Transfer Test AQE 2014-2015

Mrs_mum

Hello Co Down mum and welcome to our duscussion, the reason that we are discussing the raw scores is that it will perhaps help the children and parents in the future sitting the tests to maybe gain a little better understanding as to how these scores are obtained, it is certainly not to blow the trumpets of the children (or the parents)who gained a score that will gain them entry into a grammar school and yes, I agree, it would be helpful if more people whose children are borderline with their score posted but as with all forums, you always have people following closely but never actually post! As a newbie to the whole AQE shambles, unlike yourself, I have greatly benefitted from the information, support and encouragement that I have received from this forum.

sca11ion

Hi Co Down mum

Co_Down_mum wrote: »

Hi All.

We have spoken to her about how we deal with both options both now and in the future should she end up in Secondary education and possibly wish to transfer if possible. By doing this we hope that she realises that this is not the end of the world and that she has options in the future and that we as her parents will work with her to achieve her goals.

100% agreed, and good luck. The unfortunate thing about any transfer test is that some kids and parents will have to deal with the feeling of not having achieved their goal. Personally, I would not have wanted my daughter to have had to go through it, would rather she had just gone to the next school with all her peers.

Co_Down_mum wrote: »

In reading this forum, can I say i really find all of these discussions on raw scores quite frustrating as they are mainly coming from parents with kids who have achieved a score of well above the level required to get into any school in Northern Ireland and they will have their choice of school. WHat is the point in going over information which frankly no one apart from AQE know the real method of scoring. It is what it is and the raw scoring is not going to make a blind bit of difference to anyone. The bottom line with all of this process is not what the top score is but what is the lowest score your child needed to get into their school of choice. PLease accept it if your child has done well and move on. I would appreciate more feedback from others in similar situations to me dealing with lower scores and the possibility of children not going to their school of choice with their friends.

Sorry rant over!!!

I understand the frustration - but can only reiterate what Mrs Mum has said. For me, the importance of RAW scores is just to give a bit more information to those parents with kids sitting the tests next year (or in future years - my turn again in 3 years) - so that we know what sort of score will give what sort of AQE result, and therefore have a bit of foresight re what % is required to get a particular AQE score, and an indication to what schools will accept.I honestly think that this is valuable information for the folk going through it next year and in the years afterwards.

flymetothemoon_2

sca11ion wrote: »

Hi flymetothemoon

what month was your son born?

Born in January

flymetothemoon_2

(Ask the school for your child’s NFERPIM and PIE scores for the past 5 years since P3. Average them out and I guarantee it will not be far off the money!!)


Sadly, not the case for my son either. His school gave us the NFER results each year and his AQE score of 103 is significantly lower than both.

I think all the tutoring is skewing everything when it comes to AQE. A boy in my sons class was tutored for 18 mths and just scored 118 in AQE ie: the highest boy's score in the class yet pre-tutoring he was never in the top end of the class? If people did not employ tutors for 1 - 2 years before the real tests we would all get more realistic results reflecting actual abilities. A friend of mine had her daughter tutored for a year to get her through AQE and she scored 106 and got into grammar of choice but is now (in 3rd year) really struggling and doing well in only 3 subjects. By contrast, my own daughter who got a borderline result (without the help of a tutor) is in our 2nd choice grammar in 4th yr and is doing extremely well in most subjects. I never doubted her ability. So what I'm trying to say is, if we did not have so much tutoring going on then maybe, the NFER PIE & PIM scores would be closer to AQE outcomes.

sca11ion

@flymetothemoon

difficult call re tutoring. Yes, I think it is skewing the results - those who can afford to tutor (or can but choose not to) as opposed to those with equal ability who do not get tutored for the tests. * also some schools choose to tutor, some don't *. Equally disadvantages some of the kids. It's almost like the richer parents giving their children an advantage - the ones who lose out are the children of folk who either can't or choose on ethical grounds not to have tutoring - but the whole thing is a bit of a mess.

