O- level, CSE

[Humble]

Hi,
The dictionary says, CSE is Certificate of Secondary Education. I don’t understand it in this sentence:
I did reasonably well at school, finishing up with a couple of O-levels (??) and quite a few CSEs.

Thanks for your help.

[Anglika]

British Secondary education used to end with the General Certificate of Education, which has three stages: Ordinary Level "O-level", Advanced Level "A-level", and Scholarship Level "S-level".

Those intending to apply to a university would be expected to have at least a number of O-levels and a couple of A-levels.

The CSE was designed for less academically able students.

[Humble]

Tnx, but I am still in the dark abt the SCEs. Why a few?

[Tdol]

It's 'quite a few', which sounds like several to me.

[BobK]

British Secondary education used to end with the General Certificate of Education, which has three stages: Ordinary Level "O-level", Advanced Level "A-level", and Scholarship Level "S-level".

Those intending to apply to a university would be expected to have at least a number of O-levels and a couple of A-levels.

The CSE was designed for less academically able students.

To add to Anglika's summary, O-levels and CSEs were combined to form the present-day GCSE (General Certificate of Secondary Education). But GCSEs have 2 standards - Foundation and Higher. So pupils who used to take CSE now tend to take GCSEs at the Foundation Level in subjects where it's available (I'm not sure whether it's available in all subjects).

b

[Humble]

I’m sorry, but I couldn’t get much from your answers. How can one have several certificates??
Or it just means some marks here?
Our school-leavers get a document – CSE, in which one can see their final marks for 15 (?- not sure) subjects, the same for everybody. All the subjects are obligatory for everybody.

Obviously it’s different in Britain. My guess is it’s up to the students which subjects and how many to have in their certificate. Therefore there may be school-leavers who do not qualify for CSE in any subject? And what document do they get then?

[Tdol]

It's different- you take a certain number of exams, and the results appear on the certificate, and it can vary from pupil to pupil. If you leave school without any exams, you won't get a certificate (I believe).

[Tdol]

BTW, you can have more than one certificate if you take exams at different times. I took English and Maths one year, then the rest of the subjects the following year, so I ended up with two certificates.

[BobK]

BTW, you can have more than one certificate if you take exams at different times. I took English and Maths one year, then the rest of the subjects the following year, so I ended up with two certificates.

And I ended up with 4 bits of paper, by taking O-level exams at different times.

Today, things are different in many ways. The two relevant to your questions Humble are:

1 Nobody gets a CSE now. They're GCSEs.

2 One school can choose to be examined by different Examination Boards in different subjects. My daughter, for example, was awarded GCSEs in 10 subjects this year, but has just received 3 certificates.

So, Humble, there isn't _one_ School-leaver's Certificate. There ought to be, and would have been, but the plug was pulled [the initiative was stopped] at the last minute for political reasons. We'd better not discuss that, because it's of no interest to most people and feelings on both sides can be extreme.

b