I know I know, this might seem a bit late, but the reason I am writing about GCSE results day this week is because it is a big deal! GCSE’s are something that young people put a lot of time into, and regardless of how you did, there is a huge amount to be proud of for getting through them and I personally believe that it should be celebrated for more than just one day!

Students are made to believe, either consciously or subconsciously, that GCSE’s are qualifications that define their futures, and this is just not true! I believe that success is relative and holistic, this means that regardless of what letter is on your result paper, that what we really take away from our GCSE’s are the skills and experience of taking them, these being things that can’t be graded. So, if you got anything between an A* and a U in that really difficult maths paper, and you tried your hardest for that grade, then congratulations!

Personally, I was someone who was just naturally good at school, exams themselves were not something that I found particularly difficult, and so being entirely transparent, I didn’t have to study as hard as most people may think I would have to. Regardless of this, I was congratulated for this from everyone I knew for all of my A’s and A*’s.

With that in mind, lets this about a scenario where there was another student who was targeted a D in maths but achieved a C, in my mind, that person has worked harder than I could ever imagine working, but because their letter is not as ‘impressive’ as mine they will not be celebrated anywhere near as much and may think they aren’t as smart as me, which is so wrong!

Now with that in mind, let’s imagine that it’s the other way around, that I worked really hard to get my A and other person just didn’t try…

What I am hoping that you realise is that there is no way of us really knowing what scenario is more likely, and so maybe this obsession with letters isn’t really as accurate as we think it is?

So, as always, what do I want you to take away from this? If you worked hard to achieve the grade you did, then it is a good grade regardless of what the letter is. You should be extremely proud of yourself and I hope you now realise that there is no fair way for you to compare yourself to anyone else’s results paper. There is no reason for you to be upset with your grades as they literally don’t define you in any way, even if they did, I’m sure it would be very wrong.

Congratulations!