially another 3 rounds which should happen this week. No-one can really give a cut off score for a particular school at this point as they don't know what is lurking in the applications still to come.

For example a candidate A with 108 applies to Regent House and is in on the first round, the 2nd round they get moved out as people with higher marks didn't get their first preference school. Candidate A's application then moves on to Sullivan. Candidate A secures a place in Sullivan but knocks out someone else who was in there on 107. We will call him Candidate B. Candidate B's application then travels on to Grosvenor. The candidate is accepted in Grosvenor knocking someone with 106 out - Candidate C. Candidate C then has a form on the way to Wellington College where he is accepted knocking out someone below him on 105 - Candidate D. Candidate D with 105 then has his form moving on to Inst. Meanwhile Candidate B is ousted from Grosvenor when Candidate E who had been happy and safe in Methody is ousted by someone not accepted by BRA. Candidate B is then back in the system thus having a knock on effect on Candidate C as he has put Wellington as his 3rd choice and the whole thing starts all over again. Confused? I am :rotfl:

That is how I see the system anyway and its why no-one can give any guarantees at this stage.

OMG I feel nervous for the first time here. I have always felt very positive about son's score of 102. Was told verbally and by email by sons first choice grammar that he had an excellent chance of gaining admission. I was also told by the principle of BRA (his second choice) during the tour that he did not think my son would have any problem gaining admission. I guess I really took this advice to heart and now I am thinking what if they were all wrong???? I agree with ex-spendaholic re the procedure although I was hoping that the scores that would be bumping others and also being bumped would be much lower. I am just thinking back to what principle of BRA said EXACTLY. What he said was that son should not have a problem and that he expected the first cut off to be around 98 or 99. So I guess it all depends on 1)how accurate he was on this prediciton 2)if first cut off was 98 or 99 would further rounds then have gone up as high as 102 which would be when my son would be bumped off. I actually feel sick now thinking about this. I don't feel confident at all now and certainly hope I have not been fed false hope by various heads of grammars. Help:eek:

Ex-Spendaholic

Kingston, all marks stated in my posts are purely illustrative and a load of nonsense really so please don't go comparing them with your son's score. :eek: They are not indicitive of what is going on out there, I was just having a ramble. :rotfl: None of us know. At the end of the day when we were all speaking to Principals back in February they were basing their predictions on the marks of the kids who sat the tests in their school. They were bound to know that if they had 150 places and 200 sat the test there what their lowest mark was from that selection of candidates and then had to factor in the fact that they would have other applications from kids who sat the tests elsewhere.

I wish I could go to sleep and wake up on the day the letter is due. I have recurrent dreams of what that letter is going to say and have had every scenario possible.

Bonno_2

Do BRA have a "pool" like Strathearn and Bloomfield. And please could someone explain how this pool works? My understanding for Strathearn is admissions no: 110 -the first 95 in rank order and then a "pool"(next highest scores) of 25 to fill the remaining 15 places. The 25 are then put in order by admissions criteria and not score.... so for example: a child with say 90 whose sister is already at the school would get, and a child with 95 with no connections wouldnt???? Eh?

Ex-Spendaholic

I don't think BRA have a pool. Its not one of my chosen schools so I can't be definite on that. I know Campbell had a pool and they used criteria such as son of a former pupil, sibling of a current pupil, feeder primaries etc. Either way my child was meeting none of the criteria for the pool.

kingston_2730

No, I can confirm that BRA are thankfully not using the 'pool' system. They are going on strict rank order only which I personally feel is more fair. BRA will only use other criteria when there is a tie. Ex spendaholic, don't worry I knew that your figures were only illustrative but it did get me thinking that I may be just taking too much for granted. I wish this nightmare were over and like you I would love to go to sleep for the next 5 weeks and wake up on the morning of May 29th!!!

KATHYBEAR

Bonno, you are right about strathearn, they take the first 95 top scores straight away. Then there is a pool of 25 for the last 15 places.
So criteria is then used on just these 25 children to place them in a new order. Then the top 15 are offered a place.
So yes you could get a lower score in the pool of children but get in as you went to penryn or has a sister at the school.
My girl has a score of 111 so i am hoping to get in straightaway as we have no previous connections with the school!

newtownabbey_mum

kingston_2730 wrote: »

OMG I feel nervous for the first time here. I have always felt very positive about son's score of 102. Was told verbally and by email by sons first choice grammar that he had an excellent chance of gaining admission. I was also told by the principle of BRA (his second choice) during the tour that he did not think my son would have any problem gaining admission. I guess I really took this advice to heart and now I am thinking what if they were all wrong???? I agree with ex-spendaholic re the procedure although I was hoping that the scores that would be bumping others and also being bumped would be much lower. I am just thinking back to what principle of BRA said EXACTLY. What he said was that son should not have a problem and that he expected the first cut off to be around 98 or 99. So I guess it all depends on 1)how accurate he was on this prediciton 2)if first cut off was 98 or 99 would further rounds then have gone up as high as 102 which would be when my son would be bumped off. I actually feel sick now thinking about this. I don't feel confident at all now and certainly hope I have not been fed false hope by various heads of grammars. Help:eek:

thats why maybe its best not to contact the school?principle and just wait for the results on the day. Only means more worry

kingston_2730

newtownabbey_mum wrote: »

thats why maybe its best not to contact the school?principle and just wait for the results on the day. Only means more worry

I had a momentary panic there and have recovered . Newtownabbey mum, while a understand what you are saying,I have to disagree. I actually do think that getting info from school principle is certainly worth a try for anyone that can manage to get any info out of them and would certainly encourage people to give it a shot! I am pretty sure that ex-spendaholic is glad she contacted the principle . I also think that contacting the school principle is a much better tactic than simply repeatedly asking folks on here if they know what the cut off for BRA is? I highly doubt that anyone on here will be able to tell you that and you would have a much better idea if you could get this information from the principle. I have told you before that the principle of BRA advised me that my son's score of 102 will be fine so quite frankly I don't see why you are worried about your daughters score of 112 not being good enough

Lisburn_Mum_2

I have pasted a response that I got from AQE at the time of the results. I spoke to the grammar school principal that I hope my daughter will go to and he advised me that looking at these scores/grades he has not seen anything that would make him believe that it will not be the same type of intake as in previous years.

Although, as you said, AQE do not provide official grades with our scores we can give a rough guide to try and help parents (and children) understand their result better. The top band would have been all As, the second mostly As with the beginning of the B1s, the middle band would have been the remainder of the B1s and the high B2s, the fourth band then would include the rest of the B2s and start of the C’s.