There was a lot of noise in the press about GCSE and A-Level results this year. There were many reports claiming that results were expected to be lower than they’ve been in years, so we decided to run a survey of our parents of GCSE and A-Level students to find out a little more.
Parents are still worried about the impact of covid on education
Homeschooling may feel like a distant memory to parents now that normality has resumed, however many are still worrying that so much time out of school has caused their child to fall behind. And whilst all children might be in the same boat, they still need to meet the same standard when it comes to tests and coursework, which means that 80% of parents are currently worried, with almost 20% feeling very worried.
The government’s plan to help was a bust
A whopping £1 billion was set aside for the government’s coronavirus catch up programme. This promised help for struggling students across the country from private tutors, amongst other methods. Of the parents we surveyed, less than 10% of them had received any help from this programme.
More than half of parents are disappointed with schools
Of the parents surveyed, 58% feel that school hasn’t provided adequate support to help their child catch up on missed learning.
The Good News
Whilst things have been tough and education has been more disrupted than ever, we seem to be at a turning point. We asked parents how much they feel their child has caught up, and only 7% said not at all.
Our tutors have had a positive impact
We asked parents how much impact their Tutorful tutor had on their child’s results, and we were blown away by the responses. An overwhelming majority (more than 75%!) told us that their tutor had lots of impact or high levels of impact – this is exactly what we love to hear.
Tutors have made huge differences to grades
One grade higher would be a cause for celebration for many parents, however our tutors were able to help students achieve even higher than that. More than 10% of parents surveyed told us that their Tutorful tutor had helped their child improve by more than four grades – that’s like leaping from an E to an A* at A-Level!!
What have we learned?
From our research, we’ve found out a few key facts:
- Parents are still worried about the impact of covid, however they feel their children are starting to catch up.
- They didn’t get any help from the government, and schools didn’t provide adequate help either.
- Having the help of a tutor had a high impact on the grades their child achieved, and many students saw improvements of multiple grades.
