How are you? Life is very strange at the moment isn't it? We've been in 'lockdown' since the end of March. Exams have been cancelled. G is on furlough from work. The girls are getting a touch of cabin fever. Boots is very confused at her house being full of humans all the time.
Luckily we live near some beautiful open countryside and have taken advantage of that by going for a walk each day. The weather has fortunately been great so far, so that's helped too.
The exams situation has been a big stress. Due to the coronavirus situation, the government here in the UK cancelled all the summer public examinations for GCSEs and A levels. The plan was for teachers to assess students using a mixture of coursework, mock exams and other evidence in order to grade the students - they called this 'calculated grades'. As you know, we home educate our two girls, so we weren't sure how it was going to pan out for us as private candidates.
L was supposed to be sitting 4 GCSEs this year to bring her total of GCSEs to 8 in preparation for college, and B was to sit 3 A levels in preparation for university entrance, in September this year. So we waited, and we waited. We gathered a huge amount of evidence, using a company that employs qualified examiners to mark papers and essays to show the standard that they were up to. Basically we worked many hours doing this and uploading it all digitally. They were both doing excellently. Sadly, however, our exam centre finally told us at the beginning of May that they would not provide a calculated grade for the girls, despite the huge amount of evidence we had and that our only options were to withdraw or defer to the Autumn sitting.
No GCSEs. No A levels. The girls were devastated.
We then spent hours getting in contact with the college and university that the girls most wanted to attend and eventually we got through, and fortunately they were both happy for the girls to still attend from September . Which is a miracle and such a relief, particularly for B because the course she wants to do is discontinued from next year, so this year was her last opportunity.
Because they would both be starting their courses in September Autumn exam sittings were not an option, so we had to withdraw. On top of the girls' devastation, of all their hard work gone to waste, the exam centre are refusing to refund our money, which is a lot - due to their 'terms and conditions'. We think this is shockingly bad business behaviour, we would understand an administrative fee but to keep the whole lot (over a thousand pounds) - other than the refund from the awarding bodies - is just disgusting. We are praying for a change of heart because B won't get her scholarship grant because she hasn't sat her A levels and we could do with the money. But, it's all in God's hands, whatever happens. We've written back to the exam centre to express our shock and disappointment and we are hoping for a change of heart.
God is in control and his will is always good:
The Lord your God is with you,
the Mighty Warrior who saves.
He will take great delight in you;
in his love he will no longer rebuke you,
but will rejoice over you with singing. - Zephaniah 3:17
We are slowly relaxing after all the stress. I bought myself a Playstation 2 and have been enjoying the nostalgia of playing Scooby-Doo Mystery Mayhem and Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation. I'm hoping to write a bit more too, both spiritual things and to write here...although I've said this before. I've been reading a lot too. It's good to just chill out.
My plans are to do some work in the garden and some decorating when I've got my energy back. And in the next few months I need to think about getting a job! Yikes. I'll put that off for a bit, haha!
G's been doing some cooking and baking, it's usually me that does all the cooking, and I hate it LOL, but I do it because G works long hours some weeks. But now he's been at home he's been cooking some delicious meals and baked a cake. It's things like this that make lockdown much more tolerable, and I'm also hoping he carries on when he goes back to work! Haha
As I said earlier, we've been going for a few walks - here are some pictures.
Well, that's all for today.
Sarah x
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