As I write this blog, today is Friday 18th June 2021. For anyone working with or in, or has anything to do with secondary or tertiary education (if that’s still a phrase), be that as a parent, student, carer, tutor, teacher, SLT, lecturer, TA or admin, today is THE DAY. Today is the day when this shitstorm of an academic year reaches its crescendo, and when everything everyone has been through over the last 15 months is all condensed down to a spreadsheet of marks, and a filing cabinet (or many filing cabinets) of evidence to back up that spreadsheet.

I feel very emotional writing this blog, and I am just a mum and a tutor. I don’t work in a school or college at the moment, I am no where near management or SLT or head of subject/area/faculty. I am just me, a tutor with one student who took two subjects, and a mum to a teen who took 8.

In 8 weeks, we will know what the exam boards make of the blood, sweat and tears that have gone into that spreadsheet. We will know that grade, somewhere between 1 and 9, that officially defines the last 18 months, on results day. The press will be full of condemnation however it goes. If grades are too low – boo to schools. If grades are too high – boo to schools. If the grades are exactly where they are expected to be – boo to schools. It’s a no-win situation for education establishments. It always is, mind you, but will be especially so this year.

I was the first year to take GCSEs, 33 years ago (had to retype that bit as I forgot how old I was!). Our grades, as a cohort, were good. Therefore, according the to papers, GCSEs were ‘easy’. Looking back I think that the schools all did an amazing job in changing an entire curriculum pre internet, when queries had to be made by phone or letter, and we did well, because the teachers rose to the challenge (as they always to), were supported by the admin staff (as they always are) and did what they needed to do – and this was shown on results day up and down the country in August 1988.

2021, however, is nothing like 1988. We are still in the grips of a pandemic. Schools are still having to isolate year groups – and teachers – when there is a positive Covid case. Schools have had to work incredibly hard during the pandemic, with teachers teaching online as well as face to face, they have had to deal with uncertainty and changing guidelines, and they have also had to deal with upset & worried students, and upset, worried or pushy parents.

So, here we are. 18th June. We’ve done it. We’ve got here. There is nothing else to do now (for parents and students at least, there are still lots of things for teachers to do & worry about as the results will all be audited by the exam boards). What’s done is done.

And the thing is, in August when the GCSE, A-level and BTEC students get their results, the world will only see a tiny bit of what they have done this year. They will see a grade, a mark, a decision. They will see something external to the students. What they won’t see is the amazing achievement it is to be here. To have made it through education in 2021. To still be smiling, to still have their friends, to just be. In years to come, people won’t be interested in their grades or how they were assessed, they will be interested in their stories of this year. People won’t be bothered if they did months of assessments or just a mad rush at the end, or if they did their assessments online, in person or as homework. That won’t matter. The students of 2021 will be asked what it was like, how they felt, if they were scared, if they felt trapped. How did they manage, was the toilet roll shortage as bad as people say, what masks did they wear, and so on. Yes, the grades will matter, but not as much as in other years. Our amazing teens have lived through a pandemic, the worst in living memory, They were trapped at home with us, they were learning online, they learnt skills that teens really shouldn’t have to learn – and their teachers and the support staff have been pretty amazing too.

I know it’s been hard, and we wouldn’t wish this on anyone, especially our teens, but they’ve done it. Let’s remember everything that everyone has been through, and whatever the results say in 8 weeks time, let’s celebrate the stories, the personal achievements and everything that they, and their teachers, have done.