And yes - tutoring will give an artificial result that will end up with some kids struggling at school - whereas they would have bloomed in a different school

N.I_Mum

All very interesting. Whilst I agree with the secret teacher its all about how your child compares to the average for us mums it is very confusing.But really I think its impossible to predict how your child is going to do going by their practice test score and we're wasting our time thinking about how aqe calculate the final score and as co Down Mum said what does it matter.it wont change anything.I think its just curiosity for alot if us and info for when our younger kids do it.I think all we can do is help them as much as we can and remember at the end of the day it does'nt really matter what school they go to so long as they work hard and settle in and are happy.Thats the main thing really.
Good luck to everyone and well done to all the kids regardless of score its an achievement to even sit the tests.

attritioner

sca11ion wrote: »

the importance of RAW scores is just to give a bit more information to those parents with kids sitting the tests next year (or in future years - my turn again in 3 years) - so that we know what sort of score will give what sort of AQE result, and therefore have a bit of foresight re what % is required to get a particular AQE score

Problem with this is that the relationship between the RAW score and the standardised score will change from year to year depending on the results - what you are posting is applicable for this year. Next year they will most likely change.

For example, if the tests are extremely difficult next year, and the maximum mark achieved by any child is 50%, that child will still acheive the maximum AQE standardised score.

All the standardisation process is doing is ranking the children against each other based on peer group and test - the actual percentages obtained in the test are irrelevant in the end, and they are not directly related from year to year.

sca11ion wrote: »

and an indication to what schools will accept.

Also, the reason you see a difference in the marks that certain schools accept from year to year is due to the actual number of children applying and the standardised mark they obtained. This can be seen by looking at how the marks have changed over the previous few years. Again, not something you can predict with any accuracy.

Co_Down_mum

Mrs_mum wrote: »

Hello Co Down mum and welcome to our duscussion, the reason that we are discussing the raw scores is that it will perhaps help the children and parents in the future sitting the tests to maybe gain a little better understanding as to how these scores are obtained, it is certainly not to blow the trumpets of the children (or the parents)who gained a score that will gain them entry into a grammar school and yes, I agree, it would be helpful if more people whose children are borderline with their score posted but as with all forums, you always have people following closely but never actually post! As a newbie to the whole AQE shambles, unlike yourself, I have greatly benefitted from the information, support and encouragement that I have received from this forum.

I certainly am not criticising the support that this forum can bring. What bothers me are those parents complaining that their child's score of 106+ is less than expected etc etc. Really this test is a means to an end. A horrible stressful unfair means to an end. But when the end result means a child gets the school of their choice then I think the parent should be grateful and leave it at that. To say scores are lower than expected when the child was likely getting close to 85% + makes me angry and I hope that the children do not have to see this disappointment. Try dealing with disappointment when your child scores less than 90!! This is not aimed at you Mrs mum but I wanted you to realise my frustration in reading these posts.

Also as attritioner says every year is different and it is effected by many factors so all of this speculation really doesn't count for much and remains as speculation only and aqe will never reveal the true me this of scoring

sca11ion

attritioner wrote: »

Problem with this is that the relationship between the RAW score and the standardised score will change from year to year depending on the results - what you are posting is applicable for this year. Next year they will most likely change.

Yes, agreed. But it's a start in collating info from year to year (even to see how it changes, and undoubtedly it will). I disagree that the actual percentages obtained are irrelevant - they are not going to be "directly related" each year, but will be similar enough to give parents a bit of foresight. It's not as if 80% will give an AQE mark of 110 one year and 80 the next, it's a lot closer than that - but we will at least see see. For example, 78% seems to have been the benchmark this year for the 100 score. We can compare that next year etc.

attritioner wrote: »

Also, the reason you see a difference in the marks that certain schools accept from year to year is due to the actual number of children applying and the standardised mark they obtained. This can be seen by looking at how the marks have changed over the previous few years. Again, not something you can predict with any accuracy.

Again, not sure I agree. Point being that schools haven't changed considerably over last few years with the scores they have accepted have they, surely a level of consistency there within margins? So parents can be a little more informed of what to expect, given a final result. (And not to say don't apply if there is any chance)

thesecretteacher

Guys I am really sorry that there is so much confusion and frustration over your child's final score but I can only go on the information I have over many years in school.

Since 2009 we have had 284 pupils sit the new AQE test. There has only been 9 pupils outside of a 3 mark deviation from their NFER scores averaged out from P3-P7. HOWEVER this is based on the assumption that schools do not prepare them for the NFER tests either....something which unfortunately does happen due to scrutiny of these results by our great inspectorate. I know of 2 schools beside us who do a 2 week revision course prior to sitting NFER. If parents are never being told the truth then undoubtedly frustration will creep in.
As a point of order NILA and NINA are not the same as NFER PIM and PIE. These were tests designed by Mr ODowd that were not fit for purpose and scrapped at huge cost £100m !!! NFER are the illegal tests that bear no weighting according to DENI and yet are the first data that the inspectors ask for when they arrive in to school....aggghhhhhh!