0_Apprentice
I was educated in the UK. I hated high school, but enjoyed university (as it's called over there).
1_Wizard
That's interesting, I'm from the US so I don't know how the levels relate.  Is University the same as college here, or is it like secondary school?
0_Apprentice
University's what we call school over here. Secondary school is the equivalent of high school. And we have primary school instead of elementary school.
1_Wizard
Interesting.  Do you have Middle School as a separate thing, or is it folded into either primary or secondary?
0_Apprentice
Grades 1 thru' 7 are primary school and grades 8 thru' 13 are secondary school. After that, you go to university (school). Confused yet? :)
1_Wizard
It's not so bad, but I don't understand why we can't just have it all the same :P  Is the grading system similar to America?  Ours is generally broken down by 10% increments, where somewhere between 60-70% is the break point between pass and fail.
0_Apprentice
50% is the pass rate over there, but the system has changed since I was there. Used to be you were awarded an A, B or C to pass an exam, A being the highest grade. Anything below a C was a fail.
1_Wizard
That's always interesting to see how grading by countries happens.  It's fairly similar, but the "pass" level always seems to change.
0_Apprentice
It does, doesn't it. And in the UK, you usually need a bunch of A grades to get into university. If you don't have those you generally go to college. If you pass your college course, sometimes you go on to university.
1_Wizard
Oh, so it's like a community college versus a College or University here.  A lot of high schoolers apply to college every year here, but a lot don't get in and go to community college instead for two years to see if they can transfer into College.