Grades are stable because of Ofqual’s comparable outcomes approach to grading – they keep grade distributions similar to the pre-Covid distribution of 2019.
Girls did better than boys. That’s because they are more mature and more likely to want to please the teacher. They work harder.
There is a long tail of underperformance. Nearly a third of 16-year-olds failed maths and nearly a third failed English Language (fail means below a grade 4). The standard of a grade 3 is so low that such results suggest these pupils have learnt nothing much in secondary school.
The pupils who did worst were white working-class boys. There are many different reasons for this including cognitive limitations, lack of family support, the fact that they became demoralised by their relative academic weakness even when they were in primary school. The children and grandchildren of immigrants do better because a higher proportion of their parents remain married (stable families) and they promote educational success as a route to prosperity.
Modern languages struggled for pupils. Out of a group of 787,000 16-year-old pupils French for 16-year-olds was down at 122,000 entries, German was 32,000, Spanish was 132,000. Languages are difficult and many schools hesitate to put pupils in for these subjects because of the impact on their Progress 8 scores. The teaching of languages often feels dull.
Music numbers are low (37,000). Music has suffered because of the decline of the subject in state schools, partly because of lack of resources.
So music and modern languages are now like classics, becoming the preserve of independent schools and grammar schools, with notable exceptions like the West London Free School.
Gender imbalance in subject take-up was obvious with subjects which are optional. The girly subjects included sociology (74% of candidates were girls, 26% were boys) and languages. The boysy subjects include computing (77% boys, 26% girls)
The good news was the relative absence of unjustified grade inflation and of course the fact that pupils are learning more content at GCSE than was the case before the Gove reforms of 2012. GCSEs are proper qualifications. It is just a pity that we still have a long tail of pupils who do so badly.
By Professor Barnaby Lenon, Dean of the Faculty of Education at The University of Buckingham
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