JCQ Guidance:

JCQ has today published guidance for schools and colleges on how GCSE and AS/A Level grades will be determined in England this summer.

Awarding organisations have worked hand-in-hand with school and college leaders, Ofqual and the DfE to ensure grades can be awarded as fairly as possible this summer.

Students will be graded by their school or college based on their performance across a range of evidence, and only on subject content they have been taught.

Material also contained in the guidance includes:

The use of assessment materials from awarding organisations;
Advice for schools and colleges around their internal quality assurance processes to ensure grades are not unduly harsh or lenient;
Guidance for those schools and colleges accepting private candidates;
Information about what constitutes Malpractice and the grounds on which students will be able to appeal;
How reasonable adjustments, access arrangements and special consideration should be taken into account.

Documents now available on the JCQ website:

JCQ Centre Guidance on the Determination of Grades

Centre Policy Summary Form

Optional documents:

Centre Policy template

Assessment record template

Head of Department Checklist template

Grading assistance

A/AS Level grade descriptors

GCSE grade descriptors

Worked examples

Other information available at the time:

Private Candidate FAQs

Student, parent and guardian guidance

Quality Assurance Support:

For the summer 2021 series, awarding organisations are working collectively to support centres on their quality assurance.

The awarding organisation supporting your quality assurance has been determined by your centre number.

Pearson will support centres whose centre number falls between 10000 and 24999.

For further queries, please contact: JCQ2021QA@pearson.com

AQA will support centres whose centre number falls between 25000 and 52999

For further queries, please contact: JCQQA@aqa.org.uk

OCR will support centres whose centre number falls between 53000 and 67999

For further queries, please contact: jcqqa@ocr.org.uk

WJEC Eduqas will support centres whose centre number falls between 68000 and 99999

For further queries, please contact: jcqqa@eduqas.co.uk

Support:

We will continue to provide support to teachers and exams officers in schools and colleges throughout the grading process. Please familiarise yourself with JCQ's dedicated Summer 2021 Arrangements hub where all relevant summer 2021 documents will sit.

To ensure you remain updated with the latest news relating to this summer's series, please continue to refer to your awarding organisations' support pages.