iGCSEs - As good as GCSEs?

[winterrabbit]

Just that really. I am reading that officially they are equivalent but is that the case in reality? Do 6th forms/unis look more favourably on GCSEs?

They seem to be a private school thing so wouldn't have thought they would do them if they weren't regarded to be at least the same as GCSEs. My son has some and it's never been commented on at all. He just needed certain grades for 6 form and he's got Uni offers based on his A level results so I don't think it makes much difference.

Exactly the same.

Overseas friends’ children does them in Singapore, Hong Kong, plus Britain International schools and get offer in UK universities.So they not view differently.

Private schools tend to use them because they have a wider choice of options within the modules. My son was at a school which did them and that school gets between 40-50 kids into Oxbridge each year from a cohort of 180 so pretty sure they aren't considered the poor relative!

They used to be seen as more difficult than the old GCSEs hence lots of independent schools were using them as they were thought to be a better prep for the linear nature of A Levels. IGCSEs have always been linear and had very little, if any, coursework. Probably on par now.

Strictly speaking "IGCSE" is a registered/trademarked brand name of the Cambridge international exam board (CAIE) and only refers to those. But IGCSE is also widely used to refer to edexcel international GCSEs.
IGCSEs are every bit as good as GCSEs, and in some cases more rigorous. One Cambridge college said they accepted them like-for-like but typically found that candidates offering IGCSE tended to take slightly fewer IGCSEs due to the greater breadth of the courses.
IGCSEs also tend to be better for home/online educated students because of less courswork / practical / fieldwork requirements and a greater weighting on the final exam. For geography and sciences the IGCSEs have an "alternative to fieldwork/practical" paper that tests knowledge of practical techniques.
The Edexcel IGCSEs are set and marked by the same exam board as the Edexcel domestic GCSEs, and have similar curricula and exam style. The Cambridge IGCSEs are essentially set by the "international arm" of the organization that sets the OCR domestic exams.
Prior to 2016, domestic GCSE's had been diluted and grade-inflated to the extent that they were of a significantly lower standard than IGCSE (which had been maintained closer to the old O level standard). Hence private schools preferred IGCSE as better preparation for A level. The "toughening up" of the domestic GCSEs since 2016 has probably reduced the disparity between the domestic GCSE and IGCSE so that it's now not that significant in most subjects. However, there are some subjects where the IGCSE is (or was until fairly recently) clearly of a higher standard than the equivalent domestic qualification. Maths/additional maths/physics spring to mind. From what I can gather this is because the IGCSEs are pitched to the international market, and there are large cohorts of kids in e.g. Singapore and Hong Kong who are working far ahead of the cohort in the UK.

See, I've always heard that they're a bit easier now, compared to the reformed GCSEs. State schools aren't allowed to offer them!

Yes. They are exactly the same. In some cases they are considered better because most private schools do them I teach both. They are the same

Normally when exams are discussed on MN there's a raft of (state school) parents who come charging in saying Igcse are easier and it's unfair and that's why private schools do them.

I always wonder why they aren't writing to all the unis asking why pupils from private schools are bring offered places with their sub standard GCSEs. Plus all those international students who have them. I always also wonder how they do so well at 'A' level after having taken igcses, it's a massive mystery 🤣

The reality is they are the same.

@winterrabbit the first I is capitalised; it stands for International. They're not Apple products 🙂

I've marked IGCSE English for Cambridge for donkey's years, and the standards are rigorous. For a while, English state schools were able to take them, but Gove put a stop to that. Strictly indies, overseas and Referral Units now.

We use the IGCSE maths at my school because we have a large number of international boarders, and the questions tend to be a bit less "wordy". I've taught both, there's no difference in difficulty (and barely any difference in content), both are viewed equally on a CV.

Anyone under the impression that IGCSEs are easier should compare the cambridge additional maths IGCSE syllabus with the MAT test syllabus used for university admissions to Oxford, Imperial and Warwick. They are extremely similar.... despite the MAT syllabus being based on the first four terms of domestic A level, not GCSE.
The decision to stop state school students from taking IGCSEs was entirely political - it had no educational basis.

At DDs school they have brought them in for the lower sets as the Head of English wanted to "try them out" but the other English teachers aren't that keen on them.