KARACHI, Aug 11: “So it’s A* in socio and psychology,” read a text with a smiley inserted in the message a friend received from his younger brother on Thursday when the Cambridge International Examination results were out.

“That’s an okay result,” was the reply. Given that it’s an A* it is more than okay, yet for many students and parents it really isn’t.Every year the announcement of the CIE results never fails to amaze one with students doing better in exams than before.

Way back in the ‘90s, it was Faisal Razi from St Michaels Convent School who set a record with over a dozen As in O’ Level and hitting the newspaper headlines. Since then there has been no looking back and every year records are broken, with the most astonishing being set up by Ali Moeen Nawazish getting 21 As in A’ Level. But for the lesser mortals, getting a decent result is the only aim in life.

Students have all sorts of reactions from panic attacks to dizzy spells. When they do unexpectedly well, a lot of them utter the choicest slang words.

“I still can’t believe I got 8 As. I am happy!” said S. Ahmed.

A quick glance at Facebook showed smileys along with coded messages. “6A. I am bad ;)” read the status of a student who till a day ago was asking Allah “Please pass me”.

On Twitter, tweets ranges from “yippeee! I passed” to a whole lot more. And then there were the students who had deactivated their accounts, so as to avoid any social contact.

For Faisal, the result was satisfactory. “I got 5As and 3Bs, fine by me. What is now more important is my SAT scores as I want to go to the US for my studies and the whole madness of 13As doesn’t count there,” he said. Same was with Mariam, who received A* in sociology and psychology while a B in general and arts.

“Over the years the results have gone up. Each year students are doing better and better,” said Nadeem Islam, the vice principal of Bayview High School. Sharing the results of his school, he said that in a class of 51 students, 43 per cent had A and A* in the A level. “Over all, 85 per cent of our students have A and B grades and that is a very good score.”

‘Not the end of the world’

“We have reached a point where it’s only As that matter but this shouldn’t be the case,” he said. “There is more to a person than just setting a world record. It’s true that there is a stiff competition to get into prime institutions like LUMS, IBA and AKUH, but the pressure takes a negative toll too. It’s just a result, not the end of the world. I keep on telling my students this as well,” he added.

Asked about a consolidated result of students in the city, Senior School Development Manager of the University of Cambridge International Examinations in Pakistan, Rakhshanda Khushal, said: “Our policy states that we do not publish country-specific candidate numbers or pass rates. We only publish the worldwide grade distribution for each qualification.”

But, she added, it would be available within a few weeks. “Every year, we give awards to the students who get the top marks in the world, and the top marks in Pakistan.” They would receive the Outstanding Cambridge Learner Award later this year, she said.

She said: “We find that Cambridge students in Pakistan work hard and do very well at Cambridge O Level and International A Level.”

About students appearing for dozens of subjects in a bid to set records, she said, “We recommend that students are guided by their schools as to how many subjects they take at A level. Universities usually only ask for three A level subjects and we do not recommend that students enter for large numbers of subjects.”

However, counsellors have a different take. “There are some students who are pushed by their parents. It’s more about parental desires than the students’ choice. Forcing your will on your child won’t really help him or her succeed. It’s best if you just let them appear for the required number of exams and let them concentrate,” said a counsellor at one of the schools.