[CescaBeth]

(Original post by najinaji)
I always find it suspicious how you hardly ever hear of papers being marked down.

I mean a kid at my old school did a GCSE Maths paper for goodness' sake, and it got remarked from a high A to an A*. Makes you wonder if it's initial poor marking or bribery...

I sent my AS English Lit exam to be re-marked last summer (4 others did in my class) all of us were 1 mark off the next grade - all 4 came back no change so not all of them are marked up

[CescaBeth]

(Original post by Moscardini)
Don't the students have to pay for their own re-mark?

I can't say for every school but at mine the school pays for it but if you go down you have to pay back the school

[CescaBeth]

(Original post by RhiiSparks)
It's possible but unless the university agrees to hold your place until you get the remark and let you in if the remark gives you the required grade, the likelihood is you'll lose your place anyway. It happened to so many of my friends last year..

My friend did A level music and there was only 2 in her class - the exam boards got some of the marks mixed up for them both luckily got into uni but when the exam board has sorted it out my friend had to resit her music exam but Liverpool Hope still allowed her to study there while she was doing this

[Venomilys]

how much does it usually cost to get a transcript of your paper?

[navarre]

It IS very worrying, especially for me, as I have A2s in three weeks and am with OCR B for chemistry, which is my most important subject.

[nm786]

(Original post by Ilyas)
how much does it usually cost to get a transcript of your paper?

here's the fees list: http://www.ocr.org.uk/download/admin..._list_2012.pdf
what a rip off! these lot are bloody money makers,

[Miracle Day]

What's with all the Jesus bracelets in that school?

[Darkarium]

It's the same across exam boards. I sat AQA Business unit 1 and 2 on the same day and got a U in the former and an A in the latter despite the exams being very similar essays. I opted not to remark because it's just too expensive on top of paying for a resit if the grade comes back unchanged. I retook the paper in the summer and got an A with just a few hours revision before hand.

[Venomilys]

(Original post by navarre)
It IS very worrying, especially for me, as I have A2s in three weeks and am with OCR B for chemistry, which is my most important subject.

the exams for OCR B chemistry are often ambiguous compared to other exam boards, so we are especially prone. I have seen silly things in past papers/ markschemes, things like carbonyl groups not being counted as functional groups according to the all knowing markscheme.

[Jim-Jam]

Can't ****ing stand exams tbh.

Just a money making ride for the companies, I always bomb on exams anyway, we're never prepared.

[navarre]

(Original post by Ilyas)
the exams for OCR B chemistry are often ambiguous compared to other exam boards, so we are especially prone. I have seen silly things in past papers/ markschemes, things like carbonyl groups not being counted as functional groups according to the all knowing markscheme.

Very true. Not only do we have to do THE hardest exam board, we also are marked using arbitrary marking guidelines. Some mark schemes really are arbitrary, and it is so frustrating.

[Jelephant]

(Original post by ctosh)
hmmm i live in scotland..... anyone know if the sqa system is different?

The difference is, the SQA are the only exam board in Scotland, so are likely to be under more pressure and scrutiny than if there were many different boards to keep an eye on. Yes, they can make mistakes (to be expected by the sheer scale of what they have to mark- thousands of students doing multiple exams equals a lot of papers), but it doesn't seem to be anywhere near the scale of the problems they have elsewhere. I think last year there was an admin error where 30 odd people were given the wrong RE grade? I don't remember any other "large scale" problems like that, and as far as I know there weren't any mistakes in the content of the SQA exams last year, whilst various A level and GCSE exams had mistakes in wording and such, sometimes leading to problems which couldn't actually be solved.

Sure, ask for an appeal if your mark seems wrong, but I wouldn't panic and assume your mark as going to automatically be several grades lower than you are expecting

(Original post by muffinstuffer)
Exam boards need to be regulated, everyone makes a mistake, including examiners, but people's papers have been known to go up by four grades.
Also, why don't they release the mark schemes at the same time they release results? At least then once people have paid £12 to get their paper back (an admin fee, apparently) they can then see the 'mistakes' that could cost them a future in their chosen careers, rather than paying anywhere up to £112 to have a remark by the same incompetent exam board!

