Good news for those of us embarrassed by our mediocre O Level achievement. The Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) devised a 2 hour exam they called "The Five Decade Challenge" to see if exams really are getting easier. It was then taken by GCSE students expected to achieve an A or A* pass. The questions were numerically-based which in itself is less the case in recent exams. Guess what. Some scored zero points with the 1965 O-level questions giving most difficulty. In fact, the older the paper the lower the score.

The RSC has launched a petition on the Downing Street website which says the current examination system is "failing a generation, which will be unequipped to address key issues facing society, whether as specialist scientists or members of a scientific community".

They claim too many teachers are "teaching to the test" because of the pressure of performance league tables, which means students are missing out on background information to help them understand their subject. The test took into account syllabus changes which means certain topics are no longer tackled until A-level, the results, the RSC argues, provide conclusive proof that the papers have become easier. It is particularly critical of the fact that students lack the maths skills necessary to tackle the calculations associated with equations.