Shock horror - A Level pass rate rises for 26th year in a row!

It's A Level results day and the number of yoofs passing them is predicted to reach 97%, an increase for the 26th year in a row. Naturally some cynics will say that the exams are too easy. Piffle! will come the indignant retort of pedagogs and politicians of the Government. Already the BBC are reporting the following:

Anthony McClaran, chief executive of Ucas, the body which handles undergraduate applications to UK universities, said: "As with every year, some people will inevitably claim that A-levels are getting easier but we shouldn't really take away from the hard work of those students who have done well in their results today.

"It is difficult to compare the A-levels of today with those of 40 years ago as the world is quite a different place.

Indeed the world is a very different place but unless I missed the email that announced that the laws of algebra and physics had changed then surely the students should be solving the same problems as their parents were back in the 70s. Of course 40 years ago we didn't have subjects like media studies and women's studies. As an advisor at a well known academic institution said to me a few months ago, if the course has the word studies in the title then it's really the light version of the subject. Anthony McClaran continues:

"Many world records are being broken at the Olympics but that doesn't make the feat easier or the distances shorter."

Apples and oranges, old chap. The stop watch and tape measure don't lie. Does he really believe that the subjective evaluation of an essay is a good comparison?

Of course the debate will rage on until next Thursday when the GCSE results are announced and both will be forgotten over the bank holiday weekend as we rightly redirect our ire towards the Government's failure to provide us with a decent summer yet again. So I've come up with my own A Level. Let's call it Youth Studies. When the moderator tells you to begin you have 2 hours to answer the following questions:

1. If A Level pass rates are rising, the people passing the exams must be smarter. Explain in no more than 500 words why nobody under the age of 35 who works in a shop, bar, or restaurant can add up the cost of fewer than 6 items without the assistance of an electronic cash register.

2. If youths r getting smrtr xpln in no mre thn 500 words y a lrge mjority ov thm cnt use vowels in wrds that hve had vowels since the yr dot (when A Levels were invented).

3. If young people are genuinely more intelligent than their ancestors 40 years ago, why is Big Brother in its 9th season?

4. If young people are genuinely more intelligent than their ancestors 40 years ago, why did Big Brother ever make it onto the telly?

5. If young people are genuinely more intelligent, why are they making the same mistakes that their ancestors did 40 years ago?