Background
The past three years have been challenging for schools, teachers and learners. During these years, there have been changes to the standards of our qualifications.
In June 2020 all exams were cancelled and, in common with other exam boards, we issued grades recommended by teachers. These grades were more generous than would have been the case if exams had taken place.
In November 2020 we ran exams once again. We awarded grades based on the more generous standard of the teacher assessments in June 2020 so that our November candidates were not at a disadvantage compared to our June candidates.
In June and November 2021 we were able to run exams in most countries, but we issued school-assessed grades in places where exams could not take place. We aligned our exam grades to the more generous standard of school-assessed grades so that all candidates were awarded grades based on the same standard, regardless of whether they had taken exams or not.
In June and November 2022 we continued to run exams in most countries. In places where exams could not take place, we provided Portfolio of Evidence as a contingency measure. Portfolio of Evidence is marked and graded by us, and we set the same awarding standard for both exams and Portfolio of Evidence.
In 2022, in common with most other exam boards, we began to move our awarding standard back towards the pre-Covid standards of 2019 and before. The standard we adopted in 2022 was approximately half way between the pre-Covid standard of 2019 and the more generous standard of 2021. So 2022 marked the halfway point in our return to pre-Covid standards.
How will June and November 2023 grades compare with previous years?
In 2022, the standard that we set was at the midpoint between 2019 and 2021. This meant that the grades we awarded in 2022 were more generous than those awarded in June 2019, and less generous than those awarded in June 2021.
The standard of exams in 2023 will return to the standard of exams in 2019. However, it is important to understand what we mean by this.
There are two different ways to maintain the standard from a previous year:
- the first is to require the same level of performance to obtain the same grade;
- the second is to make sure that comparable groups of candidates get comparable distributions of grades.
Usually, these two approaches lead to the same outcome, and it makes no difference which one we use. However, in a situation where there has been widespread disruption to learning, the second approach is more generous than the first.
To protect students against the impact of disruption to learning caused by the Covid pandemic, we will take the second (and more generous) approach to carrying forward the 2019 standard. This means we will avoid disadvantaging students whoÂ
- have taken exams in 2023, and
- who have experienced disruption to their learning.
We know these students might have performed better if they had taken the exams in 2019, when they did not experience as much disruption to their learning. We want to make sure the grades those students receive this year are comparable to the grades they would have received in 2019. We do this by looking carefully at the results of candidates in 2019 and in the years before that when we set grade thresholds.
In general, the grade thresholds we choose in 2023 will be higher than the grade thresholds we chose in 2021 or 2022, and closer to 2019. However, this might not always be the case. Grade thresholds can change each year to reflect any differences in the difficulty of the question papers. In 2023 it is possible that grade thresholds could be lower than in 2022, because of a more difficult question paper, even though we have returned to the standard of exams in 2019.
This means that if you have used 2021 or 2022 past papers as mock exams for your students, the grade thresholds set for those papers are likely to be lower, reflecting the fact that we set a more generous standard in these years. You should remember this if you are using the results from mock exams to inform your forecast grades for students being examined in 2023.
How will this approach affect individual centres?
It is important to note that we are talking about global averages – standards for Cambridge centres as a group. Grades at an individual centre could be better than in 2019 if the cohort at that centre is stronger; or lower than in 2019 if the cohort at that centre is weaker. For most centres the percentage of candidates awarded a grade A or higher will not be exactly the same as the centre’s 2019 percentage and, in some cases, it may be significantly different.
There is no set number, or ‘cap’, on the number of students who can achieve each grade.
Will Cambridge International qualifications have the same awarding standard as qualifications in England?
We align the standard of our qualifications to the standard of similar qualifications in England, so Cambridge International candidates will not be advantaged or disadvantaged by taking our qualifications rather than qualifications from the main exam boards in England. Ofqual have produced this article where they explain their planned approach to grading in June 2023.
Find out how we mark and grade exams.
For UK schools we recommend you share this information with school leaders and teachers at your centre well before results day.
Standards and grading for exams and portfolio of evidence routes
We grade portfolios of evidence in the same way that we grade exams and make sure that standards in the portfolio of evidence are aligned to those of the equivalent exams.