Reviews Of Marking And Moderation For GCSE And GCE 2016

Reviews of marking and moderation for GCSE and GCE: summer 2016 exam seriesnotes). Therefore, we may also expect to see a reduction in the number of reviewsrequested for GCE as a whole compared to summer 2015.In England, key stage 417 and 518 accountability systems have also been reformedthis year (see background notes) and new key performance measures introduced. Itis possible that changes to performance measures may have impacted on thenumber of reviews requested by schools and colleges following the summer 2016series.Changes in higher education may also have impacted on review figures. Restrictionson the numbers of students that universities can recruit each year have been lifted.This may have resulted in universities being more flexible about taking students whodid not meet their offer. Over recent years there has also been an increase in thenumber of 18-year-old candidates receiving offers for university places that areunconditional of the A level grades which they attain (see background notes)19. Bothchanges may have led to a decrease in the number of GCE assessment reviewsrequested if some students’ university places are less dependent on their GCEgrades.The way in which Ofqual has collected review data has changed this year (seebackground notes). This has highlighted that one exam board included review datafor qualifications other than GCEs and GCSEs (such as Level 1/Level 2 certificates)in their data return and that they had done so for the past 5 years. These have beenremoved from 2016 data, but remain in 2012 to 2015, so comparisons over timeshould be treated with caution. Removal of these qualifications from the 2016 datahas resulted in a drop of approximately 1.5% of GCSE reviews and 1.0% of GCSEgrades challenged and changed.All of these changes must be borne in mind when making comparisons over time.Note that figures within the commentary and tables have been rounded to thenearest 50 with the exception of service 1 figures which have been rounded to thenearest 5 as the figures for this service are generally much smaller than the others.Tables 1 to 12 referred to in the text are provided in the appendix.A glossary of terms is available on page 21 to help you interpret this ds/attachment data/file/365979/DfE consultation response 16-19 Accountability s/eoc-report-2015-v2.pdfOfqual 20165

Reviews of marking and moderation for GCSE and GCE: summer 2016 exam seriesKey statisticsGCSE and GCE qualifications are made up of a number of individual assessments,for example, exams, coursework or controlled assessment tasks. Reviews can berequested for individual assessments, so it is possible for more than one review to beconducted in any single qualification taken by a candidate.Table R1: Number of reviews, qualification grades challenged and qualificationgrades changed for 2015 and 2016% ofqualification% ofNumber of Number ofgrades% of total% of totalNumberentries qualification qualification challenged Number of qualification qualificationofwith review gradesgradesthat were qualificationsgradesgradesreviews requested challenged changedchangedawardedchallenged changedGCSE2015 372,9002016 312,350% change %GCE2015 199,5002016 114,750% change Total2015 572,4002016 427,100% change %Notes:1. For the 5 year figures, see Table 4.2. Figures have been rounded to the nearest 50.Following the release of results from summer 2016, there were 427,100 reviewsacross all service types20. This is a 25% decrease on 2015 (572,400 reviews). Whenthe number of entries is taken into consideration we still see a reduction in thenumber of reviews requested. In 2015, 2.5% of all GCE and GCSE entries weresubject to review, this decreased to 2.0% in 2016.The 427,100 reviews relate to 371,600 qualification grades. The number of reviews isgreater than the number of qualification grades challenged as reviews may berequested for more than one assessment within the same qualification. The numberof qualification grades challenged is 23% lower than in 2015 when 480,550 gradeswere challenged. When the number of certifications is taken into consideration westill see a reduction in the number of grades challenged. In 2015, 6.0% of all GCEand GCSE grades awarded were challenged, this decreased to 4.8% in 2016.20For service 1 and 2 each assessment reviewed counts as one review. For service 3, reviews arecounted at the school or college level so one review will relate to a number of candidates.Ofqual 20166

