‘I was doing it for fun’: man, 92, could be oldest Briton to pass GCSE exam

A 92-year-old man could be the oldest person in Britain to ever pass a GCSE exam after receiving the highest possible grade in his maths paper.

Derek Skipper, from Orwell in Cambridgeshire, sat a foundation level maths exam earlier this year, and found out on Thursday morning he had achieved a level 5 (equivalent to a lower B).

“I am very pleased indeed. I opened [my results] this morning to find I had got a 5, which was as high as I could get on the basic maths GCSE course I took. So I’m delighted to have got it,” he told BBC Breakfast.

He used a magnifying glass to help him see the paper because of his poor eyesight, and took along a slide rule he had used when he sat his maths exams at school in 1946.

“I wouldn’t have been surprised if I failed because I could not see it very well, but with a magnifying glass it worked out well,” he said. “It didn’t matter two hoots whether I passed or failed, I was doing it for a bit of fun for myself.”

Skipper said he decided to take the course, through the Cam Academy Trust, after seeing an offer from his local authority to take it free of charge, and felt he had never fully got to grips with maths when studying it as a child.

He said: “I took [maths] in 1946 and it seemed to me when I took it I just went through the motions as all schoolchildren had to do, and I didn’t really understand much about it.

“Maths is a wonderful thing and it is very easy to say you are no good at it … any opportunity to learn and embrace it, great.”

When he sat the exam in June, in a school hall full of 16-year-olds, Skipper said he “thoroughly enjoyed it”. His course tutor, Shane Day, who led Skipper’s online course, said he thought it was “a lovely thing to do”.

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Day said: “It’s a good thing for people to think, well, you’re never too old. He said he wants to keep his mind active, and this was far better than watching television.”

Asked if he planned to sit any more exams, Skipper said: “No, that is probably my lot. I think I shall go out on a high.”