Friday Five: A level results day special

It’s the morning after the night before. Just like that, another A level results day has been and gone (doesn’t it come around faster every year?). A level results day can be a day of huge celebration for some young people – a vindication of their hard work and a confirmation of their future plans – but for others it can feel very different. And amid the stories of university places secured or grades missed, wider analysis always reveals the extent of the UK’s ongoing educational inequities.

But what does the research say? How do A levels shape life outcomes? What do the public think? And are the results even reliable? This special A level results day edition of Friday Five brings together some of the notable recent research, readings, and policy on A levels – with several stories of scandal thrown in for good measure.

1. This year’s results: rise in top grades and regional divides

The percentage of top A-level grades has risen this year for the first time since 2021 – in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland. 27.8 percent of grades are A* or A this year, up from 27.2 percent in 2023. Alongside this, 82% of students received the grades they needed to secure their first choice university offer in UCAS. However, this news comes alongside reports of the persistence of a north-south divide in English results: in London, 31.3 percent of all grades were marked A* or A, compared to less than 24 percent of all grades in the North East and the East Midlands.

More on this year’s results is here.

2. How do A levels shape life outcomes? 

Research by the Centre for Longitudinal Studies highlights the impact of A-level choices on students’ future opportunities and earnings. Students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds who choose vocational A-levels, such as law or business, are less likely to attend prestigious universities, which may hinder their career prospects compared to peers taking traditional academic subjects like science or mathematics. 

A report by the Department for Education highlights the significant economic benefits of achieving intermediate qualifications like GCSEs, A levels and apprenticeships. The study finds that men with 2 or more A levels as their highest qualification have lifetime productivity returns of around £90,000 compared to those with 5-7 good GCSEs; for women the figure is around £76,000.

Read the research by the Centre for Longitudinal Studies here, and the full report by DfE here.

3. What is the public’s perception of A levels?

The latest round of the Ofqual-commissioned survey on perception of A-levels among pupils, parents, employers and others finds that confidence in A levels has increased across all stakeholders, reversing a previous decline. Employers and the general public reported improved perceptions of A levels as trusted, well-understood, and effective in preparing students for further study and work. Additionally, awareness and use of the access to scripts provision, reviews of marking, and processes for special considerations remained high, with general confidence in fairness and the handling of malpractice incidents showing slight improvements. 

Read the Ofqual survey results here.

4. How unreliable are A level grades?

This article in HEPI discuses the critical issue of grade unreliability in GCSEs, AS and A levels. The author highlights that grades can cary by one grade either way due to inconsistencies in marking, as acknowledged by educational authorities like Ofqual. This has serious implications for university admissions, where decisions often hinge on specific grade thresholds. The author recommends that university admissions officers should carefully reconsider applications that have grades that are within the margin of error, considered the unreliability of these grades.

This article discusses the issue of unreliable exam grades, where different examiners may give varying marks to the same script resulting in approximately 1 in 4 potentially incorrect grades. The author discusses a variety of solutions, ranging from allowing re-marks on request, double marking using statistical measures of marking fuzziness to adjust grades among others. 

Read the HEPI articles here and here.

5. A level British scandal…

A level results day is very rarely straightforward, and many a political career has been tarnished by it in one form or another. Indeed, the A level scandal that engulfed Estelle Morris’ tenure as Education Secretary – and which ultimately led to her resignation in 2002 – is a case in point, and it still makes for startling reading 22 years on. That year, students had apparently done ‘too well’ after A level results were released in August. This proved to be just the tip of the iceberg. Whispers of ‘grade fixing’ soon grew into shouts, and a Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA) report into the affair in September became mired in controversy after it emerged that the QCA were implicated in what was by now a full-blown scandal. Morris ordered an independent enquiry, which found ‘structural failings’ with the Government’s ‘Curriculum 2000’ and confirmed that over 2,000 pupils had received incorrect grades due to boundary changes. With all this going on alongside teachers’ strikes in London and accusations that Morris overstepped her brief, it was clear she wouldn’t last long in post. Two months after A level results day, she resigned. 

True A level fans might find this story reminds them of the A level results fiasco of 2020. With A level exams cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the education regulators in each of the four nations scrambled to implement an alternative. What emerged was an algorithm that would translate pupils’ centre-assessed predicted grades into moderated grades – supposedly to guard against grade inflation. The process came under intense criticism after A level results day, ultimately leading Ofqual and the UK Government to withdraw the grades and replace them with the original centre-assessed predictions. It was a similar story in Scotland: Nicola Sturgeon admitted that the Scottish Government ‘did not get it right.’

More on these two scandals is here and here.

That’s all for this week! If you found this blog useful, please be sure to share/tweet it and follow @theCfEY, @conorcarleton, and @Barristotle for future editions.