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Richard Wijeratne and Mike Mills from XIC on Exams
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Jan 13, 2025
Xabia International College director Richard Wijeratne and head of secondary Mike Mills have been in the BayRadio Studio 1 with Moody to discuss GCSE and A Level exam results. Richard Wijeratne said algorithms designed to grade students sitting UK examinations created conditions that were 'unfair in the extreme' to certain students. Mike Mills said some GCSE students had suddenly been pushed four grades lowers than expected. They said it was time now to 'look forwards not backwards' – especially as 100% of XIC students still managed to reach their 1st choice university, and 100% passed their GCSEs. Subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHyiJYOOyp4cWu5kzr_2RrA Website: http://www.bayradio.fm/ Mobile App: https://app.appinstitute.com/yddcc Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BayRadioInSpain Twitter: https://twitter.com/bayradioinspain Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bayradiospain/
View Video Transcript
0:00
you know the conversations mike and i
0:01
and other colleagues have had over the
0:02
last uh
0:03
sort of 10 days or so have been you know
0:06
our hearts have gone out to all these
0:07
students
0:08
who are young people i mean they're not
0:11
worldly wise in many ways they're
0:12
they they look up to us and they sort of
0:14
say why what is going on you know is it
0:16
fair how could it possibly be
0:18
who could do this to us so right now
0:20
we'd like to start a little conversation
0:22
we're having with you moody by just
0:23
saying to
0:24
every one of those young people you know
0:26
what an amazing
0:27
group of people you are and i mean
0:29
schools across the globe that have been
0:31
involved in this
0:32
they we saw it from our school and you
0:34
know
0:35
you hear from people that i know in the
0:36
uk young people have been so incredibly
0:38
resilient they have been
0:40
so brave and they've shown you know
0:42
great sort of strength of character
0:44
when they've been under you know if you
0:45
and i we if us we at our age and i'd
0:48
like to say our age probably
0:49
at a senior age um was faced were faced
0:52
with these sorts of um knockbacks after
0:54
you've put in so much hard work
0:57
that is one of the things that i found
0:58
really admirable and it's something that
1:00
we look forward and
1:01
enjoy in in our in our pupils and i know
1:03
that happens in all schools
1:05
the greatest thing here was you know
1:07
young people work hard
1:08
i mean we can say oh no you're lazy and
1:10
you don't do this and you don't
1:12
young people work hard if they're
1:13
managed well they work extremely hard
1:16
and then when they're faced with
1:17
such a disappointment which was clearly
1:19
unfair
1:20
in the extreme we would just like to
1:23
stay you know good on you
1:24
i hope you can you know take a huge sigh
1:27
of relief and look forward
1:28
not backwards let's just explain roughly
1:30
what happened because i'd sort of
1:32
understand
1:32
um it was the way that um a levels first
1:35
um were
1:36
were assessed wouldn't it and it was
1:38
some sort of computer algorithm
1:41
i thought that'll do the trick um and i
1:44
know that it was
1:45
just for a couple of days until the the
1:46
big u-turn but as you say some of these
1:49
students it did almost they wouldn't say
1:51
their lives depended on it but
1:52
getting into university that sort of
1:53
thing it was a big stressful time for
1:55
them of course yeah it was i mean
1:57
trying to explain the algorithm we have
1:58
no chance because no one has got any
2:00
idea at all how
2:01
hell that worked out it was it was pages
2:03
long but uh we just we just don't know
2:05
how it
2:05
how they came to some of their
2:07
conclusions i mean for us it started uh
2:09
last week with the gcc results on the
2:11
tuesday uh
2:13
first of all and then some of our
2:15
students doing the
2:16
their cambridge exams got their results
2:17
um and we did we did farewells as a
2:20
college overall but
2:22
it really hit uh some of our students
2:24
individually that were for no reason
2:26
whatsoever they did they worked so hard
2:28
and kept working all the way
2:29
and just was so dedicated and then for
2:31
them to get their results
2:33
and to be told that they've been
2:34
downgraded by three sometimes four
2:36
grades just on an individual basis and
2:38
it was
2:39
just heartbreaking for them for them and
2:41
for us as well it's like
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just it's like getting punched when you
2:44
just don't expect it it's just like
2:45
no one no one knew why there was no
2:47
explanation why it was just
2:48
these these your grades that's it and
2:51
then we had
2:52
the a-level results um again some came
2:54
through
2:55
and these are for students wanting to go
2:57
to university wanting to go their next
2:59
stage of their
3:00
their careers and again we have some
3:02
fantastic results
3:04
and well-deserved results but certain
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individuals
3:07
they just got knocked down and
3:08
significantly got down knocked down in
3:10
their a-levels
3:11
and it was just a shock to us all really
3:13
so obviously we had a
3:14
a few nice calls and an email to say
3:17
what's going on i'm sure
3:18
um yeah and we're waiting and waited and
3:21
we kept looking
3:22
like the parents like the teachers
3:23
looking what's going on the media from
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the uk
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because our students just took the same
3:26
exams as the ones in the uk and just
3:28
trying to find out
3:29
what was going to happen and then
3:31
unfortunately when we had the results
3:33
come through yesterday
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we uh we had some some justice shall we
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say for the students
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and the teachers as well that have
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worked so hard i mean one of the things
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it's exactly like mike um one of one of
3:43
one of the things that was um you know
3:44
staggering was um we took the initiative
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to speak to
3:49
the head of the national association of
3:50
british schools in spain and um
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he was speaking as a head teacher as
3:54
well and in one of his year groups
3:57
there were three candidates two had been
4:00
predicted by
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the staff for a grades and one a c
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as it came through one of his pupils got
