O level Results

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Katharine
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O level Results

Post by Katharine »

This morning I heard that some Scottish students are getting their results by text this year. We were the last year to sit O levels in a 3 term year at Hertford. We had to write a self addressed postcard, with our subjects listed on the back. DR filled in the grades, and in my case wrote Well Done DRW.

What happened when it was a four term year? I can't remember whether the Lower VI all came back and then might have to disappear in tears or what.

Incidentally, my O Levels would hardly have shown a high flyeror Oxbridge material, Ax2, Bx2, Cx2 D & E. By the present standards of 10 A* they seem very poor!
Katharine Dobson (Hills) 6.14, 1959 - 1965
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Re: O level Results

Post by Jo »

In my year (1973) we were still on holiday and got our results at home. By that stage we had graduated to SAEs so the whole world didn't see our results in advance! Actually, the day they were published my friends and I were all on the phone to each other, and I discovered that one of them had phoned school and got her results that way - a couple of days quicker than waiting for the post. So I did it too, and I think I probably spoke to Miss Tucker direct rather than to her secretary. So by the time we were due back at school we all knew where we stood.

BTW Katharine, I'm pretty sure that your results would be equivalent to 10 A*s by today's standards :D
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Re: O level Results

Post by englishangel »

in 1970 we got our 0 Level results after we got back to school and I remember us ambushing Queenie as she drove in as we had all passed, much to our surprise, altho' of course she wasn't.
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Re: O level Results

Post by midget »

We did the postcard thing. I'd been waiting every day for the postie, and eventually he came up the drive waving thecard and yelling "It's OK, you've passed"
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Re: O level Results

Post by englishangel »

I got my nursing results like that. I had failed the first time in front of all my peers, but the second time, I had moved away, fortunately I passed, kissed the postman much to his surprise. Got the results on Saturday and started midwifery training on the Monday. A year later I was on holiday when the midwifewry results came out and had to ring before breakfast from the hotel. When I got to the breakfast table there was a 1/2 bottle of champagen on it, fortunately I had passed, though there hadn't been much doubt this time.

When the letter came from CH to say I had been accepted my Mum brought it to me to open. Many years later I discovered she had steamed it open first. When the A level results came out I told her I would do bad things to her if she did it again.
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Re: O level Results

Post by Katharine »

Jo wrote:BTW Katharine, I'm pretty sure that your results would be equivalent to 10 A*s by today's standards :D
Thanks Jo, I must admit I have been known to mutter 'I got A level Grade A when it really was A level Grade A'

If any of the current Blues read this, I am well aware that you can only take the exams you are set and that things are very different now from then. There have been great changes in the syllabus and exams since our day and I have the greatest respect for those with excellent results today.
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Re: O level Results

Post by Jo »

I had a cunning plan with A level results to be able to read them in private and then, with the luxury of a little time, to decide on a strategy for breaking any bad news to my parents. This consisted of leading them to believe they came out the same time as O level results, and of getting a friend to address my envelope to me. The last few days before they were due out I was feeling quite smug that my parents wouldn't be expecting anything, and that I would be receiving in the post a "letter from a friend".

Imagine my disgruntlement when my mother handed me said "letter from a friend", saying "your A level results have arrived". How did she know? "I recognised your writing on the envelope" Eh???? I didn't think it was anything like my writing but maybe to the middle-aged all eighteen year olds' writing is the same. I guess they were also well aware when the results were due out. I was quite deflated :(

Fortunately the results were perfectly respectable so in the event no subterfuge was necessary :D
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Re: O level Results

Post by icomefromalanddownunder »

I was in France when my O level results arrived, and walking the Cornish Coastal Footpath when A level results arrived <sigh>.

To cap it all, Prof rang from Leeds to pass on the good news that I had failed a Physiology resit while I was waitressing at the Royal Festival Hall, and Mum took the call.

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Re: O level Results

Post by Katharine »

I've just remembered something else about our O level results, we were expected to write to our teachers to tell them what grades we had got, and thank them for teaching us. These were not easy letters to me to compose, I can remember sitting there pen in hand not having a clue what to say.

