Thread by @Windy_London

"Algorithms" are coming in for a lot of stick. Algorithms make decisions about who should be given a visa, which school kids go to, who gets disability benefits, and now what grade students get at GCSE & A level

Someone wrote the algorithm to a specification and policy makers will have tested it with last year's data to highlight what impact it has on different groups of people; high flyers, average performers, clever but disadvantaged kids, etc. The implications were understood

Trade offs were always going to have to be made. A % of people will always be upset by results. Policy makers will have looked at the winners and losers of a variety of different algorithms and decided which would be fairer and which would be too high a political price

In this case a calculated decision had been made some time ago to a set of losers from the system who tend to be bright kids from poorer background whilst families connected to schools with a history of many A*s (private schools) will be happy

This is not the responsibility of a faceless computer or algorithm.
It is the responsibility of a Government minister.
Given the centralised nature of our government it is likely to have been signed off by No.10 i.e. Boris & Dom

Let's not blame algorithms for a racist visa policy which automatically rejects applications from non-white countries

Let's not blame algorithms for decisions that harm prospects of working class & Caribbean background kids

These are political decisions, implemented in systems

Details of the "racist algorithm" which was thrown out by the courts last week is found here
bbc.co.uk/news/technolog…