Graham Cumming

21 Aug

Grade distributions and entry numbers by subject and exam board for all GCSE qualifications awarded by English awarding bodies in Summer 2026 (Pearson IGCSE also included for comparison, though without entry numbers)

Reading the new book by Liz Truss but can’t figure out what she’s telling me about opportunity zones

ffteducationdatalab.org.ukHow many students resit English and maths? An update - FFT Education DatalabWe look at how many and how often students who have not achieved grade 4 or higher in GCSE English and maths resit those subjects up to age 19

Latest in Treadmill News

FFT Education Datalab@fftedudatalab.bsky.social

NEW: How many students resit English and maths? An update We look at how many and how often students who have not achieved grade 4 or higher in GCSE English and maths resit those subjects up to age 19. vist.ly/5pfuk

theguardian.comWe are teaching children maths they will never use. Isn’t it better to help them speak fluently? | Simon JenkinsThe education secretary is right to focus on what students need most: the ability to express themselves. As for maths, grab a calculator, says Guardian columnist Simon Jenkins

Oh no, Jenkins on maths! (NB The volume of a sphere is 4πr³/3 rather than 4/3πr³ but journalists and formulae, eh?)

tes.comNational curriculum consultation delayed until ‘later this year’School leaders voice frustration as delay to consultation on study and subject content confirmed

Of course it is, I’ve never known one that wasn’t. There will be the same lag for vocational GCSEs, online exams, etc etc

Just had an email from my bank to say they’re removing my overdraft limit - so now I don’t know whether I will have an overdraft limit of zero or whether I will have no overdraft limit at all

I think they want me to test the old maxim “if I owe the bank a hundred pounds, that’s my problem; if I owe them a million pounds, that’s their problem”

theguardian.comCompulsory GCSE resits in England harm teenagers’ mental wellbeing, study findsUCL researchers warn repeated exam attempts may dent students’ confidence and raise risk of dropping out

Less than six weeks until the next compulsory GCSE resit, btw

I’ve recently been inducted into the world of LPG suppliers - they’re the IGCSE of energy companies A bit like the more widely used alternative but totally unregulated, much more expensive and all the numbers are made up as they go along

thefitzwilliam.comIreland Could Destroy Its Secondary School MathematicsThe proposed Leaving Certificate reforms are incredibly concerning

22 Sept

The “one-day ‘Investigating with Mathematics’ event” sounds like quite the innovation 🤔

15 Sept

Ironic, I suppose, that the development of GCSE Natural History continues at a glacial pace

14 Sept

*Dusts off T-Totals*

YouGov@yougov.co.uk

With Lucy Powell saying she wants to see GCSEs involve more coursework, where do Britons stand on how much final grades should be based on exams versus coursework? Based entirely coursework: 4% Mostly on coursework: 19% About even split: 47% Mostly on exams: 12% Entirely on exams: 3%

thetimes.comScience and maths degrees offer most value to the nation, says ministerChris McDonald told a room full of vice-chancellors that science, engineering and mathematics ‘offer the greatest personal, social and economic value’

11 Sept

“I believe that degrees in science, engineering and mathematics are amongst those that genuinely offer the greatest personal, social and economic value to our nation”

9 Sept

With GCSE exams, you can get the questions, the performance data, the sampling data, the scoring rationale I can’t get any of that with PISA. I wait to be convinced

9 Sept

Why say “the exam boards” when in this case it’s almost certainly “the AQA exam board” which is meant. Teachers are always looking for a way to discriminate between exam boards - maybe marking accuracy would be a good metric

Jonathan Mountstevens@mrmountstevens.bsky.social

We had a student’s English Lit GCSE go up by 26 marks and two grades on review. I am a big believer in exams as the fairest form of assessment but sometimes it feels like the exam boards do their level best to undermine the confidence I have in the system. Surely they can do better?

7 Sept

Have been doing the elderly parents’ financial audit today and now I’m going to lobby Lucy Powell to introduce compulsory Maths to 80

hamhigh.co.ukHampstead's new private school is treating every pupil to ice-cream in school colourAlleyn's Hampstead will serve a specially commissioned blue gelato to every pupil during their first week of term at the new school.

7 Sept

Worth paying your 20% VAT for www.hamhigh.co.uk/news/2652201...

3 Sept

Another Norman Distribution #NormanDay

3 Sept

Norman Distribution #NormanDay

3 Sept

#NormanDay

The Maths Bazaar@themathsbazaar.bsky.social

Radio 4 is celebrating “Norman Day“, to celebrate the London display of the Bayeux tapestry. Repost this with your favourite Norman. #NormanDay

1 Sept

Happy centenary of the Underground connecting South West London to civilisation!

