Traditionally in England, exam results in General Certificates of Secondary Education (GCSEs) (and before them O levels) and A levels have been reported as letter grades, with A (or A*) as the top grade, then B, C etc. The reforms gave the opportunity to revisit the arguments for different formats of reporting, and Cambridge Assessment contributed…

Setting cutoff scores is one of the most common practices when using scales to aid in classification purposes. This process is usually done univariately where each optimal cutoff value is decided sequentially, subscale by subscale. While it is widely known that this process necessarily reduces the probability of "passing" such a test,…

School grades provide an easily understandable metric to measure the performance of a school. Parents and the general public can use the school grade and its associated components to understand how well each school is serving its students. The purpose of this technical guide is to provide a description of the procedures used to determine school…

At a time when institutions of higher education are exploring alternatives to traditional admissions testing, institutions are also seeking to better support students and prepare them for academic success. Under such an engaged model, one may seek to measure not just the accumulated knowledge and skills that students would bring to a new academic…

The COVID pandemic and the cancellation of state examinations caused unprecedented turmoil in the education systems on both sides of the Irish Sea. As the policy of calculating grades using purpose-built algorithms came undone in the face of a barrage of appeal, protest and legal action, the context in which the policies had been devised…

Background/Context: Pass/fail standardized exams frequently selectively rescore failing exams and retest failing examinees. This practice distorts the test score distribution and can confuse those who do analysis on these distributions. In 2011, the Wall Street Journal showed large discontinuities in the New York City Regent test score…