4:08
an a
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the second person got a c and the third
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person got a u and unclassified
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so the curious thing was the person who
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got this the c
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had at the as level the year before got
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the top mark in spain
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an a and a top mark in spain so
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realistically through this algorithm
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it's pointing out the fact that she
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would have got zero in her a level
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i mean how on earth this is the sort of
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this is the sort of imbalance that we
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were
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dealing with and people were so confused
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and it is terribly confusing so
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the nice thing is um sense has prevailed
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however as we all know you know a
4:45
certain number of people
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have been denied their first choice
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university
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and that's really tough and then when
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you've got the
4:53
the minister for education turning
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around and saying well you know they're
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going to remove the cap
4:57
from universities i wouldn't really like
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to be a university principal
5:01
because how on earth do you saw that
5:02
that pickle out because that's really
5:04
complicated now you've got another 80 90
5:05
150 people who are saying well i'm
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you know i qualify for this course yeah
5:10
what are you going to do so i mean we
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didn't come in here to um
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to bash the system we came in here
5:15
really for you know and thank you for
5:17
inviting us because it is
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it's really nice to talk about the
5:20
wonderful things that the youngsters
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have done
5:22
what mike did and i'm gonna i'm gonna
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defer to him but um what we insisted
5:27
would happen
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in the college um with the students
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during lockdown
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was that they would work throughout the
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summer term
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now there's a reason for that as far as
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i'm concerned and that is that
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young people go to school to complete a
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year
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they don't go to school to do two-thirds
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of the year they have to do the whole
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year
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and we have that responsibility
5:47
otherwise they're under-prepared
5:49
yeah if for us i it was all about the
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integrity of the
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of the exam system really in the
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educational system um it's important for
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us
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whether students stabilize xic or they
5:59
go elsewhere to
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the uk or to wherever they go for their
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university studies it's important for us
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to make sure that they are the best
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prepared that they can be
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um and for us if you are studying a
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course
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the course shouldn't stop in end of
6:13
february or march
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the course stops at the end of the
6:16
summer term so it was important for us
6:18
that
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when our students go from gcse to a
6:21
level xic
6:22
we know that our students are fully
6:24
prepared because they have studied the
6:25
whole of the gcse course
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for our a level students we know that
6:29
our students have studied the whole of
6:30
the a level course
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not three-quarter quarters of it so for
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us
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for integrity just for the honesty of
6:38
the exam system and for the benefits of
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our students they
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they are prepared they have done the
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course they've got fantastic grades
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because they work so hard the teachers
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have worked them so hard also so
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credit to them as well but um it's just
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we did the right thing for our students
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and we know we did the right thing and
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therefore
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that's why they are so well placed now
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and in the uk in particular
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many sixth form colleges are making them
