Are GCSE Syllabus Changes Needed Before The Next Pandemic?

While classrooms are empty should the curriculum be rewritten to equip children better for pandemics in the future?

GCSEs are the standard qualification usually taken at 16 by UK students, historically the age at which you could leave school. Often there are two levels of exam available – Higher and Foundation Level, with higher achieving students on the Higher track I volunteer in a school with GCSE maths students on the Foundation level.

A lot of the information from the press and government press briefings and datasets is conflicting or very detailed/scientific and in the future we may want to consider if changes to core educational syllabuses should be made to raise the level of public health information, give kids the skills to evaluate the information and also practical skills that could have solved problems of education going remote or online. Also pandemics are interesting and now relevant, so perhaps we might want to dial down the ubiquitous Tudors, Romeo and Juliet or Alkali Flame Tests.