Did you know GCSE A* grades are being slashed this year?

[roisin]

The Joint Council for Qualifications have required all GCSE subjects to grade A* differently in future. OFQUAL have required all the exam Boards to return to the level of awards as made in 2008, leading to a reduction in the pass rate at all grades.

I don't have information for all subjects, but apparently in some subjects the difference is massive. In 2011 in AQA Biology 23% of all entries were graded A. In the Jan 2012 Biology module, just 0.9% of papers were graded A!

I approve wholeheartedly of the revised exam board policy of reserving A* for truly exceptional - and statisticallly rare - performance.

There is not necessarily a direct correlation twixt GCSE and A Level marks anyway..... got 6 O levels (and not maths) - not very good grades but did considerably better at A Level in robust academic subjects (B, C, C) - which in my day was good enough for a goodish Russell Group Uni.

Further to this debate the unit 1 module grade boundaries for the exams sat in June 2012 reverted to pre January 2012 levels leaving the students who sat these modules in January stranded at a massive disadvantage.

In the January 2012 chemistry exam you needed 97% to achieve an A with 100 UMS but in June 2012 for the same module you needed just 77% to obtain the same. In Biology you needed 95% in January for an A with 100 UMS but in June 2012 just 77%.

To expand further if you took the January 2012 Chemistry module 1 exam you needed a raw mark of 38 out of 60 to achieve an A grade but in June of the same year a raw mark of 38 out of 60 would give you an A* grade with more UMS points.

Similarly in the January 2012 Biology exam you needed a raw mark of 39 out of 60 to achieve an A grade but in June of the same year a raw mark of 39 out of 60 would give you an A* grade with more UMS points.

To put this into perspective:

In Biology in January less than 1% of students achieved A* compared to June 10.67%.

In Chemistry it was 2% in January compared to 11.53% in June

In Physics 1.32% in January compared to 8.38% in June.

Set this against the fact that the final award grades for 2012 in these subjects saw the percentage of students achieving an A* grade Biology 17.7%, Chemistry 20.7% and Physics 19.2%. (These statistics from the Joint Council for Qualifications).

From a statistical outcomes perspective this is highly irregular given the number of students involved. Ofqual are saying this is down to variances in paper difficulty and student ability! Ten times more students capable of getting an A* in biology in June than in January!? It beggars belief. The grade boundaries answer the question as you only needed to get 39 marks in June compared to 48 in January. It seems obvious to me.

The January modules need to be re-graded.

This issue was reported by the BBC:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-19599279

I've not read that article, but that date does seem to make some sense. It is not at all beyond belief that the January exam was harder. Likewise, it is also easy to see why the students might have been of a lower ability as January is regularly used as an opportunity for students to re-sit, most commonly for that magical 'C' grade.
Finally, the module grade results for B1, C1 and P1 are not comparable to the final grades awarded for Biology, Chemistry and Physics. This is because only 'top' students sit separate award science, and you would expect a high number of students to get the best grades.

That's just my take on it, but without reading the article I don't take that info as being overly suspicious.

data, not date!

In response to BringBack1996:
New syllabuses were introduced in September 2011 for the seperate science subjects Biology, Chemistry and Physics. They were introduced to bring additional rigour to these subjects. Ofqual have said that the January 2012 modules were harder than the previous syllabus as a result. I am only talking about the seperate science subjects so these results only relate to the more able students. No re-sits would have been applicable as this was the first cohort to sit the new syllabus. Re-sits would have been against the old syllabus. However, it was the grade boundaries that were the issue:

Raw scores for Biology:
January 57/60 = 100ums and 48/60 = 90ums A*
June 46/60 = 100ums and 39/60 = 90ums A*

Raw scores for Chemistry:
January 58/60 = 100ums and 48/60 = 90ums A*
June 46/60 = 100ums and 38/60 = 90ums A*

As you can see from the above if you scored 46 out of 60 in June you would have got A with 100ums but in January only grade A and less than 90ums. If you then look at the percentage of students who achieved an A in January compared to June in my original post - most irregular.

I stated the percentage of students who got A in the previous year as it helps to show the massive dip in numbers getting A in January compared to the previous year and the next paper in June.

Whatever amount is deemed worthy of an A (the papers referred to are only taken by higher ability students to start with) the problem at the moment as we seem to have lost any consistency in the system. DS is in year 11 and what sort of standard does he needs to be to get A's and A's next June? I have no idea and he is my third to take GCSEs. Will they leave English alone this time or will Maths get the "Gove" treatment or maybe they'll just pull the rug out from under the kids in every subject.

I fail to see though how 63% (38/60) could ever have been deemed worthy of an A. If those were the previous boundaries then I agree they need to be revised.*

Why not? If the questions are all highly challenging then it is perfectly possible. It suggests the paper was set at too high a level perhaps, but the mark gained is utterly irrelevant unless you take into account the level of diffuculty of the paper.

I think it is possible. I helped a dc mark past papers from the old science specs this year, and the papers did vary in difficulty a lot. There were also questions which to the naked eye were badly phrased, given the answers in the mark scheme. We sometimes then checked the examiners' reports and they sometimes said very few of even the most able had got the marks for particular questions, or there was widespread confusion even though other questions were answered well...mmmm!. However, the UMS were surprisingly consistent, so that bit did seem to work, in our very unscientific sample.

When I sat 'O' levels (early 80s), 70% got you an A as standard, I think

I think the extent of grade inflation has been exaggerated in the media - which is also unfair on all the children. I agree it has happened to some extent, and that its effects are negative.

Lots of academic schools don't do January sittings, so it is perfectly possible there is wide variation in Jan-June cohorts.

Just to be clear the 38 out of 60 for the A* in Chemistry was in June 2012 i.e. second sitting of the unit 1 module. Those who took the same module in January 2012 needed 48 out of 60 for the same grade.

Agreed that the top students should be distinguishable with an A* grade, which is what the January grade boundaries represent but those who sat in June have a significant advantage with the total ums that they now carry forward toward their overall grade.

At my Daughters school they have averaged 40%+ papers at A* in science subjects but in January 2012 this fell to under 5%. Students who re-sat in June 2012 improved their grades significantly.

The percentage of students nationally getting A* in Chemistry in January 2012 was 2% but in June 2012 it was 11.53%. For Biology it was 0.90% in January but 11.67% in June 2012. This is not surprising given the grade boundaries.

Saying that the January 2012 cohort were not good enough to get A just does not stack up from a statistical analysis perspective, it is very irregular. Also the grade boundary score for 100ums in Biology was 57 out of 60 and for Chemistry 58 out of 60 i.e. much higher than June 2012. This would indicate that the January papers were on the easy side. It still begs the question as to why so few students were deemed worthy of an A in January compared to June 2012 (harder papers according to the grade boundaries).

The percentage of students achieving A* grades can fluctuate year on year, but by a few percentage points. For the January to June comparison we are looking at variances in a multiple of 10!