Petition Percentile Grading for GCSE, A Level and key national examinations

To make law that national examination boards adopt a percentile grading system for their GCSE, A Level and other key examinations.

For example, in each subject, based on their individual marks, the top 5% of examinees achieve ‘A*’ grading, the next 10% achieve ‘A’ grading and so on. Anyone in the bottom X percentile to obtain ‘U’ or ‘Fail’. I am not proposing where the boundaries should be placed, but the principle itself.

Under the current system, universities and employers looking for particular academic qualities are unable to assess candidates’ relative strengths in comparison with the rest of their peer groups. This makes both the education and recruitment processes highly uneconomical.

Only by differentiating the highest achievers in each year-group do educational establishments, businesses and individuals get a fair and unbiased opinion of their academic achievements.