ONE of Oxford's top pupils has confounded the critics by proving GCSEs are not getting easier.

When The Oxford Times threw down the gauntlet, Magdalen College School student Philip Davies agreed to defend the honour of his generation and sit a 1987 maths O' level paper.

And he passed with flying colours - scoring 95 per cent, virtually the same mark he got in his GCSE.

Straight A* student Mr Davies, 16, said he found the papers very similar in terms of difficulty.

He said: "They were not any more challenging than each other."

He said there were contextual differences between the papers, set 20 years apart, with more questions about imperial to metric conversions in the 1987 O' level.

He said: "The background to the questions has changed but the maths behind it is much of a muchness.

"I would not be uncomfortable sitting either paper."

Mr Davies said the perennial charge that exams were getting easier did not bother him.

He added: "If results were getting worse everyone would be up in arms about the education system.

"If it stays the same they would say things are not improving.

"You cannot win, whatever happens someone will complain."

The school's Master Andrew Halls said pupils were working harder and taking more subjects than ever before.

But he said GCSEs were being belittled by the increasing number of top grades.

He said: "There are too many A and A*s at GCSE nowadays.

"I feel it has become a little debased. It is not as discriminatory as it ought to be.

"Worst of all, it is becoming quite a boring exam for the brighter children, and maybe for less bright children.

"The actual syllabuses themselves are quite dreary. They are quite thin and weak.

"I think they are thinner and easier, and certainly more boring than it needs to be."

He said many independent schools were turning to the International GCSE (IGCSE) in a bid to inspire gifted students.

Mr Halls said: "The IGCSE has an international market in mind. It's based on thorough and interesting syllabuses that are fully exam-based."

But he added good teachers could still make a difference.

"Even with bad syllabuses a good teacher can make it worthwhile.

"If you teach it well and go beyond the syllabus then the kids will go with you."

Oxford's NUT representative, Brenda Williams, agreed with Mr Davies's analysis.

She said: "I have been teaching for 35 years and I don't think children these days have it any easier at all.

"The pressures on them are far, far greater.

"There are differences between syllabuses in exams but what's expected remains broadly the same.

"Some people who sat O' levels would struggle with GCSE and vice-versa, purely based on content."