With GCSE results day almost upon us, we will once again see a great deal of focus on the number of students achieving the top grades.

However, anyone achieving lower than a grade 4 in English or maths is required to resit - and this has contributed to the misconception that grades 1-3 at GCSE are a fail. This is absolutely not the case - only a U is a fail and very few students receive those.

So where did this perception come from? How can we celebrate the efforts of students who work hard to get these grades? And how can we better recognise these achievements in the future?

GCSE grades 1-3

When the grading system changed from A*-G to 9-1 in 2017, part of the rationale was to end the damaging fixation on the C/D borderline by encouraging schools to support all students to achieve as highly as possible.

The government and Ofqual were clear that all grades 1-9 represented a pass. However, that soon changed.

Having announced the new grading system, the government then decided to label a grade 4 as a “standard pass” and a grade 5 as a “strong pass”.

Immediately, any attempt to really value grades 1-3 was undermined, because what is a grade that isn’t a pass? A fail.

Compounded by the fact that students who don’t achieve at least a grade 4 in English and maths have to resit the same qualification as a condition of their post-16 funding, it’s little surprise that the cliff-edge language of pass/fail became embedded in the system - and in people’s minds.

The Labour government’s doubling down by making it a requirement for resitting students to have 100 hours of timetabled GCSE English and/or maths from this September has only intensified this.

What is so frustrating is there was a genuine opportunity to place equal value on the achievements of all young people, and this opportunity has been dashed by clumsily worded policies from successive governments.

The ‘forgotten third’

Roughly a third of young people don’t achieve a grade 4 or higher in English and maths each year, and the system has found itself in a position where these 16-year-olds are labelled a failure after more than a decade of formal education.

So is this “forgotten third” of students baked into the system? Ofqual claims not, arguing that, in a normal exam series, the proportion of students who achieve each grade is determined by the quality of the cohort’s work in the exam hall, not by norm referencing. In theory, all students could achieve grade 4 or above.

Yet the process for setting grade boundaries remains opaque and baffling to many. What is the balance between statistical modelling and senior examiner expertise in reaching a decision?

How can Ofqual on the one hand claim that all grades are set by the quality of students’ work, and, on the other, direct exam boards to be more generous in grading French and German GCSEs, as it did in 2024? Which is it?

An easy solution to this would be for the exam boards and Ofqual to record and publish those high-level decision meetings where grade boundaries (and therefore the percentage of students achieving each grade) are set.

It would increase trust in the exams system, support assessment literacy and hopefully bring an end to the fallacy that grades are baked in.

Changing the narrative

In the meantime, there is much that schools and colleges can do themselves.

Instead of having the local news photographer taking photos of the three students who achieved straight 9s, ask for a range of successes to be shared, including those who achieved a broad mix of results.

Focus, too, on the range of destinations that students are going to, both after Year 11 and after sixth form, and celebrate the experiences that young people have had during their time at school.

Most importantly, we need to remind ourselves, our communities and our students that grades 1-3 are a pass and are achievements to be celebrated.

It is within the scope of the Francis review into curriculum and assessment to consider how the qualification system can better support this group of students.

Yet it is clear that any policy suggestions will be “evolution, not revolution”. This was underlined in the review’s interim report, which stated: “Traditional examined assessment should remain the primary means of assessment across GCSEs.”

The review’s final report will be published in the autumn, but it is almost unthinkable that the current 9-1 grading at GCSE will be changed after so little time. So the perception that anything before a grade 4 is a fail is likely to persist, whatever the outcome of the review.

But in the long term, if we keep this group of students in mind - whether it comes to school or national policies, education and employment routes or how we award qualifications - we can move beyond the binary notion of pass or fail and recognise all achievement. When the government publishes its White Paper later this year, there is a chance to ensure that this third of young people, at every stage of their education, are no longer forgotten.

Tom Middlehurst is deputy director of policy at the Association of School and College Leaders

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