The view from the other side of the desk

I've been teaching Business for some years now. But I don't have any qualifications in the subject (my background is Economics). So this year, I thought it'd be fun to take my Business A-level. I'm getting sponsored within school on a per-mark basis with the proceeds going to a project the school is linked with in Ghana, but besides that worthy cause it's been a real eye-opener to be there in the thick of it with the students. With one exam to go, tomorrow, I thought I'd put up some thoughts on how its gone so far...

Writing. My hand hurts after an exam! Having not written much by hand since the last time I did exams, this has been quite an issue. Also, my legibility has never been that great...

Timing. I was writing down to the last minute in both BUSS2 and BUSS3. We all know these are time-pressured, and I have always told my students that, but it was quite different to actually experience it. Some of this may have been down to having more things to say than the average candidate, but I did struggle to fit everything in that I wanted. In BUSS3, I certainly had to miss out some ideas that I had planned to include. This reinforces the importance of planning and deciding which themes to develop and which to leave out or merely pay lip service to, something that will also be important tomorrow.

Quality of the questions. This has generally been pretty good. As we know, there have been some years where the questions haven't quite made sense (cough chocolate cough), but there were no howlers or particularly unclear questions. The only one that got close was the final question in BUSS2, which I found had little information to go on. My answer was quite speculative and relied a little bit on my own contextual knowledge of the industry in question. Which leads to...

The advantage of age. I saw this a little more in a mock exam we did in a class than in this year's exams, but I've only recently realised quite how much being older makes things easier. A recent BUSS2 paper had case studies on a small chain of ethnic and organic food shops, followed by one on a company that made storage boxes. My students struggled a little for good application - they don't buy the food in their households, nor do they buy storage boxes that frequently! I therefore had a slight advantage (especially in the first case study) in understanding a little more clearly what this market was about, what customers want and the key elements of the marketing mix, for example. I'm not saying students can't know these things or work them out, but I had a distinct advantage over them in making my answers fully applied to the case study. It certainly cut down some thinking/planning time.

Knowledge. I didn't do much revision for BUSS1-3, nor should I have needed to - I teach it, after all. But doing the exam hammered home the importance of good knowledge and understanding of content, even in something like BUSS3 which mostly examines the higher order skills. Knowing your stuff saves time. It allows you to pinpoint the key issues quickly, and provides a lens through which to analyse a case study. Those who know their content best do have an advantage even in the higher skills. Revise early and often (i.e. from the start of the course)!

Analysis. I think BUSS3 went well, but I do know where my answers could fall down in the eyes of an examiner. I think they were decent answers, but it could be argued that sometimes, in an effort to provide an overarching answer to the question, my analysis may have been a little lacking. Maybe - maybe - I was trying to provide too much evidence and not always taking a line of argument as far as I could. We shall see, come August.

All in all, it's been a fun, and extremely useful experience. I could pontificate all I want in class about timing and analysis and so on, and give feedback on what hasn't gone well in students' work, but now I feel like I understand a little better the pressures candidates are under. I have a bit more sympathy now - this certainly isn't easy!

Now for a nice early night ready for tomorrow's BUSS4. Bring it on...