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sit entry exams so they can see what
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they've learned to see whether
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where the gaps are xic students this
7:06
year for 2020
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they have no gaps so how did it change i
7:10
mean it went from the
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the algorithm doing the air bunnies
7:13
there um to being
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how the teachers predicted they would
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there would go so was was that already
7:20
in place or did the teachers have to
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come back in and
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do some extra work it was already done
7:24
no no it was all done
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yeah i mean the teachers the teachers
7:28
worked with the students um
7:30
we made sure that we had evidence prior
7:32
to lockdown
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and during lockdown they were working
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hard to make sure that we were accurate
7:36
in our
7:37
assessments of them we made sure that
7:39
the students had the best opportunity to
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get their grades
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um and so we had a portfolio for each
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students we had a portfolio of evidence
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that built up through the course the
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two-year courses richard said and we had
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everything ready
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everything prepared for them we still
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kept kept them working we had
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every opportunity to assess them and
7:57
when the exam boards
7:58
could ask us for what richard
8:01
vigiertnick did in his
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a level of physics we said we could say
8:05
this is
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this is what they've done this is our
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evidence so when they
8:09
came and then they we've queried some of
8:11
the grades they said
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okay you've got the evidence we'll use
8:15
your teacher evidence because the best
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people that know
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are the teachers not some algorithms
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exactly yes you see them every day and
8:20
see their progress
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yeah i mean they do that every year it's
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not as if this was an unusual year
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they're going to have to
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go through that process every year it
8:26
was a little bit more um in depth
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than it than it would but something
8:29
that's very important here is mike used
8:31
a word
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just just just a couple of minutes ago
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and that's integrity you know you have
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to be honest
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and you have to show integrity to to
8:38
what you do and especially where young
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people
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are concerned now let's not
8:42
misunderstand the fact that there are
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young people who
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underperform and there are young people
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who don't work particularly hard and we
8:48
as teachers
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throughout my career i could i could
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tell young people you could usually
8:53
tell the people who are going to fail an
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exam what you can't tell is people who
8:57
are going to pull the rabbit out of the
8:58
hat and do something
8:59
unbelievably fantastic on that day
9:01
because everything is lined up and they
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just have a good day and they take their
9:04
grade from a b to an a now that couldn't
9:05
happen this year no they couldn't do
9:07
that
9:08
we did have young people who failed
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examinations
9:11
they they failed examinations they the
9:13
the the evidence that
9:15
the teachers gathered and the work that
9:17
was done um
9:18
just proved that the people hadn't
9:20
actually made the grade
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and that's sad in many ways but you know
9:23
it's it's almost inevitable well you're
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always going to get that yeah
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you always always have had yeah you do
9:28
but um i think the thing was integrity
9:30
the the the work that was done was done
9:32
um in appropriately at the right time
9:34
and was done with with
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great skill i think and um you know i we
9:39
both
9:39
are enormously grateful to the teachers
9:42
for the time that they spent on this
9:44
because it was really time consuming
9:46
and something that i think is is is key
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is um
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there's a huge amount of um speculation
9:52
that
9:53
a number of schools and colleges
9:55
upgraded youngsters
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and you can see that was happening that
9:59
was happening now we had to be able to
10:01
stand in front of a mirror
10:03
and look at what we've done and say
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we've done the right thing
10:06
and actually you know parents could come
10:07
in and say you you you could have given
10:09
my
10:09
son he works really hard you could could
10:11
have given my daughter a higher grade
10:14
we had to give the honest reflection of
10:16
what that person had done
10:17
that was it it is integrity
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