31 Aug

GCSE Maths Resit - two months to prepare. Everyone who missed grade 4 by a few marks will have dropped one or two among the first five questions on each paper - but you should be aiming to answer all of those. Practise them until you can’t get them wrong

31 Aug

In summer 2026, between 37% and 46% failed to answer these one mark questions. In particular, learn your definitions and get them all right in November

GCSE Mathematics: There’s quite the gap between the percentage of marks needed for a grade with AQA/Pearson and OCR/Eduqas, particularly at Foundation tier - they’re about one grade adrift. For example, 44% on F will get you a grade 4 with OCR - but that would score a Grade 2 with AQA or Edexcel 1/4

View full thread

Eduqas similarly, though from their distribution of results it looks like their entire entry is a resit cohort - only 15.6% achieving Grade 4 or above. Picking them for admin reasons of only two papers isn’t paying off, despite the low boundaries (12% for a Grade 4 at Higher? Blimey) 3/4

The boundary for Grade 4 is set way too low (and has been since 2017) but to fix it would mean a huge spike in the number of Grade U being awarded - too much explaining to do then, I would think 4/4

Are OCR papers particularly hard? I never see a suggestion they are; no petitions, no protests. Perhaps with <10% of the entry they go unnoticed. OCR award proportionally more Grade 4+ than AQA, even though they have a larger proportion of Foundation tier entries - it all comes out in the wash 2/4

25 Aug

Where to resit to get that Grade 4 in GCSE Mathematics? Results for 17-19 year olds by local authority (source: Ofqual Analytics)

AS qualifications again. This summer saw 106 quals, many of them duplicates, offered by four exam boards in England. 93 of those had <1000 entries and in total just under 50,000. OCR offered 38 quals for fewer than 5000 entries! They surely can’t be financially viable - they’ll be gone by 2030 1/3

I’m the Alex Polizzi of exam boards - “Myles darling, it’s lovely to offer all these but think of your cost base!” AS Further Maths is the only one seeing an increase in entries but can it stand alone? AS made sense in modular days but not any longer; they wouldn’t be missed by many 2/3

Other quals exam boards could get rid of to save money: any qualification where entries are <1000 and where another board has the lion’s share; IGCSE (in the UK, particularly); GCSE Maths at Higher tier in November. No doubt there are others, add your suggestions! 3/3

Thats enough gooey sentimentality about exam boards - I see we’re already back to the “all marking is dreadful” part of the year (usually from people who didn’t step up to be markers slagging off the efforts of those who did)

Graham Cumming@mathsnot.bsky.social

They don’t often get a lot of praise, so I’ll say thank you and well done to the exam boards for successfully delivering another year’s worth of Level 3 qualification results with maximum efficiency and minimum fuss @cambridgeocr.bsky.social @aqaeducation.bsky.social plus Pearson, WJEC and CCEA

observer.co.ukNearly 40,000 pupils forced to resit GCSE English because...New research suggests many thousands of children could have passed the exam if their grades had been awarded by senior examiners

Oh no, this old tosh has made it into The Observer now observer.co.uk/news/nationa...

22 Aug

People of the A303 and beyond! Here are the entries and grade distributions for 16 year olds sitting GCSE Mathematics in the South West in 2026 by county or unitary authority Source: Ofqual Analytics

Grade 9 in GCSE Mathematics gets less likely the further you are from London and the South East

22 Aug

In table form (source: Ofqual Analytics)

21 Aug

Londoners! Here are the entries and grade distributions for 16 year olds sitting GCSE Mathematics by borough in 2026 Source: Ofqual Analytics

Pearson/Edexcel GCSE Mathematics Summer 2026 by centre type, age and sex from mathsemporium.com/1ma1-grade-b...

GCSE Mathematics 2026 by centre type (England) - % of students achieving Grade 7+ and Grade 4+ Source: Ofqual Analytics

GCSE Statistics 2026 by centre type (England) - % of students achieving Grade 7+ and Grade 4+ Source: Ofqual Analytics

GCSE Mathematics 2026 grade distributions by age and sex (England) Source: JCQ

One for the nostalgists: GCSE Mathematics 2026 graded A*-G (This exercise fails somewhat around Higher tier grades D and E which shows, if any further evidence was needed, that Grade 4 boundaries were set way too low in 2017 and have been ever since)

Where have the bulk of GCSE Maths entries been made this summer? Not surprisingly, with Pearson/Edexcel who now have 2/3 of the entry in England. As with A level, AQA’s entries have remained flat though OCR’s very low Foundation tier grade boundaries have helped them pick up a few extra this year

There’s been another surge of entries for GCSE Statistics this year too, mostly made with Pearson/Edexcel - perhaps a set of statistics AQA would rather not see, ho ho

JCQ reports that 71.8% of 16-year old students in England achieved Grade 4 or above in GCSE Mathematics this summer - the “forgotten third”, if indeed they are forgotten, is slightly nearer to a quarter so there’s progress

Congratulations to the ~17,000 Year 12 students who achieved Grade 4 or above in their GCSE Maths this summer, to add to the ~10,000 who did the same last November - showing there is an exit from the endless roundabout of desolation, or whatever we’re calling it this week