I have been somewhat tardy when it comes to keeping up with the examiner’s reports for Philosophy, Theology and Ethics (last blog review dating back to 2020). So I thought it was important to review the last two years of examiner’s reports (2022 – 2023). After doing so, I have to admit that I am feeling both frustrated and slightly confused. After teaching the subject for 15 years, been an exam marker on and off and attending multiple CPD training sessions, the examiner’s reports just seem completely off point. So I thought I would share with you my frustration, confusion and overriding concern for the future of my relationship with OCR (to whom I have been very loyal).

Reading the examiner’s reports (2022-2023) for Philosophy, it felt reminiscent of Goldilocks and the Three Bears but in this case it was Goldilocks and the philosophy paper. Some had too little detail “superficial knowledge“, some too much detail “weighed down by overlong expositions” and then of course there is just the right amount of detail that falls on a spectrum between “concisely and accurately examined” to what I would class as degree level understanding “most successful responses included detailed knowledge of how Descartes arrived at this view in reference to divisibility, conceivability, hyperbolic doubt and an application of Leibniz’s Law.” So it is fair to say I am concerned. When faced with teaching 32 units to students with no philosophical background or understanding, who are then expected by the exam board to appreciate the subtlety of arguments, have what seems like in depth knowledge of each individual thinker and extended reading so wide that the textbook is a mirage in the distance…how are we meant to achieve this? Or more importantly, how are our students meant to achieve this?

Now the exam board will say that students do not NEED to know beyond the specification but when the examiner’s reports seems to glorify such answers, how does it not feel like an expectation on all students? To have even mentioned it in the report, implies that this level of knowledge is used as some sort of bench mark for the highest marks. For example 2022 Augustine Q “What marked out the very best was the appreciation of the subtlety of Augustine’s argument, including the principles of plenitude, harmony or the aesthetic principle and the reasons why God might give less grace to some of the angels.” Did I somehow miss this on the spec? Yet the section finished with “although this is not required for the top marks“, how is this not the bar if this distinguishes out ‘the very best’? Students should, of course, be awarded marks for this level of understanding but to mention it in the examiner’s reports advertises to everyone else essentially this unwritten expectation. But the concern lies not only in the lack of contact time needed to achieve this but also the risk that some students will be impeded by the extra detail that they will forget/ confuse the actual content needed. So how do we achieve this?

It feels like the bar for OCR has moved higher and higher each year due to a small selection of students who excel. Therefore the majority of students may be at risk of becoming alienated from the top marks because of this shift in perception of what an 18 year old is actually capable of achieving. As noted on the first page there is a “tendency towards underdeveloped explanations leading to analysis that could have benefited from a firmer grasp of the details being assessed.” But how are we supposed to know what these ‘details’ are, when some students (as celebrated in the examiner’s reports) are exploring ideas that are not found on the spec or within the textbooks.

A further concern I have is when reading the DCT examiner’s reports. On the first page it notes that when approaching this paper students need to be able to “think like a Christian theologian” in order to “understand the power” “true significance” and “the revelation [ ] and tradition” of different types of Christians. Is this same expectation and requirement found in the other religions? How am I supposed to teach this in 6 months, when most students do not have even the most basic understanding or knowledge of Christianity? This expectation is based, one can assume, on the presupposition that students have a foundational knowledge within Christianity to build upon and thus more is expected of them than “the skills required for Paper 1 and Paper 2.” Since the specification change and the added requirement of religious thought, the students essentially gain another academic field on top of Philosopher and Ethicist to include Theologian as well. Do the examiners expect students to perform as three different academic thinkers at A level standard, when essentially we have lost 6 months of focus on philosophy and ethics to do this? It feels that the examiners expect more from the student as far as skill but have given them a whole new field of academic thought to tackle, one which they expect them to already have “the appropriate background knowledge required for this unit.” Unfortunately for many this is not the case and therefore it feels unfair to criticise students for presenting a “very naive perspective”, when this is just one third of a huge course.

Just as a little side thought, I do not recall the excessive and unnecessary use of convoluted language in previous examiner’s reports, most notably the philosophy ones. Here are some of my favourites: “responses juxtaposed the whole movement as one homogenous mass” and “although more concerted work to counter the criticism of the Fifth Way would have been more fruitful” or “with argument running through the piece as a golden thread“. Whilst these comments do essentially make sense of course, the examiner’s reports are suppose to provide clear guidance to teachers not an academic masterpiece.