Thousands of students in England have missed out on top marks in their A-levels as results plummeted across the board after the government enforced a reversal of pandemic-era grade inflation.
The sharp fall in As and A*s came as the education secretary, Gillian Keegan, was accused of “adding insult to injury” for suggesting no one would be interested in pupils’ exam results 10 years after the event anyway.
Five thousand fewer students in England gained three A* grades than in 2022, while the proportion of top A*-A grades shrank from 35.9% to 26.5% within a year, with 67,000 fewer awarded this year.
The proportion of A* grades awarded in England was 8.6% – a steep fall on the 14.5% awarded last year and but still above the 7.7% awarded in 2019. The proportion of A* and A grades combined were also higher than in 2019, by 0.7 percentage points.
Headteachers said they were alarmed to see that in some cases grading was even more stringent than the last set of A-level exams taken before the pandemic, with the proportion of A*-C grades this year lower than those awarded in 2019 because of a sharp increase in the number of lowest grades.
For the first time, more than one in 10 entries in England were awarded an E or U (unclassified) – a 10% increase on such grades in 2019. The increase is likely to be the result of more students taking A-levels based on their GCSE results awarded by teacher assessment when exams were cancelled in 2021.
England’s results also showed a large gap in top grades compared with Wales and Northern Ireland, where regulators have taken into account the long-term impact of the pandemic through more generous grading.
Northern Ireland awarded A*-A grades to 37.5% of its A-level entries, while Wales awarded 34% – in stark contrast to the 26.5% in England.
As school-leavers opened the results they had worked towards for two years, Keegan said those who didn’t receive their expected grades “shouldn’t be disappointed”, adding: “They won’t ask you anything about your A-level grades in 10 years’ time. They will ask you about other things you have done since then, what you have done in the workplace, what you did at university.
“And then, after a period of time, they don’t even ask you what you did at university.”
Bridget Phillipson, the shadow education secretary, responded that Keegan’s remarks were “downright rude” and that she needed to apologise.
“This is a nerve-racking day for young people who’ve worked incredibly hard. The last thing that they need is the secretary of state offering comments like that.
“It really does add insult to injury coming from a government that completely failed to put in place the kind of support that our young people needed,” Phillipson said.
Keegan later qualified her remarks, saying: “It is true; it is just real. It’s an important step to get to your next destination, but when you’re a couple of destinations further on there’ll be other things that they look at.”
Jo Saxton, the head of Ofqual, the exam regulator for England, defended the fall in grades, saying: “There are no surprises here and the changes in grading that we’re seeing are very similar to the changes that we saw last year. And these results are above those of 2019 so these students have absolutely had the protection that they deserve, given everything they went through.”
But Geoff Barton, the general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said this year’s set of students should be proud of what they achieved. “Whatever the rationale, however, it will feel like a bruising experience for many students, as well as schools and colleges which will have seen a sharp dip in top grades compared to the past three years,” he said.
Ucas, the university admissions organisation, said 79% of UK school-leavers qualified for their first choice of undergraduate course starting in autumn – slightly below the 81% who did so last year but higher than the 74% who got their first choice in 2019. About 60,000 students entered clearing in the hunt for university courses.
Jeremy Miles, Wales’s minister for education, said there was no evidence the differences in approach between England’s grading and the rest of the UK was creating difficulties.
“What’s been happening behind the scenes is that the exam regulators have been working closely together, and with universities, so that everyone understands the approaches being taken in the four countries, and I don’t think we have any evidence that is causing issues,” he said.
Independent and grammar schools had the largest drop in top grades compared with last year but both received more top grades than in 2019. Forty-seven per cent of entries from independent schools received A* or A grades, as did 39% of entries from grammar schools in England.
There were also sharp regional disparities. While London and south-east England recorded a greater proportion of top grades compared with 2019, there was a fall in the north-east of England, and in the Yorkshire and Humber regions. There was an 8 percentage point gap between students getting A*-A grades in south-east England and those in the north-east – wider than the 5 percentage point gap in 2019.
Chris Zarraga, director of Schools North East, said: “If these challenges across different stages are not addressed, we risk this year’s gaps and inequalities becoming the norm.”
Mathematics remained the most popular subject, while economics replaced geography in the top 10, with more than 39,000 students taking the subject. English literature went up in popularity, after two years of declining entries, while computing recorded the highest increase with 16% more entries this year.
The second cohort taking the new vocational qualification, T-levels, also received their results, with a third of the students who enrolled dropping out before the end of the two-year course. Of the 3,119 students who received results, 90% achieved at least a pass and 22% earned a distinction or better.
• This article was amended on 18 August 2023. An earlier subheading incorrectly described Gillian Keegan as the health secretary.