Reviews of marking and moderation for GCSE and GCE: summer 2016 exam seriesThe proportion of qualification grades challenged that are changed as a result ofreviews has remained fairly consistent (between 16% and 19% of qualificationgrades challenged) over the past five years (see table 2 in the appendix). In 2016,18% of qualification grades challenged resulted in a change.In total, across all three service types, there were 67,900 qualification grade changesin summer 2016. This represents 0.9% of all certifications. This percentage is thelowest since 2013. Of the qualification grades changed in 2016, 99% were changedupwards21.Seventy-three reviews were still being processed at the time of data collection, ofwhich 37 were within agreed turnaround times.21This year, automatic grade protection applied for all reviews of moderation and extended reviews ofmarking. This means that some grades that might have gone down did not because they wereprotected. This is subject to change in future years.Ofqual 20167

Reviews of marking and moderation for GCSE and GCE: summer 2016 exam seriesCertifications and entriesIn the summer 2016 exam series, more than 2.2 million GCE certifications and over5.5 million GCSE certifications were made in England, Wales and Northern Ireland,other UK regions and overseas. A certification is a formal acknowledgement of acandidate’s achievement for a whole qualification. The number of GCSE and GCEcertifications has remained fairly constant over the last five years (see figure 1).GCSE and GCE qualifications are made up of a number of assessments and thegrades that candidates receive when they certificate are based on their performancein these individual assessments. Candidates are entered to each assessment of thequalification separately and schools and colleges submit these entries to the relevantexam board on the candidate’s behalf. These are referred to as unit entries22.There were 16.5 million GCSE unit entries in summer 2016, a decrease of just over1% from summer 2015. The return to linear assessments23 in 2014 for GCSEs inEngland contributed to an increase in entries of 11% between summer 2013 andsummer 2014.There were 4.9 million GCE unit entries in summer 2016, down 17% on summer2015. This decrease will largely be due to changes made to A level and ASqualifications which resulted in a decline in entries for the reformed qualifications in2016. These changes include the decoupling of AS and A level in England and thereduction of the number of assessments in reformed qualifications.Figure 1: Total entries and certifications for GCSE and GCE, summer examseries, 2012 to 201622Or component entries for linear qualifications. For ease of interpretation all are referred to as unitentries in this report.23Exams taken at the end of the period of study.Ofqual 20168

Reviews of marking and moderation for GCSE and GCE: summer 2016 exam seriesNumber of reviews and qualification gradeschallengedThere were 427,100 reviews submitted following the summer 2016 series across thethree service types. Table R2 shows the breakdown across the three services.Table R2: The number of GCSE and GCE review requests across service typesin summer 2016GCSE reviewsGCE reviewsService 1 (administrative error review)Service 2 (non-priority review of marking)Service 2 (priority review of marking)Service 3 (review of 400Total number of reviews312,350114,750Note: Service 1 figures above have been rounded to the nearest 5, all other figures have been rounded to thenearest 50.Schools and colleges can submit reviews for one or more of the assessments withina qualification and so in some cases multiple reviews relate to a single qualificationgrade for a single candidate. In total, there were 371,600 qualification gradesinvolved in reviews, down from 480,550 in summer 2015 – a 23% decrease.Ofqual 20169

Reviews of marking and moderation for GCSE and GCE: summer 2016 exam seriesQualification grade changesWhen a review is conducted, there are three possible outcomes: No marking error is found, resulting in no mark adjustment and therefore nograde change A marking error is found, a mark adjustment is made (up or down), but there isno change to the overall qualification grade A marking error is found, a mark adjustment is made (up or down), which in turnresults in a change to the qualification grade.For GCSE, 280,250 qualification grades were challenged. Of these, 51,350 resultedin a qualification grade change (of which over 99% of grades went up). Thisrepresents just over 18% of GCSE qualification grades challenged. This percentageis slightly lower than last year, when 19% of GCSE grades challenged were changed(see table R1 and figure 2).At GCE, 91,350 qualification grades were challenged. Of these, 16,550 resulted in agrade change (of which 98% of grades went up), representing 18% of GCE gradeschallenged. This percentage is slightly lower than last year, when less than 19% ofGCE grades challenged resulted in a change (see table R1 and figure 2).Figure 2: Percentage of all GCSE and GCE qualification grades challenged thatresulted in a grade change, summer exam series, 2012 to 2016Ofqual 201610

