Ofqual, the Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation, has published its review of GCSEs, AS and A levels taken in summer 2018. The report gives an overview of the exam boards’ planning, administration and marking which supported the series, along with a summary of the awarding process and what happened post-results. 

Read Ofqual's 2018 summer exam series report here

Reformed qualifications

2018 was the biggest year of reform, and most exams taken this summer were in reformed qualifications. 

• In recent years, exam results have been stable, and this trend continued. Variability in school and college results this summer was similar to previous years. 
• Entries for GCSEs and A levels remained broadly stable. In line with recent trends, entries for AS subjects fell by almost 60%, largely because new AS qualifications are stand-alone qualifications in England, meaning students do not have to take an AS as part of a reformed A level.
• During the exam series, 14.7 million scripts were generated by 1.3 million students. The vast majority of exam papers were error free. There were fewer security breaches and incidents of malpractice.

Further Ofqual publications, reports and statistics

Alongside this summer report Ofqual have issued the following publications:

• Official statistics: reviews of marking and moderation
• Official statistics: malpractice
• Comparability between exam boards and the maintenance of standards over time
• National Reference Test
• Extended Project Qualification
• Analytics App and interactive map
• Official statistics: special consideration 2018
• Official statistics: Entries for GCSE - November 2018 exam series