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Students in the middle of their class could suffer under coronavirus grading system, Royal Statistical Society warns

 All A-level and GCSE exams have been cancelled this summer due to the coronavirus pandemic
All A-level and GCSE exams have been cancelled this summer due to the coronavirus pandemic

Students who are in the middle of their class could suffer the most under the coronavirus grading system this summer, the Royal Statistical Society has warned.

There is a “high degree of uncertainty” around the grades of pupils who have been judged by their teachers to be roughly average compared to their peers, according to the learned society.

All A-level and GCSE exams have been cancelled this summer due to the coronavirus pandemic. Pupils will be awarded grades based on predicted grades submitted to exam boards by their teachers who were told to use a combination of pupils' mock exam results as well as "non-exam assessment" to inform their decision.

The predicted grades will then be moderated by exam boards, which will involve looking at a school's exam results in previous years as well as examining national data on the typical distribution of grades across a cohort of students.  Within each predicted grade band, teachers will need to rank students in order of best to worst.

This means that, during the moderation process, if the school was deemed to have been too generous with their predicted grades some students could see their grade drop. Likewise, if the school was thought to have underestimated students' predicted grades, other students could be bumped up.

Pupils dissatisfied with their results this summer will have the opportunity to take the exam at the start of the next academic year and prove they can get a higher grade than their teacher’s prediction.

The Royal Statistical Society criticised Ofqual, the exam watchdog which drew up the plans for this year’s grading system, over its secrecy by saying that “little detail” is known about their moderation process, adding that they would “welcome more transparency”.

In a letter to Ofqual, seen by The Telegraph, the society pointed out their concerns around the certainty of predicting grades and asking teachers to provide a rank order for pupils.

“This may be particularly important for students who are not predicted to get top or bottom grades, or who are not in the top ranks or in the bottom,” Sharon Witherspoon, the Royal Statistical Society’s vice-president for education and statistical literacy, said.

“Middle grades and middle rankings are likely to be subject to more uncertainty, both in the sense of true uncertainty, and potentially systematic bias.”

While there will be a small number of pupils at the top or bottom of a class, there is usually a far larger group of children in the middle making it more difficult to accurately delineate between them.

She said that if Ofqual was more open about its methodology middle-ranking students, whose grades carry a greater degree of uncertainty, may be more likely to consider sitting exams in autumn.

“We understand the objective problems Ofqual have, and we sympathise. They don’t want everyone putting forward their own algorithms that increase their own grades,” Ms Witherspoon said.

“But we suspect if they were to publish the exam algorithm and it could be discussed, it would help inform individual students about whether they would want to consider sitting autumn exams. The more transparent you are, the more students have information on which to base a decision about whether to sit an exam in autumn.”

Gavin Williamson, the Education Secretary, has said cancelling exams was a "necessary step" to help fight the spread of coronavirus, adding that this year's predicted grades will be "as valid" as any other.

An Ofqual spokesperson said: "We have been grateful for the contributions offered by expert statisticians as we have developed our standardisation model. We have established an expert panel, and they have been able to provide advice and guidance as our work has progressed."