Cambridge National in Enterprise and Marketing: how to use our candidate exemplars effectively
03 September 2026
This blog was first published in 2024 and has been updated to reflect new resources.
Sarah Phillips, Business and Economics Subject Advisor
On Teach Cambridge we have provided candidate exemplars for the non-examined assessments (NEAs), R068 and R069, of our Cambridge National in Enterprise and Marketing. These resources use real candidates’ work relating to the relevant assignment at the time and are provided to help you assess your own candidates’ work. The exemplars can be used as comparisons with your students’ work to determine how best to mark it.
We have full unit exemplars and also individual task level exemplars with commentary more focused on marking support. On each piece of work the principal moderator has indicated the criteria that should be considered and how the marking criteria could be applied. The resource does not in any way indicate an endorsed approach to responding to a non-examined assessment (NEA) task and the candidate work should not be used as a model answer.
Here are a couple of reminders to help you get the most out of a candidate exemplar.
High-level work is not perfect
Since the new specifications were introduced in 2022, Performance Objective (PO) 1, ‘recall knowledge and show understanding’ is not assessed in the two NEAs (R068 and R069). Some of the high-level candidate exemplar work includes significant amounts of PO1 work, which does not gain any marks and takes away time that the candidate could use for the set tasks.
The principal moderator does draw your attention to this. For example in this extract from the high-level candidate exemplar for R068, the principal moderator has stated that the section contains theory for which there are no marks, so students shouldn't be including it:
Focused marking support – High exemplar Task 5 – page 6
Tip: Make sure you read the principal moderator’s comments and advise your students not to include large amounts of theory in their work.
Candidate work may include work from all the mark bands
Do not assume that high-level work will contain only mark band (MB) 3 work, or that medium-level work is all MB2. In most cases there will be examples of work from more than one mark band.
This is useful as the principal moderator’s comments will identify why the higher mark band was not achieved and what else the candidate needed to do to achieve the higher mark band. For example, in this extract from a high-level candidate exemplar for R069, the principal moderator in their three comments has identified that the work has achieved MB2, where the candidate has failed to build upon MB2 and what they could improve upon to achieve MB3:
Tip: Use the candidate exemplars and the moderator’s comments to identify where your students could improve their work.
As we have more assessment series and more candidates’ work to select from, we will update the candidate exemplars to further illustrate how students can best achieve the higher mark bands without imposing a huge workload on themselves, or you!
Finally, do remember that if you have any questions regarding the delivery or assessment of your Cambridge National, the subject advisors are here to help you. Contact us at ocr.vqbusiness@ocr.org.uk
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About the author
Sarah joined the Business and Economics team in September 2022. She has over 20 years’ experience as a teacher of Business, Economics and Finance and in leadership roles including Head of Department, Head of Sixth Form and Assistant Principal. She has been an assessor for A Level Economics and holds a degree in Business Economics and the RSA Certificate in English Language Teaching to Adults (CELTA).
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