They are regulated, by ofqual. IMO, this is the second year in a row this has made headlines, so quite frankly ofqual can't be doing their job right. But nothing will be done about it unless everybody complains directly. They don't care about comments on a forum they never visit. If you want next year to be different you're going to have to stand up and make a fuss (I direct that to everybody who has made a complaint here).... how many people are likely to bother to do it though?

(Original post by Dandaman9999)
Over 30 top students who were predicted A* grades managed to get Cs and Ds so the teachers investigated and paid for every single script to get remarked. After the remark, the majority were moved up to As and A*s and only 1 person got a C.

How gutted would you be to be that one person

[Dandaman9999]

(Original post by Jelephant)



How gutted would you be to be that one person

haha, yeah... I'd be pretty darn annoyed at least

[goku12345]

edexcel are bloody cu**s aswell

[Caribbeantwist]

(Original post by Moscardini)
Don't the students have to pay for their own re-mark?

I go to private school and we have to pay for remarks etc


This was posted from The Student Room's iPhone/iPad App

[Millyshyn]

I had 2 GCSE remarks done. Both went up - one, which was a history paper that was already on an A* (because I couldn't get coursework remarked that was on a low B), by 8 UMS :s and the other, French writing controlled assessment, by 16 UMS. Sixteen! The piece went from only just being an A to being full marks... HOW can they be so far off with the marking?
I couldn't believe my grades went up that much and to be fair, I keep advising people to get remarks done now if their marks don't seem quite right. I know I definitely would if I felt I did well in the exam and then got a grade which was lower that expected because it's quite easy to judge how well you've done.

[Palindromic]

(Original post by Ilyas)
the exams for OCR B chemistry are often ambiguous compared to other exam boards, so we are especially prone. I have seen silly things in past papers/ markschemes, things like carbonyl groups not being counted as functional groups according to the all knowing markscheme.

sorry i have to tell you that carbonyl doesnt count as it could be ketone, aldehyde, carboxylic acid, ester or amide so is too generic. but yeah the mark schemes are horrible in alot of questions

[Ra Ra Ra]

No jokes, I've actually got money saved up for August so I can get my papers remarked if I don't get decent results. Though I know there's probably a bigger chance of my money going to waste due to my mark either slipping down or not changing, all these stories do make you wonder.

I'm not on OCR, but still. Reading up on this has actually made me regret not challenging my GCSE results, as some looked much lower than what I expected

[Bobilina]

I'm from an average school in the North East and if i were to get my paper re-marked I would have to pay for it. It's easy to say 'just get it re-marked' but when your sitting so many papers at once it's a large amount of money to pay for.

Also my maths board is OCR, fabulous. I mean its only my most important subject.

[Gales]

(Original post by Jelephant)
The difference is, the SQA are the only exam board in Scotland, so are likely to be under more pressure and scrutiny than if there were many different boards to keep an eye on. Yes, they can make mistakes (to be expected by the sheer scale of what they have to mark- thousands of students doing multiple exams equals a lot of papers), but it doesn't seem to be anywhere near the scale of the problems they have elsewhere. I think last year there was an admin error where 30 odd people were given the wrong RE grade? I don't remember any other "large scale" problems like that, and as far as I know there weren't any mistakes in the content of the SQA exams last year, whilst various A level and GCSE exams had mistakes in wording and such, sometimes leading to problems which couldn't actually be solved.

Sure, ask for an appeal if your mark seems wrong, but I wouldn't panic and assume your mark as going to automatically be several grades lower than you are expecting



They are regulated, by ofqual. IMO, this is the second year in a row this has made headlines, so quite frankly ofqual can't be doing their job right. But nothing will be done about it unless everybody complains directly. They don't care about comments on a forum they never visit. If you want next year to be different you're going to have to stand up and make a fuss (I direct that to everybody who has made a complaint here).... how many people are likely to bother to do it though?



How gutted would you be to be that one person

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SQA_exa...ns_controversy ?