Re-marks, worth it?

[Orangesandlemons77]

A teacher emailed to tell me DS was one point off a 6 in a subject (GCSEs) and looking at his scores he is also one point off an 8 in another. He is taking the latter subject for A level but not the other.

She asked if we wanted a re-mark of the 6? Is it worth getting the two subjects re-marked? It costs about £45 and no guarantee of a change in grade.

DS says he is happy with the grades as they are as he has got in for 6th form etc, but I wondered if it would make any difference to for example UCAS points for university? I expect they would be mainly bothered about the A level grades though.

Any advice welcome. And best of luck to anyone getting their exam results today or dealing with re-marks / resits etc.

Thank you! Yes it's crazy seeing as Eng Lang is so critical but we move on.

Interesting about English language as I noticed on the thread about grades quite a few were saying they had got less than predicted, wonder if the original marking has been off in some way? It's not great is it, but good to hear the remarks were helpful.

Heard from teachers here they think should remark one as teacher has found more points, still not sent it back yet though as we have been away in holiday. Will get the payment sorted out.

His college let him in anyway as he was 1 mark off the 5 he needed and school "felt confident" that he would go up a grade (they had no idea but The Head told him to say that) but having a firm 5 now will be much better for whatever he does next.
Its annoying because instead of celebrating at school with his mates we were in a big queue at the college hoping they would take him but it ended well I suppose

Anyone else had results back? If so how long did they take. We have just been able to send ours off as school only just reopened.

@ForSharpViewer

Exams Officer here.

Edexcel are v fast, science and maths often come back the same day or next day.

Aqa English can take 15 working days sometimes. Also Geography is slow

OCR always a few days.

We had dc's physics paper remarked, having reviewed the script. it WAS literally remarked. You can lsee the new marking for each question on a clean script

I'm confused about this, school asked for the scripts so the teachers could look at them but then just sent a form about paying the money, however have not said what the teachers think, so I don't know what to do.

Think we will just leave it as they have not come back to us.

@Orangesandlemons77 why not email the teachers and ask them?

You have two weeks before the deadline.

I have but they don't reply.

That's appalling!

I checked the emails and they have sent me the exam papers so I can see them but not given any further advice, I am not an expert in maths so not any the wiser really

I will email again and see what they say.

Not all teachers will look at scripts. For maths it is worth looking at the scripts yourself. Do it alongside the mark scheme, which gives quite a lot of guidance.

Anything that's a grey area probably won t be changed on review anyway, but if there are any real howlers in the marking you have a decent chance of spotting it.

Most schools will not be giving detailed advice. Experienced teachers and examiners find that what they think should happen often doesn’t.

If a student asks me to look at script, I will skim it. I will say if I think it’s been very harshly marked or glaring errors such as missing pages out. I will not comment on individual Qs. I will share grade boundaries and tell them if they performed better in one paper or other. They must decide themselves if to put in for review.

It is often the case that a teacher thinks it’s been a bit harshly marked and then there’s no change.

Some schools suggest anyone less than 3 marks from next boundary could consider ‘having a go’. Again, families decide if to do it or not and it shouldn’t be case that teachers are analysing papers unless the grade is extremely surprising or papers out of kilter.

Remember too that predicted grades are more often wrong than right. Mock performance (esp when students didn’t sit full papers or proper grade boundaries used) don’t give an especially accurate indication of what will be achieved. Most students will do a bit better in some subjects and a bit worse in some, than expected. It’s entirely normal.

I will check and see how many marks out it is. I don't want to cause the teachers extra work, bet they are busy now the term has started.

Hi. Does anyone have any info on whether BTECs can be submitted for marking reviews and whether there can be movement in grades comparable to those we sometimes see in GCSEs?
Have already had physics go up a grade (2 extra marks) and now thinking about BTEC (performing arts and Creative Media) where we are off by 5 marks and 3 marks respectively, for the next grade. There is so much info on GCSEs but can't find anything about BTECs.

Heard from the school DS was one point off an 8 in maths, they might have one question where he could possibly get a point but not sure. The science teacher is recommending a remark of chemistry as thinks there are points there.

DS is not bothered though! I am not sure what to do. It's quite a lot of money overall.

"could" and "think" are not a lot to spend £100 on.

If he's not bothered, then what exactly is gained from the possibility of a slightly higher grade? Not bragging rights because you'll have told everyone his results already?

Do you think it looks good for the school? It is the school emailing me about these remarks, I didn't start it

Could be useful for uni admissions. Not uncommon to rank gcses when deciding whether to make an offer as predicted grades are not reliable.

Yes. They're hoping that it'll go up but if it doesn't it's not cost them a penny. It's a win win for them.

So it looks better for the school's results? That makes sense.