Anyone still waiting for GCSE marking reviews?

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Ours were submitted on results day. Heard nothing yet but I know some people have. Waiting on CIE and AQA.

It is - my dc has now (since beginning of Y11) has decided they hate english as the marking is so subjective.

submitted ours Friday as we had to wait for the school to be open to request payment. English Lit AQA, really hoping it's not too long but at least it's not urgently required.

We have submitted two for re-marking today. The grades weren't deal-breakers (DS got on to the A Level courses he wanted), but he was keen for the higher grades in both subjects (which would better reflect his performance in all his mocks).

Keeping everything crossed for those still waiting!

Ds just got his back and went up to a 9.

Congratulations @bananaapplepears. What subject was that?

Thank you. It was english language which he's studying at A Level.

That's what we're waiting for although just hoping it goes up to a 7. She's doing Lit for A level so doesn't need it, but would prefer it to bed higher.

DS’s came back within a week for both English language and Lit. I’m not convinced they even looked at them. 100% in Lit paper 1 and then 50-something in paper 2 - doesn’t seem likely to me.

AQA Spanish speaking came back with 4 extra marks and a 9 - took just over a week,

Finally got French speaking back from AQA and no change unfortunately. Still 1 mark off a 9. I’m gutted. Not convinced it was properly reviewed really as the mark was bizarrely low and all the other papers he aced.

Well done to all those who have had grade changes. We feel unlucky but will have to move on!

We had the same last year - a jump of 20 marks and 2 grades, on ONE paper. Also an 'error in academic judgement' - the entire paper had been incorrectly marked.

Did you receive the recording back of the speaking (sorry I am not sure how it works but obvs it's not as simple as getting a copy of the script obviously)? Were there areas where he felt the mark was incorrect, eg he got 5/10 on the roleplay but actually gave a good answer to every question? or did you not have the chance to assess it?

I didn’t receive the recording, we just asked for the review. I knew we were going to get it reviewed so didn’t seem necessary to listen to the recording first.

It's clear now that they (AQA) don't learn from their mistakes and bear no responsibility for such poor quality of markings. That's sad.

Ah fair enough. I was just wondering if it would give you an idea. Or you might listen to it and go "oh gosh, he gave no answer at all to that section which was worth 10 marks" (I mean I hope not obvs but it might explain it, if that matters). Can you ask now?

DS did one GCSE early last year, and we requested a review of marking because he was 1 mark off a grade 8. The review turned up 12 (!) extra marks so he went from a grade 7 to a 9. That was the end of our confidence in the whole marking system.

So this year, his proper GCSE year, we requested reviews of marking for 5 subjects, submitted to school on results day. Our school is very hot on reviewing marking and cover the costs as long as the heads of department can see a case for a review. So far we have had confirmation that French isn't being submitted to Edexcel, English Lit went to Edexcel and the 2 marks needed for the next grade were found, so a 7 has turned to an 8. We're still waiting to hear on the other 3 subjects. Frustratingly, it doesn't seem possible to find out if school have reviewed the papers and deemed them eligible to submit to the exam board - I guess no news is good news.... but it's quite opaque and the deadline for submissions is looming. I'd almost rather pay and then just have clarity on exactly what's going on.

This is great for the DC getting higher grades but so upsetting that marking is so unreliable

My DD got a 6, predicted 8 in English Lang. She is only 1mark into a 6 and because of this school is advising against a remark. However her whole paper 1 she has been almost 'typecast' as a level 2 response student. I have just got her paper back and there's plenty of evidence that she's seriously down marked in SPAG (she got 8 despite correct use of ellipsis, varied sentence starters, correct use of colon and semicolon throughout and one single misspelling).
IMO her writing is over level 2 as well - there is some overwriting but also some sophisticated attempts at using extended metaphor, cyclical structure and time slips. Would they really mark down for one or two episodes of getting carried away in the language? She got a 15 for content
I put her whole description exactly into AI and asked it to mark it according to AQA marker guidelines for 2026 and AI gave it 34 (21 + 13). If AI is close to accurate she would get into the next grade boundary.

However when I then gave AI the grade she achieved (23) it backtracked and said why it wasn't a good piece of writing and only deserved band 2.

She got 11 marks higher in her paper 2 and I really feel it was an unfair mark - but should I just leave it for fear that she could be marked down and end up with a 5?

@DameOutrage it's possible that she got level 2 for the writing if it didn't answer the question. I don't mark that paper so I don't know it well enough to say whether that might be what happened.

The paper isn't marked by one person though, so it's not that someone has decided on q2 that it's a "level 2 paper".

Have the school looked at it, or just said "leave it because it's borderline"

@DameOutrage Was that ChatGPT? Have you tried GoogleAI for the same thing? I did this- ChatGPT gave a higher mark then reduced it when I said actual grade but Google didn’t. I probably wouldn’t pay for a review because of the risk but if it’s been really harshly marked I’m sure it’s very unlikely to go down.

We submitted 2 papers to Pearson and got them back within days. One went up a grade (4 extra marks) and one stayed the same (Eng Lang and the HoD felt this had been very harshly marked).

It seems a very flawed system in which parents and schools who are prepared to pay/go through the admin are at a big advantage.

We’ve asked this week for DD’s AQA Eng Lang to be reviewed, her teacher had predicted a 9 and on his review felt a question on paper one had been harshly marked.

She was 2 marks off a 9, which she doesn’t need for her next step but which she will be really pleased if she gets.

Quite a few kids in her school seemed to get an 8 in Lang when they were expecting a 9, not sure how many have paid for the review though.

Don’t get your hopes up. The system is rigged - teacher here. Remarks are not really fair remarks anymore. Examiners are told on some papers that they shouldn’t move up more than 1% of requests and that they have to disagree by more than 2 marks on a question to move it. You cannot challenge if you don’t agree - you can only appeal against the system and have to someone prove the whole process was wrong - despite not being able to prove anything. Exam boards mark their own homework essentially. The training and pay gets less and less and the quality of marking is also now dire. I’m so frustrated as a teacher but there is no one to complain to!!!!! More parents need to know what the system is actually like these days.

It was the description of a strange place or house, which is what she wrote about. There wasn't a question to answer.

The school think it has been harshly marked but because worst case scenario is that if she looses a mark overall she will end up as a grade 5, she's better just accepting the 6.

We just got Paper 1 of English Lan back with no change. We're going to try paper 2 as still 1 mark off the next grade boundary. Mine also did badly in the writing which I thought was good and showed lots of different styles. But I think she answered the prompt a bit obliquely and didn't pull it together so can see why it was marked lower too.

I did try putting them into Chat GPT after I'd sent Paper 1, and it advised that Paper 2 had more capacity for higher marks so fingers crossed.

We’ve just put both English lit papers in for a review - she got a 5 and was consistently working at 7/8. 2 marks off a 6 in the marking so unlikely I imagine to change. School have taken forever to get back so we’ve just gone straight for a remark without their review so goodness knows and I expect we will get nowhere but she wants to give it a go so here we are. I find the whole system grossly unfair. Her friends at the local private school have had teachers all over their papers in terms of remarks (and many have gone up a grade) whereas we have had nothing (can’t blame very stretched teachers in our state). Never a level playing field is it.