ALL comments on AS and A Level results 2017

AS and A Level results were published on 17 August 2017 by the Joint Council for Qualifications (JCQ).  Representatives from ALL attended the presentation given by Michael Turner, Director General of the Joint Council for Qualifications, in London today.

Ofqual results infographic 

Ofqual infographic on results of all A levels

Overall outcomes and entries at all A Levels are considered to be steady, during the current period of exam reform.  Higher grades in A Levels (A*- A’s) were the key area of improvement, with notably high increases for French, Spanish and German.  This would seem to be in line with research evidence (from JCQ and Ofqual), that suggested a small but important effect that native speakers have on the results in their respective languages, in the higher grades in particular, with exam boards therefore, increasing expectations for outcomes at A* and A by 1%.

The proportion of A Levels awarded an A or A* grade increased overall by 0.5 percentage points, compared to 2016, to 26.3% of all entries.  STEM subjects remained static at these grades at 30.3% but for languages the proportion of A*-A grades in French, German and Spanish rose by 2 percentage points to 39.1%.  In French, A*-A grades rose 1.7 percentage points to 39%; in German, they went up 1.8 percentage points to 41.4%; and in Spanish the increase was 2.5 percentage points to 36.9%.

Summary of A-Level A*- A grade achievement levels across subjects

At AS Level total UK results have increased overall (at grade A by 1.1% to 21.3%, and at grades A-E by 0.7% to 90.1%).

There continues to be a decline in the number of entries at both A and AS Level, albeit relatively small at A-Level – down 1% overall, and only 0.2% for MFL.  At AS Level, the picture is considerably bleaker with the total of UK entries down by 39.1% compared with 13.7% last year.   Some, but not all, of this decline can be attributed to the reduction in the 18 year old population – down 1.7% and 17 years down 3.3%.    A Level entries in Modern Foreign Languages have seen a slower rate of decline against 2016: French down 2.1% (-6.4% in 2016), German down 4.7 % (-4.2% in 2016) – equating to only 172 candidates, Spanish up 1.7% (- 2.7% in 2016).

In order to continue to address ongoing decline, action regarding severe grading at GCSE is still of high importance.  These results show however, that students can have more confidence in the chance of getting an A*-A grade, and this should help stem the decline in the most able students taking modern languages at A Level.

ALL President Elect Jane Harvey commented on this year’s results  “Very many congratulations to all the candidates and their teachers for this year’s MFL A Level results. It is heartening to see that the issue of the impact of native speakers on the top language grades has now started to be addressed and that students can feel confident that they will be awarded the grades they deserve. I hope that next week’s GCSE results will show that the severe grading issue has been addressed there too so that future students will feel confident to continue their language studies to A level and beyond.”

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