GCSE Appeal 2021 on the ground of unreasonable academic judgment. What do you think?

[Questioningit]

Just found out that school have set grade boundaries incredibly high in a subject my DD got an unexpectedly low mark for. I’ve got a day left to do a stage 2 appeal. Any advice would be much appreciated.

Has it stopped her progressing to college/sixth form?

Why would the school do that?

@Hercisback no but it’s a subject she potentially wants to do at university.

Grade boundaries are only meaningful when considered alongside the assessment. If everyone graded lower than expected, and lower than previous comparable cohorts, then there is potentially an issue. But I can't see why it how the school would do that.

We appealed on similar grounds and found out today DS has passed.

Were they grade boundaries issued by the exam board or did they set their own?

@adeleh that’s amazing news and encouraging too.
@TheFallenMadonna the evidence used was ‘high control’ ie GCSE style In hall, exam conditions.

@olivo school set their own.

Was this a high uptake subject (ebacc)
There will be a big difference between a smaller subject (an arts subject) and something like English or geography

Do you know the actual marks in assessments so you could compare how she would have been graded in eg 2019 or 2018? Would it have been significantly different?

If so, I'd go with an appeal.

Disclaimer, I don't know what a stage 2 appeal is but if you are concerned that it will affect her future, I would discuss.

@Changingtides1234 it’s a subject that not a lot of dc take.

@olivo yes there’s a significant difference between 2018/2019 grade boundaries compared to the ones school set.

This is your way forwards - the difference in grade boundaries. Why would they set them high? Doesn't make sense to penalise their pupils like this

The only reason I can think of is to make data fit previous years so as not to draw attention to themselves. Many dc did worse than expected in general at our school.

did the school not set the boundaries so they would end up with the correct ratio of grades? surely some exams are 'easier' so will require a higher % to get a 9. Think that's always been the case?

If you've talked it over with the school and this is not the case and they can't explain their logic then you could appeal if you think it's worth the agro. Risk is that grades can go up or down though.

Did you appeal op? Ds1 was a quarter of a mark off a 9 on one of his subjects due to high grade boundaries and full gcse condition exams. Literally a quarter of a mark. I was cross but the centre review failed and so he didn’t feel inclined to do an exam board appeal.

@HasaDigaEebowai not yet. I’m finding it really stressful as worried when it says grades can go down which would be awful. School are adamant they’re right but we were the same as you - full exam conditions, really high grade boundaries and no use of the grade descriptors JCQ advocated this year.

We are also thinking of appealing on the same grounds. We did send an appeal to the school in August and they sent us some forms which dc did not complete as the email from school warned stringing that the grade could go down. Also dc lost confidence in winning the appeal.

However, dc changed their mind and want to go for an exam board appeal, the deadline is Friday. Not sure if school will support the appeal but dc has submitted it to school asking them to send it to the exam board. What a mess this year has been. Dc ground is that alternative evidence should have been sent as he was in the middle of a long isolation period when tests were done and the school had no online learning provision at the time. The selection of evidence placed him at a disadvantage and substituted evidence should have been used.

Schools didn’t have to use grade boundaries, they should have used the jcq grade descriptors.

They didn’t have to use grade boundaries but it was a legitimate thing to do (is my understanding). If it wasn’t then their centre plan thing wouldn’t have been approved.

@HasaDigaEebowai yes it’s in our centre policy too which makes me think there’s no point appealing. It’s been such a frustrating and unfair process.

Did you do a centre review?

We had a centre review on two. One was upheld on centre review since they’d inputted the marks incorrectly. It was immediately rectified and he got new corrected paperwork through. The other is the one where he’s half a point off the grade boundary. Centre review out one was no change to the grade. Ds can’t be bothered to push it and he isn’t doing the subject anymore. But I think he probably should have appealed. Since he’s half a mark off a nine, he’s hardly going to be moved down to a 7 by the exam board.

We started the centre review but didn't really conclude it and they never came back to us on our queries. I'm hoping we can still do exam board review or maybe the centre will do a review quickly. Who knows. It would help if the school weren't so defensive and aggressive, it's nothing personal against them I wish they'd understand that.

I’d do a formal centre review on the basis of a check for administrative error.