Knowing how many marks will equal a certain GCSE grade is vital intelligence for teachers, but difficult and risky to predict.
Now hundreds of schools are coming together and using their combined numbers to work this out for themselves, despite exam boards urging extreme caution.
The initiative has been launched by the PiXL (Partners in Excellence) club, a partnership of more than 1,500 secondaries, in response to the new English and maths GCSEs.
The qualifications are being examined for the first time next summer, with a new 9-1 grading system, and are an enigma to many schools. Little is known about what will come up on the exam paper, and less still about the critical question of where the grade boundaries will lie and therefore what marks pupils will need to achieve a particular grade.
But PiXL is attempting to answer that near-impossible question.
In order to do so, it is acting like an exam board. The club has created sample test papers for schools, and is utilising its huge membership to help work out where grade boundaries will be. The method it uses is very close to the approach taken by the boards themselves (see box, opposite).
About 150,000 current Year 11 pupils, at 1,000 schools, have taken sample PiXL English papers as a mock exam. The same number have also taken its sample maths exam.
This week, schools and pupils found out their results. As on the real GCSE results day, pupils got a certificate showing their grades. But, unlike on the real results day, they will also get a breakdown of which questions they answered well and where they missed out on marks, in a document called a “Smith Pro Forma”. This is the most important part of the process, according to Will Smith, deputy chair of PiXL, after whom the report is named.
Although this research is interesting, any findings must be treated with very considerable caution
“The most powerful bit is telling the pupils where they’re weak or strong,” he said. “For all of the areas on the paper, particularly where they have struggled, we’re providing extra resources to help them improve.”
Tailored approach
In order to prepare pupils for the exams they will sit this summer, PiXL has created a range of sample papers and mark schemes in English and maths, each tailored to the style and specification of a different exam board. They include foundation and higher-tier papers.
The group also runs a quality-assurance system to make sure that the marking, which is done by the pupils’ own teachers, is accurate. In maths, there are webinars to tell teachers how to implement the mark scheme. And in English, each school submits a sample of marked papers to PiXL’s experts for checking: much the same as the process that is used by exam boards themselves.
Once the marks are in, PiXL’s examiners - all current or recent teachers, supported by a professional statistician - set grade boundaries. Mr Smith said this process was feasible because PiXL operated on a similar scale to some exam boards. “It only works because of the scale; because 1,000 schools did it,” he added.
And when the pupils receive their results, teachers will also receive PiXL’s version of the examiner reports produced by exam boards.
“The report will say, at a national level, most kids did this well and most missed this particular thing,” he said. “It’s linked to resources, so schools can work on the areas the pupils need more support with.”
But trying to second-guess exam papers and grade boundaries is a process fraught with risk, especially at a time of major reform to the content of exams and grading scale. Mr Smith acknowledges this.
“We have people who know how exam boards work, so we’re not going to be a million miles away,” he said. “But we don’t control what exam boards do, so we have to put caveats over it.
“And we say that, to a certain extent, the grade isn’t the important bit of information. The important part is pupils finding out where they’ve done well and less well, so that they can improve.”
But exam boards are sceptical. A spokesperson for the Joint Council for Qualifications, which represents exam boards, urged schools to use PiXL’s tests carefully.
“Although this research by PiXL is interesting, any findings must be treated with very considerable caution, as schools relying on this information could lead to students expecting a grade that they don’t achieve,” they said. “Awarding bodies are experts in what is a highly complex system.
“The question-setting process takes account of statistical information about the cohort, and it is well known that pupils’ performance matures considerably during Year 11.”
