New

Some of these changes have already taken place and further changes will be made by summer 2019.

What are the changes and what will they mean?

In summer 2019, CCEA will award new A*–G GCSE grades, which will include a C* grade. The A* grade will be aligned to the grade 9.

Students taking exams with AQA, Pearson, Eduqas and OCR, will receive GCSEs graded 9–1, where 9 is the highest grade and 1 is the lowest.

Students in Northern Ireland may receive both letters and numbers in their GCSE results, so it is important to understand how these grades compare.

Please see picture for comparisons

Grades A* and 9 will reflect students’ exceptional performance. The alignment of the new A* grade with the grade 9 will mean that the percentage of students achieving an A* grade will reduce. This means it will be more difficult to achieve an A*.

The A grade will cover grades 7 and 8.

Approximately the same percentage of students that achieved an A grade and above in the past will achieve grades A or 7 and above.

The B grade will equate to a grade 6.

The new C* grade will equate to a grade 5.

Approximately the same percentage of students that achieved a C grade and above in the past will achieve grades C or 4 and above.

Introducing the C* grade will mean that the percentage of students achieving grades B and C will reduce.

Approximately the same percentage of students achieving grades D–G will achieve grades 3–1.

For more information, including a short video, please go to the CCEA website at:

http://ccea.org.uk/regulation/gcse_grading