A-levels 'could be taken at different time'

January 17 2011

A-level exams could be taken earlier, meaning students would not have to wait to be offered a place at university.

At present, institutions make conditional offers using predicted grades and confirm them once students receive their results in August.

However, in an interview with the Times, universities minister David Willetts suggested that things could be changed in the future.

"Instead of speculative applications based on possible A-Level grades everyone is dealing on how (a pupil) performs," he told the news provider.

"It would involve some change in the time at which people do their exams.

"Exam boards would have to move more rapidly and the process of people getting the application into Ucas would have to change."

Commenting on this, BBC Education Correspondent Reeta Chakrabarti suggested that any timing changes could benefit pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds as they are the most likely to have their grades under-predicted.

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