How do moderators + exam boards mark work and detect plagiarism fully?(including ai)

Hey! I get why you’re wondering about this the whole process can be a bit confusing.
From what I know, exam boards don’t usually mark every student’s coursework themselves. Teachers mark everything first, then the exam board moderators just check a sample to make sure the marking is fair and consistent. If the teacher’s marking seems fine, they don’t re-mark all the work.
But that doesn’t mean plagiarism just slips through. Schools often run coursework through plagiarism checkers before sending it off, and teachers usually know their students’ writing style well enough to spot anything off. Plus, if something seems dodgy to moderators or the exam board, they can look into it further.
So yeah, while it might feel like someone could get away with plagiarising if their work isn’t sampled, there are lots of checks along the way to catch that kind of thing. It’s not perfect, but it’s not like it’s unchecked either.
Hope that makes sense!

Thanks for your insight! But surely not all schools have detection softwares yet alone run all the work they receive through them. I personally imagine that all exam boards scan for ai and ‘traditional’ plagiarism on the samples they receive and if they spot something the teachers haven’t spotted when marking will then take all the work from that class. Does this seem right?

Yeah, you’re probably right that not all schools have detection software or use it for every piece of work but it is now becoming the norm so more schools have it then not. Some schools do run things through Turnitin or similar tools as standard, but others might just rely on teachers spotting things manually.
And yeah, your take on how the exam boards handle it sounds pretty accurate. From what I’ve heard, if moderators see something suspicious in the sample — like plagiarism or a clear mismatch in marking — they can request the full set of coursework from that class for a proper look. It’s kind of a spot-check system, but with room to dig deeper if something seems off.
Definitely not foolproof, but there are a few layers built in to try and catch anything dodgy.