[Poll] Edexcel Further Maths Overall Grade Boundaries 2019 A-level

Top 30% got A*s in further in 2017. Then again TSR may not be representative.

I reckon I've got about 240 (taking FP1 and FS1). What grade do y'all think this would be?

A or A*

I think basing grade boundaries off the modular spec has its own issues - with modular it's a lot easier to resit and you don't need to revise the entire A-level. So I think we can reasonably expect lower grade boundaries than before.

With new specs you can expect lower boundaries out of hand. It's just a thing with new specs. How much lower varies.

“Also, the old further maths spec was roughly 82-83% overall in terms of raw marks for an A grade back (not an A*!) before the grade boundaries started inflating, and I personally feel that the new spec is not significantly harder than the old spec”



It seems that the poster has evidence that when the old spec was first brought in, the boundaries were still high. Could we see a similar thing play out?

To add to this, the boundaries for each FM module back in June 2009 are attached and yes, they are all pretty low.

Hmmm that's fair. I overlooked that the first year for the previous further maths modules was in fact 2009- except they didn't have A*s at the time, only from 2010 onwards which was what I looked at instead.

This is my concern exactly. I looked through grade boundaries from 2018 back through until 2010, which was the first year I believe. 80% ums was always the standard for an A of course, whilst if you added up raw marks, it was roughly 82-83% for an A in the first couple of years.

In the following years the raw grade boundary began to inflate (presumably due to people retaking and becoming more familiar with the course) to reach the likes of 84-86% and eventually the peak of 88% for an A, which I think might have been last year (can't remember the exact details).

Last year we saw that the A* boundary for single maths was around 76%, significantly lower than in previous years. However, single maths has definitely gotten harder, whereas I think further maths has not really increased in difficulty - this is just my opinion of course.

I don't think it's a popular opinion that the spec has become easier. People found CP1 straightforward but CP2/FP1 didn't go well for a lot of people. FM1 seemed to generally go well for people but FS1 had enoguh to trip people up.

There is a tendency on TSR, because the top end is overrepresented here, to overestimate boundaries. If you can find a FP2/FP3 poll and compare this to the actual A* percentage, you could apply that to this poll to get a very very rough prediction. This was the case at GCSE where a lot of predictions for a 9 fell in the 200s, with some going into the 90%s, but the actual boundary was 191.

Damn you got me lol, that is pretty much exactly how the exams went for me. I made a few mistakes in CP1 and FM1 but they were generally cool. I didn't do great in FP1 and completely panicked in CP2 RIP.

I wouldn't say the spec has gotten easier, although it seems like there was more content in the old spec to some extent? idek. But personally I think that the increase in difficulty for single maths has been considerably more significant than that for further maths.

I did look at a few old FP2/FP3 polls- except they were for predicting grade boundaries instead, and they were generally quite accurate. I couldn't find any polls for people estimating their own scores though (there are probably some out there, I only did a very rough search). Thanks for the info though!

I don't think the spec has got easier either - I think it's mainly the style of the exams that has changed. Same with single maths too, the spec changed even less there. (and pure was even made easier by taking out the majority of vectors, which people thought was the hardest topic in C4, and putting it in CP1!) It does feel like you learn a bit less maths, to be honest. (given the choice I would've done FP1-3, S2-4 for FM on the old spec and it feels like that'd amount to more than CP + FP1 + FS1)

I think if people are to make predictions (I haven't bothered to think about it), that'd be the way to go.