Best Schools - Some private schools, which have reduced the number of GCSEs pupils can take to nine, have designed

GCSEs belong in Victorian times along with the dunce’s cap and should be scrapped, private school head teachers have said. Some private schools are restricting the number of subjects pupils can take so that their free time can be used on other forms of study.

Wimbledon High School in southwest London offers philosophy, politics and economics. Others are sending students to care homes or local primaries.

Students at Bedales boarding school in Steep, Hampshire, are only required to take five GCSEs and can then study the school’s internally assessed courses, or other GCSEs if they prefer. But there is a reluctance to go much further than this in case it jeopardises their students’ chances of getting into a good university, which generally assess the exams in their admissions.

Rose Hardy, head of Haberdashers’ Aske’s private girls’ school, in Elstree, Hertfordshire, said that the days of GCSEs were numbered. “I think many heads would say that in 30 years’ time, maybe sooner, we’ll look back and say what we’re doing now with young people is the equivalent of what the Victorians did — building their school rooms with windows so high up pupils couldn’t look out, and putting them in dunce caps,” she told the Girls’ Schools Association conference in Bristol. She said the “terrible treadmill” ran contrary to the drive to help young people build resilience and look after their wellbeing and mental health.

Jenny Brown, head of City of London School for Girls, called GCSEs “outmoded, uninteresting and draining”.

'Helicopter parents' should not push children towards A-levels with high earning potential but that bring 'joy', says top girls' school head

So-called “helicopter parents” should not push children towards A-levels with high earning potential but instead to subjects that bring “joy”, a top girls’ school head has said.

Students’ choices must not be “governed by a certain earning capacity”, according to Jenny Brown, headmistress at the £19,200-a-year City of London School for Girls.

Her comments come as English A-level is experiencing its biggest drop in students in 20 years. The number of students taking the subject has plummeted by 13 per cent since last year, according to provisional data published by the exams watchdog Ofqual.

Speaking at the Girls’ School Association annual conference in Bristol, Mrs Brown said that when it comes to advising teenagers about which A-level subjects to choose, there can be a “fear” among parents about “earning power" and "steadiness of income”. She said there has been a huge focus on encouraging students to take science, technology, engineering and mathematics (Stem) subjects.

But choices must be about “intrinsic joy and love of the subject”, she said, adding: “People do worse when they are not doing what they love but what they think might get them somewhere. It is a disastrous route to success in exams.”

The “helicopter generation” of parents are now far more involved in their children’s decisions, she said adding that her own parents were “much less worried about our futures”.