UK Schooling

[Ali]

 "Louisa Brown" wrote:

 <<< Given that JKR has spent many years living in Edinburgh the 
Scottish (confusing) system may be closer to how she's modelled the 
Hogwarts syllabus. Without those weird SYSs.>>>

I disagree, though it is possible. It's simply that by the time she 
went to live in Scotland, JKR had already spent years mapping out the 
Potterverse. I think that she would already have invented OWLS and 
NEWTS by this time. Also, 7 years appear to be fairly standard at 
Hogwarts, which does not appear to be the case in Scottish schools. 
(Which is why I had always assumed that Scottish degree courses were 
4 years compared to the 3 years in English Universities, as the first 
year of the Scottish degree was in some way comparable to the last 
year in an English school - standards-wise?

I also think that the OWLS are based around O'Levels which JKR took, 
rather than the GCSEs which replaced them. Again, when JKR planned 
the story, she would not have not experience of GCSEs, and OWLs sound 
much more like O'Levels than GCSEs.

 Louisa again:

>>> Which could (I only just thought of this) explain how Percy got 
so many NEWTs - maybe he did several in 6th year and more in 7th?>>>

Me again:

I don't think we've ever been told how many NEWTs he took. This would 
be a key factor in deciding just how similar NEWTS are to A'Levels. 
We are told though that Percy got 12 OWLS. This would seem fairly 
hard to achieve though not impossible - perhaps Potions could count 
as a double OWL, rather like "Science" now counts as a double GCSE? 
Perhaps he took extra subjects like Hermione. (Getting 12 O'Levels 
was certainly possible, I've got 11, and several of my friends have 
got 12).

Ali

(Wondering in her personal capacity why this is on the Movie List...).