Having talked to some people more in the know than me, this is what seems to have happened with A-level results.
If you were part of a very small cohort (<15 students taking your subject in the entire school) then a different algorithm was used for standardization, due to the problems caused by small sample sizes. This algorithm put far more weight on the center assessed grade than on the standardization process because of this.
Teachers over predict. It’s a very hard hearted teacher in this situation who can predict someone a U grade, for example, and if you’re not predicting any Us, then everyone else goes up accordingly. Given there was basically no guidance about coming up with CAGs, teachers did their best and came up with grades accordingly- and we are only human and we care about our students.
So, anything that puts more weight on teacher prediction will benefit students, so having a different system for small cohorts benefits those students.
You know which schools tend to have small cohorts? Private schools. Just saying.
Honestly, all of this could be avoided by using prior attainment at an individual level, not a cohort level. It’s not like we don’t have access to this data and it isn’t already used as a stick to beat teachers and schools with via Progress 8 and ALPS.
But every exam board and Ofqual and JCQ and probably the DfE looked at a system which would probably benefit private school students over others, and signed off on it. Because perpetuating structural inequality is what England does best.
(This is not to ignore the general structural differences between state and private schools, but it seems like the system in place in England actively benefited private schools EVEN ABOVE their already existing high prior attainment).
And sure, theoretically, students can appeal and resit autumn exams. But you know who is least likely to be able to afford a gap year? Yeah...
