We know how busy you are, so we’ve highlighted the key elements from the JCQ guidance on the determination of grades for summer 2021. This summary will be of help as a quick reference point for your centre policy.

To support you and your teachers for summer 2021 we have created a series of videos that provide an overview of the JCQ guidance.

The key dates to be aware of are:

Centre policy guidance for senior leadership teams.

Centre policy for awarding teacher assessed grades.

Proformas and templates to assist centres: a number of documents are being made available as a template in Word format, these include:

• Centre policy summary form (required)
• Head of centre declaration (required)
• Head of department checklist/declaration (optional, recommended template)
• Assessment record (optional, recommended template).

Worked examples to assist teachers in making grading decisions: these provide a number of scenarios to assist teachers to arrive at a fair grade.

Grade descriptors for GCSE, AS and A Level.

We know that arrangements for quality assurance is an area about which you and your staff have had many questions. The following is just the key points, and you will need to refer to the JCQ document for full details including information on the centre policy and what to include within it, as well as the production of a centre policy summary.

The purpose of the QA process is to support you to construct appropriate processes to determine grades, and there are internal and external elements to this.

Internal processes

It is recommended the centre policy should include:

• Statement of intent
• Roles and responsibilities
• Training support and guidance
• The use of appropriate evidence
• Awarding teacher assessed grades
• Internal and external quality assurance
• Comparison of teacher assessed grades to results for previous cohorts
• Access arrangements and special considerations
• Addressing disruption/differential lost learning (DLL)
• Objectivity
• Recording decisions and retention of evidence and data
• Authenticating evidence
• Confidentiality, malpractice and maladministration and conflicts of interest
• Private candidates
• Results
• Appeals

External process

This will take place after submission of centre policies (please see timeline), and is in three stages:

1. Centre policy review
2. Virtual centre visits
3. Post-submission sampling

Heads of centres need to ensure that students have the opportunity to show the full breadth of their knowledge and understanding in each subject, based on what they have been taught.

Heads of centres will need to confirm that an appropriate amount of content has been taught that will allow them to move on to the next stage of education/training/employment.

Grades should be a holistic, objective, judgement based on the evidence used.

Every centre must produce an assessment record for each subject cohort, that includes the nature of the assessment evidence being used, the level of control for assessments considered, and any other evidence that explains the determination of the final teacher assessed grades. Any necessary variations for individual students must also be recorded.

You could do this using the following steps:

1. Consider what has been taught
2. Collect the evidence
3. Evaluate the quality of the evidence
4. Establish whether the proposed range of evidence of appropriate for all students
5. Assign a grade

In doing this you can use grade descriptors and grading exemplification, as well as data to support the grading process. Additional assessment materials are also being prepared to support you should you wish to use them, though their use is optional.

Every effort must be made to ensure that students’ approved access arrangements and/or reasonable adjustments are put in place for any assessments used to determine teacher assessed grades.

The process of centres submitting special consideration applications to awarding organisations for qualifications will not apply this summer. As the range of evidence is flexible and can be tailored to an individual student according to coverage of the specification, then instances of special consideration should be limited.

Special consideration cannot be applied due to lost teaching and learning. This can be addressed through the flexibility of the range of evidence centres may use to determine students’ grades.

Watch our roundtable discussion which draws on the most frequently asked questions we’ve received about the ways in which schools and colleges can best approach and manage the process for assigning grades. The discussion included representatives from schools and colleges who shared their experiences.

To give students' results this summer, please submit teacher assessed grades for GCSE, AS and A Level, Cambridge Nationals, and Cambridge Technicals by 18 June 2021 using our grade submission system.

This is the same system you used for summer 2020.

What to consider when submitting grades:

1. A grade for each candidate, and this can include a ‘U’ (ungraded)
2. If there is a tiered GCSE subject (e.g higher and foundation tier) the teacher assessed grade you provide must be available in the tier you’ve entered for

We will collect grade decisions for the endorsements in spoken language in GCSE English Language and practicals in A Level Biology, Chemistry, Geology and Physics at the same time as teacher assessed grades. OCR will confirm this arrangement in due course.

A declaration by the head of centre is required to finalise the submission of grades. Further information on submission will be provided along with details of grade submission.

Stages for an appeal

1. Centre review - a student can ask if an administrative or procedural error has occurred. If upheld, the centre will submit a request to amend the grade.
2. Appeal to the awarding organisation - if the student believes there is still an error following the centre review, or if the awarding organisation has made an administrative error, or the student considers that the grade awarded was an unreasonable exercise of academic judgement. The centre will need to ensure the student is aware that their grade could go down, up or stay the same.

In both stages the centre will need to ensure the student is aware that their grade could go down, up or stay the same.

For GCSEs, AS and A Levels, if the student or centre considers that the awarding organisation has made a procedural error, they can apply to Ofqual’s Exam Procedures Review Services (EPRS) to review the process undertaken by the awarding organisation.

Grounds for a centre review or appeal

• At stage 1: The centre made an administrative error, e.g. an incorrect grade was submitted; an incorrect assessment mark was used when determining the grade.
• At stages 1 and 2: The centre did not apply a procedure correctly, such as the centre did not follow its Centre Policy, did not undertake internal quality assurance, did not take account of access arrangements or mitigating circumstances such as illness.
• At stage 2: The awarding organisation made an administrative error, e.g. the grade was incorrectly changed by the awarding organisation during the processing of grades.
• At stage 2: The student considers that the centre made an unreasonable exercise of academic judgement in the choice of evidence from which to determine the grade and/or the determination of the grade from that evidence.

We regularly update our most frequently asked questions to support you through summer 2021.