Reviews of marking and moderation for GCSE and GCE: summer 2016 exam seriesIn summer 2016, the 51,350 GCSE grade changes represented 0.9% of all GCSEcertificates awarded. For GCE, the 16,550 grade changes represented 0.8% of allGCE certificates awarded (see table R1 and figure 3). Grade changes for both GCSEand GCE amount to 0.9% of all certifications awarded for both qualification levels.This percentage is the lowest since 2013.Figure 3: Qualification grade changes as a percentage of total certifications,summer exam series, 2012 to 2016Ofqual 201611

Reviews of marking and moderation for GCSE and GCE: summer 2016 exam seriesGrades subject to a reviewFor GCSE, schools and colleges submitted more reviews for candidates whoseoriginal grade was D than for any other grades (96,250 reviews or 34% - see table 3and figure 4). This was the same last year, however, the percentage of candidateswith an original grade of D has fallen by 3.0 percentage points in 2016. This yearthere were also slight increases in the percentage of candidates with an originalgrade of A (0.5 percentage points), C (0.5 percentage points), E (1.0 percentagepoint) and F (0.5 percentage points). These differences may reflect usual year-onyear variation or they could possibly be due to changes in key stage 4 accountabilitymeasures (see background notes) resulting in less pressure on schools and collegesto attain high proportions of A*-C grades.Figure 4: Percentage of qualification grades involved in reviews for GCSE,summer exam series 2016For GCE, schools and colleges submitted slightly more reviews for candidates whoseoriginal grade was B (29,350 reviews or 32%), closely followed by reviews forcandidates whose original grade was C (25,450 reviews or 28%) (see table 3 andfigure 5). This year there was an increase in the proportion of candidates with anoriginal grade of A and B (percentage points of 2.5 and 1.5 respectively) whilst theproportion of candidates with an original grade of C, D, E and U all decreased(percentage points of 1.0, 1.5, 1.0 and 0.5 respectively).Ofqual 201612

Reviews of marking and moderation for GCSE and GCE: summer 2016 exam seriesFigure 5: Percentage of qualification grades involved in reviews for GCE,summer exam series 2016Ofqual 201613

Reviews of marking and moderation for GCSE and GCE: summer 2016 exam seriesService breakdownIn this section the number of reviews, qualification grades challenged andqualification grades changed are reported for each service type.Reviews are conducted on individual assessments and so it is possible to requestmore than one review for a single qualification that a candidate has taken. It istherefore possible that, where more than one review has been requested for thesame candidate and qualification, more than one service may have been used. Forexample, consider a candidate who has taken GCSE biology and whose school hasdecided to request a review for two assessments that the candidate has taken for thisqualification. The school may decide to submit both assessments for a review ofmarking (service 2) or they may decide to submit one assessment for anadministrative error review (service 1) and one assessment for a review of marking(service 2).Breaking down the number of grades challenged and changed by service becomesproblematic when schools submit more than one assessment for the same candidateand qualification to more than one review service. In the example above, only onegrade is challenged but two services are used to do so. Counting the gradechallenged in both service 1 and service 2 figures would mean double counting it,which would be incorrect. Therefore, in the breakdown of figures presented below,candidates who have had their grades challenged through more than one servicehave not been included. These candidates are however included in the total figuresreported in previous sections of this report. Of the 91,350 GCE grades challenged,1,750 (2%) were challenged through more than one service. Of the 280,250 GCSEgrades challenged, 4,650 (2%) were challenged through more than one service.These 6,400 qualification grades challenged are not included in the figures reportedbelow and therefore neither are the 1,550 qualification grade changes which resultedfrom these challenges.There has been a reduction in the number of reviews requested across all services insummer 2016 compared to summer 2015. The introduction section of this reportprovides some of the possible reasons for this decline.Service 1: administrative error review(See table 4 and figure 6)In a service 1 review, the exam board checks the script to make sure that everyquestion has been marked and the total number of marks awarded for that script hasbeen correctly added up and recorded and no error has occurred.Service 1 reviews continue to be a very small proportion (less than 1%) of all reviewsin 2016.Ofqual 201614