Do you think Queenie and the others had class lists so they could tick us all as the letters arrived? Surely they would have found out from school what their results were. This always happened when I was teaching, I can't remember anyone ever writing to tell me and to thank me.
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Re: O level Results

Post by icomefromalanddownunder »

Katharine wrote:I've just remembered something else about our O level results, we were expected to write to our teachers to tell them what grades we had got, and thank them for teaching us. These were not easy letters to me to compose, I can remember sitting there pen in hand not having a clue what to say.

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

I intended to write BO@@OCKS across a copy of mine and send it to DR, but Ma restrained me.

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Re: O level Results

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My O level results arrived when I was working in a cafe as a holiday job. Was so nervous I spilt vinegar on them ! The results, still readable: 4 passes, but I was disappointed as I had failed one of my favourite subjects-German. I passed it the following summer tho. I found Mr Watson ok, Miss Riddiford could be moody-she corrected my work in strong red biro , quite often putting negative comments underlined. At times she was more positive, and praised my essays.Would have liked to have learnt Latin, but in the B form at that time it wasn't an option. French, German and English were the only lessons I liked at CH. I felt very unmotivated to work otherwise.
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Re: O level Results

Post by Fjgrogan »

I left CH in the LVI and went on to do different A levels elsewhere. The day my A level results arrived I was doing a holiday job in the local tax office where we handled the employees of a number of Kensington hotels. That day a Spanish waiter came in to the counter, who spoke very little English and someone remembered that I had just passed A level Spanish (only barely!) so I was sent out to deal with him. My Spanish was really not up to the task, because I didn't have the necessary tax vocabulary - let's face it PAYE is difficult enough to understand in English - but we somehow managed to sort out the problem between us in French.
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Re: O level Results

Post by Jo »

fra828 wrote:My O level results arrived when I was working in a cafe as a holiday job. Was so nervous I spilt vinegar on them ! The results, still readable: 4 passes, but I was disappointed as I had failed one of my favourite subjects-German. I passed it the following summer tho. I found Mr Watson ok, Miss Riddiford could be moody-she corrected my work in strong red biro , quite often putting negative comments underlined. At times she was more positive, and praised my essays.Would have liked to have learnt Latin, but in the B form at that time it wasn't an option. French, German and English were the only lessons I liked at CH. I felt very unmotivated to work otherwise.
You must have been there a similar time to me, as I also remember Mr Watson & Miss Riddiford - I know they were there for a while afterward so perhaps you were a little after me. I didn't find Miss Riddiford moody, but I did find her lazy. I think I have written before on here how when we were in the 5th form she used to amble back really late after break - sometimes a 40 minute lesson became 30 minutes - and would often take up a chunk of the lesson getting us to call out our marks so she could record them in her record book, as she hadn't already done so.

Languages were my strong point so I wasn't really worried for myself but I had friends who I knew were really making an effort and, frankly, being let down by her. So one form time I brought it up with Miss Jukes, our form mistress, whose eyes positively lit up at the prospect of a little gossip, and having elicited as much information as possible from us, undertook to "ask Miss Morrison to have a word with her". Things did improve after that.

I also had them both for A Level, plus Mrs Watson for French essays, and found them to be unremarkable teachers, though Mr Watson was somewhat better than either Miss R or his wife. I still think the best teachers I had were Miss Mercer, Miss Coles, and Miss Marter (who became Mrs Roxburgh) - three consecutive history teachers. I sometimes wish I had done my degree in History rather than French.
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Re: O level Results

Post by fra828 »

I took O levels in 1972, so was there around same time as you Jo. Miss Riddiford late for lessons- now I remember that thanks to your reminder! Do you remember Miss Griffith-Williams, a young quite shy French teacher, she must have started about 1970? She found it difficult to discipline our somewhat unruly class and we played her up like mad-poor lady! Don't think she was there more than a couple of years.
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Re: O level Results

Post by mvgrogan »

I took my O Levels at Hertford in 1985 and the results dictated if I would make it to Horsham that Autumn...

I spent the summer working in a factory canteen (my first job - thanks Dad!) and I was so nervous they had to take me off soup service as I just kept spilling hot soup everywhere!

Didn't get my results til I got home that afternoon - passed - phew!

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