For those of us who have had our IB results through already, we have had a preview of the A-level heartache that is coming on 13 August.

The purpose of this article is to show you what’s around the corner so that you can prepare. As all good teachers know, prior preparation can prevent all sorts of bad things from happening.

I’m going to make an unexpected analogy: imagining A-level results day could be like imagining an alternate reality in which Liverpool didn’t win the Premier League this season, but Manchester City did. Chelsea, by the way, came second.  

Despite the fact that Liverpool were nearly 20 points clear, if the Premier League had stopped at 29 games - as it did at the start of lockdown - and had not restarted, they would not have been crowned champions this season. 

Instead, Man City would be the title winners and Chelsea second. Liverpool would be limping home in third place. Here’s why.

Predictions of the Premier League exam board

Let’s apply the published A-level exam process to the objective football facts. Liverpool were way ahead: such was the gap that many people even suggested that they should have been awarded the title regardless of restarts.

But this doesn’t count. The Premier League exam board, if there was one, would have no way of knowing how far clear Liverpool were. They would have no objective data about this year’s performance. Teachers were not asked to send mock results or homework grades. Only in certain subjects with coursework grades would there be any objective data about this year’s performance.

What about the predicated grades? To extend the football analogy further, it’s clear that Liverpool would have been predicted an A* by their teacher. But, think about it. So, would Manchester City, would Chelsea and probably even Leicester, too. 

These teams would have also predicted themselves an A* grade. Why not? Man City would have considered themselves in the title race; Chelsea are serial trophy winners. And in Leicester’s case…well, miracles have happened before (2016, anyone?). 

Past performance

So, the exam board can’t tell the difference between Liverpool, Man City, Chelsea and Leicester based on predicted grades. It goes to the next data point: past performance. 

Liverpool have never won the Premier League title before. In fact, they have a history of blowing leads (most notably in 2014, with the infamous “Gerrard slip”). 

By contrast, all three of the other teams have won the Premier League in the past five years. Man City and Chelsea have won it twice each. 

The algorithm takes past performance as a very influential factor. And, to look at Liverpool’s average Premier League performance from previous seasons, there is simply no evidential base to award Liverpool the title. Instead, the title would be awarded to Man City, with Chelsea in second place. Liverpool are just third. 

(Leicester are in fourth place because, despite their 2016 win, their average place from other seasons would significantly lower their credentials as title winners.)

It’s also worth noting that three out of those four clubs would consider themselves to have been downgraded. They all submitted A*s, but only one came away with the title. 

Man City’s is the only miscarriage of justice, but Chelsea will feel that they deserved more. And Leicester, despite only really taking a punt, will feel that the exam board didn’t do them any favours either.

This is the grim reality we are facing on 13 August. 

Not people - just statistics

In defence of the A-level exam boards, it’s very hard to see that they can calculate grades in any other way. Taking in mock results, for example, would have opened up a whole new set of problems (Manchester United were top of the League at one point this season, for example). So, we are where we are. All we can do is get ready. 

What have we learned, though? First, this process isn’t about people. Despite our natural instincts as teachers, we need to try to remove emotion from this process. Students, teachers and schools are just statistics, which are being manipulated in exam-board offices. 

You may have spent hours poring over the different learner characteristics in your class and lost sleep over your classroom ranking, but the person doesn’t matter to the exam board. This is a mathematical exercise; it cold-hearted and brutal. It’s not personal.

Secondly, your grades are not a judgement on this year’s performance. You will be judged exclusively on the past successes and failures of your department. Nothing you did this year will make any difference to the exam grades that your students will receive. For some teachers who are new in post, this will mean your grades are not even your grades at all: they are the grades your predecessors achieved. 

The exam boards are not interested in your story about the midnight coffee sessions dissecting examiner commentaries, running revision sessions every lunchtime and reversing the fortunes of your department. Instead, they will award grades based on the average distribution that your department has achieved in recent years. Good for some. Not so good for others.

Third, the ranking. Most teachers I know can accept things if the ranking of their students is correct: if the top student gets the top grade and the bottom student gets the lowest. Thankfully, the A-level system seems to have got this right. 

You are, however, very unlikely to get back the grades you submitted. In almost every case they will be lower. Like the football analogy, not all of the predicted A* candidates will get A*s. Some will miss out on Oxbridge as a result. 

Those students might even (incorrectly) assume that you downgraded them because it was you who submitted the predicted grades and the ranking. You should be prepared for this. Some of your C grade students are going to get Ds and Es, especially if your department has a history of Ds and Es over the past few years. This means they might miss out on a university place altogether. Again, you should be prepared for this. 

This was never going to be an easy process, and exam boards can only do what they can do. Unfortunately, though, there will be no fairy tales this year. In our parallel universe of school exams, the Premier League didn’t restart, and Liverpool didn’t win their first Premier League title.

George Vlachonikolis is head of economics at Headington School, Oxford. He previously worked as principal examiner (economics) for the WJEC exam board