Four takeaways from this year’s GCSE results

This is a tale of two cohorts – those who picked up their A Level results last week and those who just now opened their GCSE grades.

And the story is very similar in some ways.

Both cohorts experienced months-long disruptions to their schooling during their formative years due to Covid, both were granted special measures for this year’s assessments to counteract this disruption and neither had sat public exams before this summer.

Pupils who received their GCSE results on Thursday were halfway through Grade 9 when the pandemic hit and schools closed during the national lockdowns.

More school closures followed while in 10th grade and many students were also experiencing disruption due to Covid at the start of 11th grade.

That’s the context. Here are four key takeaways from this year’s GCSE results:

In England, Wales and Northern Ireland this year 73.2% of GCSEs were graded 4/C and above – up from 77.1% last year when grades were set by teachers.

This percentage is still significantly higher than 2019, last year’s exams were taken before Covid when it was 67.3%.

The proportion of top grades – 7/As and better – is 26.3%. Again it is lower than in the previous year (28.9%), but higher than in 2019 (20.8%).

The decline since last year is not due to the poor performance of this year, but to a system-wide changeover.

England’s examinations board Ofqual has described 2022 as a “transition year”, with grades being lowered from the highs of the past two years to better match pre-pandemic results.

But they were still higher than 2019, in “fairness” to students in that year.

The drop in the pass rate this morning is significant as in England, where most GCSE students live, they need to pass GCSE Maths and English with a grade of 4 or above to continue studying and get their Abitur or T-Level .

So today’s results mean that more students in England are having to take re-examinations than in the last two years.

These Grade 4 passports could also become more important for those in England who wish to go on to university.

The Department of Education has floated the idea of ​​minimum grade requirements to qualify for student loans. Achieving at least a 4th grade in English and Mathematics at the GCSE (or equivalent) is an option being considered.

Nationwide, there are significant differences in the proportion of top grades.

In London, 32.6% achieved grades 7/A and above, compared with just 22.4% in North East England and Yorkshire and Humber.

Here, the percentage gap between the regions with the highest and lowest shares of top grades is 0.1 percentage points wider than in 2021. But it’s 0.9 percentage points wider than in 2019.

This north-south education gap existed before Covid, but business leaders say it is widening and have urged the government to allocate more resources and funding to schools.

In a joint open letter Think tank Northern Powerhouse, Schools North East and education organization SHINE warn that parts of the country like the Northeast, which were already lagging behind the South, have been set back further by the “disproportionate loss of learning” as schools and classes closed for various periods in the pandemic.

Parts of northern England, for example, spent longer distances under tighter Covid rules as part of the country’s tier system in 2020.

Labor has accused the Conservative government of leaving behind a “legacy of unequal outcomes that are holding children and communities back”.

The Department of Education in England said it was investing alongside its £5bn Covid recovery fund.

This fund is only a third of what was originally recommended.

According to data published for England, 66.2% of enrollments from selected schools and 53% of enrollments from private schools received grades 7/A and above.

This contrasts with 23.3% of comprehensive schools and 25.6% of academies.

The gap between private schools and these categories of state-funded schools has narrowed compared to the past two years, but is larger than in 2019.

Data released last week by the Institute for Fiscal Studies suggests that the performance gap between affluent and disadvantaged students at GCSE level has changed little in 20 years.

It also suggests that the average gap in funding per student between state and private students has increased from £3,100 in 2009-10 to £6,500 in 2020-21.

But the “disadvantage gap” is about more than school spending — especially for students in this grade who have learned so much at home.

Family income will have influenced things like access to laptops and the internet, and the amount of physical space students had to study.

Girls have outperformed boys every year since the introduction of GCSEs in the late 1980s, and this summer is no different.

30% of girls received the best grades – 7/A and above – compared to 22.6% of boys.

The gender gap in these top marks has narrowed by 1.6 percentage points since last year.

This gap in Classes 4/C and above has also narrowed, albeit very slightly.