School systems

[Warskum]

I am just wondering how the school systems in other countries work.

This is how it works in The Netherlands:

4-12 years old u go to a basicschool, after u have done a test ur teacher gives u a advice were to go after the basicschool. There are 5 levels: vbo(lowest), mavo, havo, vwo, gymnasium(highest). If u were smart in the basicschool u go to vwo or gymasium, if u were avarage u ll go mavo or havo, and u were below avarage u ll go to vbo.

vbo and mavo takes 4 years, after that u ll learn a proffesion.

Havo takes 5 years after that u ll learn a higher profession.

vwo and gymnasium take 6 years and after that u can go to a university.

The different between vwo and gymnasium is that gymnsasium has 2 more languages old greek and latin and u learn there things much better.

In vwo u get 3 languages(french, german, english)

In gymnasium u get 5 languages(french, german, english, old greeek and latin)

I am not sure how may languages u get in vbo, mavo and havo cuz I am doing gymnasium so I havent checked much about them.

[lowzeewee]

5yo go to Kindergarten 1[K1]->Not compulsory

6yo go to Kindergarten 2[K2]->Not compulsory

7yo go to Primary 1[P1]

At primary 3,the "gifted" students do well in the "gifted" exams and go to the "Gifted Education Program"[GEP] that reduces Teacher-Student ratio to give them special attention.

All the way till...

12yo go to Primary 6[P6]

A major exam called Primary School Leaving Examinations[PSLE].Students with very good results go to the GEP while students with quite good results go to "Special" stream and students with good or average results go to "Express" stream and students with rather-poor results go to "Normal" stream.There is Normal Academic for better Normal stream students and Normal Technical for lousier Normal stream students.There are different textbooks.

13yo go to Secondary 1[s1]

14yo go to Secondary 2[s2]->This is a streaming year where you pick the subjects you want to do-Physics,Chemistry,Biology,D Maths,A Maths,E Maths,Geography,History,English Literature.English and Mother Tongue are a must.Art and music are just optional subjects that are not counted in the chosen subjects.

15yo go to Secondary 3[s3]

16yo go to Secondary 4[s4]->GCE 'O' Level Examinations to determine whether you go to Junior Colleges[JC],Polytechnics or Institutions.

***Normal stream students do Secondary 5 after doing Secondary 4[they do 'N' level in S4] and do the 'O' level in S5.

For JCs,there are two years to complete it.The first year has a promotion exam and at the end of the second year there is an examination that determines if you get to University.

I think it is like this... :)

[Cyborg]

<6 Kindergarten

6-12 -> Primary school

13-15 -> Lower secondary

16-18 -> Upper secondary

>18 University/college

That's the Norwegian school system

[Andrew]

Not sure of ages thing,

but playschool, kindergarten, grades 1-12, then eithor univeristy or college type thing.(which you pay for >:()

[ExSPlug]

Starting from 6/7-12/13, Primary 1-6

Your results in 2nd term of P5 and whole of P6 would be used to allocate which secondary school you go to. From here we seperate into EMI(English as medium of instruction, 1/4 of total no of schools.) and CMI(Chinese as medium of instruction, the other 3/4.)

Then we have Secondary 1-3, and that ends compulsary education. From here you would choose to study in the commerce, science, or arts branch.

Then it's S4-S5, which we study for the HKCEE(similar to GCE O Level, only the requirements are about 2X higher, but is less regonized >:() This is what we refer as the "First Gate in your life" in HK.

After that's it's "pre-university", S6-S7, where we study for HKAL(similar to GCE A Level, but the requirements and regonization...the same situation as HKCEE :() People call F6 the "honeymoon year" and the whole S6-S7 living hell. I'm currently at S6, but well...don't trust the "honeymoon" saying.

Then we have 3 years of university.

[Andrew]

Forgot to add 4 years university is normal but can go up to 5, 6 or 7 (~$70 000 for university!! which is cheap for 7 years :( )

But I will end up paying around $40-50 thousand, once I pay my student loan. I'm guessing 5 years, since my marks are not the greatest, and I hopefully will join Co-op workterms (4 terms)

[Seal89999]

The way it goes where I live is,

(Elementary School)

Preschool

Kindergarten

First Grade

Second Grade

Third Grade

Fourth Grade

Fifth Grade

(Middle School)

Sixth Grade

Seventh Grade

Eight Grade

(High School)

Freshman

Sophmore

Junior

Seinor

(College)

Freshman

Sophomore

Junior

Seinor

From there you can go on to do more school like graduates school and you can go on to get your masters degree or other degrees to help you in your profession and show others that you learned these courses so that you specialize in that area.

[Apollyon]

Here it's kinda variable but a rough outline is as follows:

Nursery - Very young (optional)

Primary School - 5 to 11/13 (It's always 11 for girls but sometimes 13 for boys)

Secondary School - 11/13 to 18 (although you can leave at 16 if you want).

College - If you leave secondary school at 16 you can come here till you're 18

University - 18 or 19 or maybe even older (what with gap years etc) till whenever the course ends.