Reviews of marking and moderation for GCSE and GCE: summer 2016 exam seriesFor GCSE, there were 1,550 reviews at this service level, a decrease of 44% fromthe previous year when there were 2,775 reviews. There were 765 GCSE gradeschallenged through service 1 of which 20 (3%) were changed.For GCE, there were 875 reviews at this service level. This is down 28% on last yearwhen there were 1,215 reviews. There were 445 GCE grades challenged throughservice 1 of which 15 (3%) were changed.While both GCSE and GCE show decreases in the number of service 1 reviewscompared to last year the numbers are not dissimilar from 2012 to 2014 (see table4).Figure 6: Service 1 reviews and grade changes, summer exam series, 2012 to2016Service 2 – non-priority: review of marking for an individualcandidate(See table 5 and figure 7)In a service 2 review, a second examiner reviews the marking of the originalexaminer to determine, in respect of each task in the assessment for which markscould have been awarded, and in respect of the assessment as a whole, whether theOfqual 201615

Reviews of marking and moderation for GCSE and GCE: summer 2016 exam seriesmarking included any marking error(s). This service also includes a service 1administrative error check if this has not been previously requested for theassessment. If a grade is changed as a result of using this service, it is not possiblefor us to differentiate in respect of a marking error or administrative error having beenfound when both reviews have been carried out as part of this service.For GCSE, there were 306,600 reviews, a decrease of 17% on the previous yearwhen there were 368,150 reviews. This decline entirely accounts for the fall in totalGCSE reviews between 2015 and 2016. There were 200,100 GCSE gradeschallenged through service 2 of which 44,200 (22%) were changed.For GCE, there were 82,800 reviews, a decrease of 47% from the previous yearwhen there were 156,800 reviews. This decline entirely accounts for the fall in totalGCE reviews between 2015 and 2016. There were 58,400 GCE grades challengedthrough service 2 of which 11,500 (20%) were changed.Figure 7: Service 2 non-priority reviews and grade changes, summer examseries, 2012 to 2016Service 2 – priority: review of marking for an individual candidate(See table 6 and figure 8)For GCE, there were 29,700 priority reviews, a decrease of 26% on the previous yearwhen there were 39,900 reviews. There were 19,100 GCE grades challengedthrough service 2 priority of which 3,500 (18%) were changed.Ofqual 201616

Reviews of marking and moderation for GCSE and GCE: summer 2016 exam seriesFigure 8: Service 2 priority GCE reviews and grade changes, summer examseries, 2012 to 2016This summer, Pearson offered service 2 priority to GCSE candidates and 2,250reviews were processed through this service. There were 1,300 GCSE gradeschallenged through this service of which 250 (17%) were changed.Service 3: review of moderation of internal assessment(See table 7 and figure 9)Exam boards moderate a sample of candidates’ work to check the schools’ andcolleges’ marking (a sample consists of several candidates’ work). Therefore, eachsingle service 3 review applies to a number of candidates within a school or college,not to candidates individually. This service is only a

2015, 6.0% of all GCE and GCSE grades awarded were challenged, this decreased to 4.8% in 2016. In total, 67,900 qualification grades were changed, down from 90,950 in 2015, or a 25% decrease. This means 18% of all GCE and GCSE qualification grades challenged were changed, slightly lower than in 2015 (19%). Overall, 0.9% of GCE and