England KS4 & 5 Examination Results 2025: What to expect this summer?

Blog written by Alps Training Director, Dr. Jevon Hirst.

In this blog, for England KS4 and KS5 Examination Results 2025, Jevon looks ahead to what we might expect to see this summer.

Getting results ready

As schools and colleges look ahead to both GCSE and post 16 examination results, my colleague Dr. John Roe has written a useful blog providing a great range of tips to help colleagues prepare for August.

In this blog, I anticipate what we are likely to see in terms of attainment and the implications regarding key value-added measures.

A-Level Results

Following the record high levels of higher grades awarded during the CAG and TAG processes, results in 2023 and 2024 have returned to standards broadly in line with results awarded in 2019. However, it is worth noting that in terms of A-levels, the proportion of grades awarded at A*, A*-B and A*-C in 2024 were slightly above those awarded in both 2019 and 2023. Table 1 outlines the % of grades awarded by outcome band.

Table 1. A-level attainment profile 2019-2024

Fig 1 shows that, from an individual subject perspective, there was also variation particularly when comparing outcomes across specific grades e.g. A*.

Figure 1. Percentage of A* grades awarded in 2019, 2023 and 2024 for selected A level subjects

For some subjects, like mathematics, the proportion of A* grades awarded in 2024 was almost identical to those awarded in 2023. In other subjects, like Biology, the proportion of A* grades awarded was still substantively higher in both 2023 and 2024 compared to 2019.

So, as we look forward to results in 2025, OFQUAL have indicated that they expect that results awarded in 2025 will be broadly similar to 2024. However, it is important to note that precise outcomes are expected to vary a little to reflect the nature of this year’s cohort.

From a value-added perspective, the DfE published L3VA data for the first time since the pandemic and they will continue to publish this information for results in 2025. The important point to remember for the 2025 examination cohort is that while the attainment outcome profile of the students is likely to be similar to 2024, the prior attainment is likely to be much lower than the 2024 cohort, as the 2025 cohort had GCSEs awarded following the return to 2019 standards. The impact of this will be that if schools use analysis based on 2024 results e.g. the DfE Ready reckoner this will almost certainly provide an inaccurate measure of performance in the context of this years cohort.

As leaders in the schools and colleges will also be acutely aware the DfE VA analysis of 2024 outcomes arrived in schools a substantial time after the students had received their results . To help support schools and colleges with early value-added analysis of their outcome data in what is another unique year, Alps, as we did last year, will be generating Alps customer-based A-level benchmarks in the week following A-level results day as we did for the 2024 cohort. These benchmarks were an incredibly close match to the final DfE benchmarks and as a result schools leaders using Alps in 2024 were able to gain invaluable insights into understanding exactly how students had progressed in their context significantly in advance of the DfE data release.

GCSE Results

As with Post-16 results, OFQUAL have indicated that 2025 outcomes will be broadly similar to last year but, again I think it is reasonable to expect some variations as discussed in relation to the A-level results above. If we look back at last year, we can see in Table 2, the proportion of students achieving key grades e.g. 9-7 was slightly above those in 2019 and 2023.

Table 2. GCSE Attainment profile 2019-2024

Equally, at a subject level is likely we will continue to see some variation in grades awarded across different subjects. From a progress perspective it has been well publicised there will be no P8 measures released by the DfE for the 2025 cohort due to the absence of KS2 Scaled scores. However, for colleagues who are keen to evaluate the achievement of their students from a progress perspective Alps offer a number of different alternatives including using Mean SAS from the GL CAT4 tests as a proxy for prior attainment. If you are keen on exploring possible options regarding measuring KS4 progress please do not hesitate to contact us.

End note from Alps

We currently work with over 1,200 schools and colleges and 95 Groups and MATs in the UK and internationally, offering our high-quality analysis at both KS4 and KS5 based on DfE datasets.

If you do not use Alps, but are interested in how Alps could support you to improve your outcomes, do not hesitate to contact one of our friendly team here.

About the author: Dr Jevon Hirst, Alps Training Director

Jevon has over 20 years’ experience working in education. Prior to joining Alps in 2020, Jevon has worked in a number of senior leadership roles within schools, with responsibilities for teaching, learning, curriculum, strategic planning, self-evaluation and student achievement. Central to these roles, has been the intelligent use of data to inform school improvement and maximise outcomes for students.