TY  - JOUR
IS  - 1
A1  - Jerrim, John
PB  - Informa UK Limited
Y1  - 2022/03/10/
N2  - In England, failing to achieve a ?good pass? (C/4 grade) in key subjects is thought to have serious negative implications. Yet evidence on this issue remains relatively sparse. This paper therefore presents new evidence on the link between meeting a key threshold on high-stakes examination and a wide array of future outcomes. Using Next Steps survey data collected from around 4,000 young people in England, we explore the short-to-medium term benefits of achieving a ?good pass? (grade C/4) in English Language, double science and mathematics. Results from our regression analyses point towards a sizable association with future educational attainment; those who achieve a good pass in GCSE mathematics are around 5 percentage points more likely to hold a university degree by age 26 than observationally similar individuals who fail to meet this threshold. No link is found with future wellbeing and mental health, while results for labour market outcomes are somewhat mixed. The findings potentially motivate the need for GCSEs to move away from awarding a set of discrete grades and towards a continuous measurement scale. Alternatively, if discrete grades are to be retained, computer adaptive testing should be introduced for GCSEs to increase measurement precision around high-stakes grade boundaries.
VL  - 71
ID  - discovery10145867
N1  - © 2022 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
JF  - British Journal of Educational Studies
EP  - 28
AV  - public
UR  - https://doi.org/10.1080/00071005.2022.2033692
SP  - 5
TI  - The Benefits of Meeting Key Grade Thresholds in High-stakes Examinations. New Evidence From England
KW  - high-stakes testing
KW  -  examinations
KW  -  mental health
KW  -  wellbeing
ER  -