[Mahdi]

Nursery school (optional, I went but very few do)

Elementary school:

Kindergarden (now they have junior kindergarden too, but not in my day) to grade 8

Secondary School:

Grades 9-12

OAC which takes place in high school, but after you have already graduated. Last year was the last year for it. Required for University. Kinda a preperation for university.

Then college or university.

[Dante]

Variable again, but this is more or less what goes on.

Nursery/Playschool: Depends on the place, but generally ages 2-4.

Primary School: 7 years of basic schooling.

Secondary School: 6 years of more advanced schooling, only four of which are compulsory.

College: Can be entered after four years in the above, or a full six. Courses generally last a year, but can be taken more than once. No upper age limit.

University: Can be entered at any age, as long as appropriate entrance qualifications in secondary school and/or college have been met. Courses generally lasting 2-4 years, and more for the really advanced.

It gets nastier as it gets more advanced... :-

[nemafakei]

English, Welsh, and Northern Irish system of education

Timeline:

Ages in completed years as of the 1st September, the commencement of the school year:

3: Nurseries and Playgroups

4-10: Primary schools

11-15*: Secondary Schools, after which they may leave education at any point.

At 15 or 16, General Certificates of Secondary Education (GCSEs) are taken.

16-17: Varyingly called secondary schools or colleges

At 16 or 17 General Certificates of Education ate taken at Advanced Subsidiary level (GCE: AS).

At 17 or 18 General Certificates of Education ate taken at Advanced level (GCE: A)

18+: University or Gap year before university

*11-12: Note that there exist 'Preparatory schools' (not all for boys, as I recall, Apollyon) which sometimes take children to prepare them up to just before their GCSE years.

Examination systems:

GCSEs: Pupils will normally take about 7-13 of these, now; English Literature, English Language and Mathematics are almost always compulsory; Sciences, Foreign Languages, Geography, History, Art or design subjects and so on make up the rest. Each qualification is independant of others. Grades from A* to D, E, F, or G, depending on subject. (These are derived from the old O-level, and the CSE, which ceased to exist over two decades ago).

AS and A levels: Pupils ususally take 3-5 AS levels in the first year, and 3 or 4 A levels in the second. The marks for the former, if continued into the the latter level, are subsumed. There is no restriction on subject, and each qualification is independant of others. Grades from A to E. (The old single-chunk A-level was dropped about 3 years ago).

Some schools are beginning to use the International Baccalaureate instead of A-levels. For the IB, you study 6 subjects, three (possibly four) of which are at higher level, the rest at standard level. An IB HL is approximately equal to 85% of an A-level, and a SL is about 75% of an AS level. Furthermore, there are requirements to study Theory of Knowledge, perform certain tasks under the IB 'Community, Action, Service' scheme, and also an 'Extended Essay' project on the subject of your choice. All of these count towards an integrated IB Diploma, and though the academic qualifications therein can be taken seperately, they are not really intended to work that way. Subject grades are from 7 to 1, and the whole IB is out of 45, I think.

Education is an important part of society, and it must not be neglected.

[Terror]

In fact for Netherlands is:

Lowest is not VBO, or VMBO as it is called these days.

lowest is IVBO, then comes VMBO, which is at about same level as MAVO, except that it is specified to a certain area (for instance, electrosystems)

Then there is HAVO, and that is at same level as MBO, except.. again MBO is specified at a certain area, and HAVO takes you shorter to get at that level

Then there is VWO which is at higher level than HAVO and let's you go to University directly and is at the same level as one year of HBO. (if you succeeded one year of HBO completely you can go to university as well)

Gymnasium is a little higher than VWO, generally it is the same, though you get 1 or 2 more languages (depends on the school) and the average level can be higher... however i have heard there is much difference about this between schools too. At my old school Gymnasium was at about same level as VWO, whereas on a school that i heard of, all the people who did Gymnasium were thaught in English and their grades were counted much differently from normal VWO.

[Inoculator9]

Same as Sard's for me. And I'm loving it ;D 9 day thanksgiving breaks have just arrived for my personal happiness, and the whole thing is much more tolerable then last year ;D Back then, we had dozens of fewer days off... :(

[Cyborg]

It's beeing seen to that we get as few days off as possible.

6 or so days during the whole first half-year...

[Khan]

GCSEs: Pupils will normally take about 7-13 of these, now; English Literature, English Language and Mathematics are almost always compulsory; Sciences, Foreign Languages, Geography, History, Art or design subjects and so on make up the rest.

Sciences are still mandatory, but triple award science may be taken as an extra subject.

Single award being 1 grade, double award being 2 grades, and Triple award being worth 3 grades.

[Apollyon]

"Sciences are still mandatory"

No, they're not. I only took 2 sciences, and I could have taken none at all if I had so wished.

[Khan]

Really? Well they were mandatory at my school.

[Apollyon]

Yeah I think most schools force you to do them, although technically they're not mandatory.