Grades for CIE qualifications

What are grades?

A grade is the principal piece of information provided by CIE to candidates who have completed a CIE qualification. For example, for IGCSE, a candidate will be awarded one of the following grades: A*, A, B, C, D, E, F, G, U. The actual grades may vary between different qualifications, but the reasons they are provided and how they are determined are similar.

What are grades used for?

A grade is awarded to provide an indicator of a candidate’s overall level of achievement on a set of examinations which make up a particular qualification (e.g. GCE A Level Mathematics, IGCSE Physics). Grades are used by schools, universities and other institutions of higher education, as well as employers, to select from a range of candidates for a particular course of study or job. They may also be used as the basis for decisions about the granting of scholarships or other awards.

How are grades determined?

Key grade thresholds at component level

To gain a qualification in a particular syllabus, candidates need to be assessed in one or more ‘components’ - either examinations or pieces of coursework (or both). For each component in turn the candidate is awarded a total mark, which reflects their performance on that component based on a pre-determined mark scheme. Once the distribution of candidates’ marks for the component is known, ‘key’ grade thresholds (or boundaries) are then determined – e.g. the threshold for a Grade A is the minimum mark that a candidate would need to score to achieve a Grade A on that component. The key grades are set for a particular qualification, e.g. for IGCSE the key grades are A, C, E and F.

In determining grade thresholds, the objective is to maintain the same standard from one examination session to the next, i.e. to set a threshold for which the performance in the current session can be deemed equivalent to that achieved by candidates at the threshold for the same grade in the previous session. Grade thresholds are determined using a combination of statistical information and professional judgment of the principal examiners for the component and other components within the syllabus. Grade thresholds are not necessarily kept the same from session to session; for example, if the component is considered to have been more difficult than in the previous session, threshold marks lower than those used in the previous session might be considered.

Key grade thresholds at syllabus level

Having determined the key grade thresholds for each component, these are then aggregated to produce key grade thresholds for the overall syllabus (or syllabus option for syllabuses with more than one route of assessment). A grade threshold mark at syllabus level is the sum of the threshold marks for each component, taking into account the weighting applied to each component, and possibly adjusted to allow for the fact that a candidate may not be required to achieve a particular grade on every component in order to achieve that grade at syllabus level.

Intermediate grade thresholds at syllabus level

Having determined key grade thresholds for the syllabus using the approach described above, ‘intermediate’ grade thresholds at syllabus level are calculated using pre-defined arithmetic formulae. For example, in IGCSE, first the thresholds for the ‘key’ grades, A, C, E and F are determined, followed by arithmetic calculation of the thresholds for A*, B, D and G, where the threshold for a Grade B is set halfway between the thresholds for Grade A and Grade C, etc.

Summary

  • CIE grades are intended to reflect a consistent standard of assessment between different syllabuses within the same qualification and different regions of the world.
  • CIE grades are awarded based on grade thresholds, chosen at each examination session and for each qualification to reflect performance to a certain minimum level of standard, incorporating judgments about the relative difficulty of the individual syllabus components compared with previous examination sessions.
  • CIE grades are not awarded based on a quota system, whereby a certain fixed percentage of candidates is awarded each grade.
  • Grade thresholds are not predetermined and may vary from one examination session to another.