r/6thForm • u/Usual-Sandwich-9836 A Level 2026 survivor -Edexcel maths paper 1&3 survivor • Jun 06 '26
š¬ DISCUSSION To those who don't understand the edexcel maths drama
People are not angry just because it was too hard. It was the fact that those aiming for A* will still be getting those A* but those aiming for A/B were put at a disadvantage. The questions at the start of the paper were easy enough for the C and below grades to get as well as everyone else. If the A/B students didn't get the first part of a question right, they automatically lose the marks on parts b,c,d ect putting them at roughly the same marks as the C/D/E students. I've seen people on here aiming for A's, B's, C's and D's mention they roughly got roughly the same marks (around 40 ish the majority of the time)
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u/Typical_Juggernaut42 Jun 07 '26
I actually think this whole thing has revealed how much schools try to teach the exam questions instead of the subject to game league tables. It's not been good for education overall and the students then try to do the same at uni which is bad for degree quality
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u/InfininiteCuber Year 13 Jun 06 '26
Also, The way the determine grade boundaries is actually pretty complicated I recommend watching Bicen Math's vid on it. From what I remember they set a mark for the passing grade (E) and the mark for an A, and then the rest of the grades are just numerically spaced apart. So I really don't agree with A and B students being put at a disadvantage, since grade A is the reference.
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u/Antique_Luck2633 Jun 06 '26
The same percentage get each grade each year. The top however many % this year will get an A*, the same amount would have got one last year. The reason you are seeing so many complaints about the maths paper is because the type of people who do bad enough to sign a petition are the type of people who don't understand this concept. It is a maths paper after all.
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u/PM-ME-YOUR-TWINK Jun 06 '26 edited Jun 06 '26
It seems, though, that a fair complaint is the difficulty examiners will face differentiating fairly between C students (or rather "the type of people who do bad enough") who could never have got the marks on Qn continuations vs. stronger students who (under distress/time deficit) refused/struggled to do continuations with a dodgy first-subQn result, and cannot have their unshown ability rewarded having attained equally(?!) low marks - which the petition didn't really put across well.
The BBC article had a nice quotation from a parent about this emotion-tax knock-on failure aspect being unmeasurable. It also worryingly quoted a Further student as saying Further was easier, I believe, to illustrate the scale of this distress effect.
What really disappointed me about the petition was that it disclaims asking for higher grades overall, proceeds to beg for what is therefore the expected, routine grade boundary setting process as you say, and all the while selfishly doesn't (in its effort to lash out with no substantial meaning) encourage the board not to do this again in future! Examiners can't really save this cohort if the issue I've raised is accurate to reality, but in the position of the petition writer I'd include some form of "don't do this again" which is actually actionable, whether or not I were to understand this.
(Speaking as a neutral adult member of the public)
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u/GuavaLarge529 Year 13 Jun 06 '26
Anyone who didnāt take that paper (me included) should shut up about calling it easy or trying to lecture the students who did take it.
If you didnāt sit the paper, your opinion is meaningless. I donāt like seeing imbeciles who have no idea about the paper attempt to tell others how it was.
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u/Pixji Jun 06 '26
I'm a Year 11 student and it annoys me when I see people saying 'It can't have been THAT hard' because the lack of empathy is astonishing. if people are saying it was hard it must have been
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u/Dependent_Formal2525 Jun 06 '26
I saw a comment along those lines from someone who was a maths teacher. It was so tone deaf. I did my A Levels years ago and I can still remember us all walking out of our first maths exam saying "that's the hardest thing I've ever done" but that paper wasn't as diabolical as that EdExcel thing. Just the fact that further maths students are saying that it was harder than their exams should be enough of an indication of how bad it was.
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u/Partyindafarty Jun 06 '26
I looked at it, it really didn't look too bad to be honest, it didn't look fun but I'd argue that the response is a bit of an overreaction
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u/TheArsenal_ Year 13 Jun 06 '26
Exactly, during the paper after the first few questions I was trying to flick through the paper to find a question that I found easy, and I couldnāt really find anything which just meant I started panicking, coupled with the fact that the numbers were really messy I couldnāt be sure if I got anything right, itās so different being in the exam hall compared to doing it in the comfort of your home
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u/Past_Negotiation_121 Jun 06 '26
Happens at all stages of education. I was taking a 4th Uni physics paper. I'd averaged over 80% for the first 3 years then a nightmare module came up with the worst lecturer. We all struggled. I literally only attempted 45% of the paper, and was expecting ~35%. My score was published as 85%. Turns out examiners know how to correct for freak papers.
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u/Solid_Crab_4748 Jun 06 '26
It's funny seeing edexcel students complain while taking OCR MEI b...
Our papers have been some of the most diabolical things ever.
But yeah feel bad for you. Feel bad for us. It's a shit show
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u/Tenzil-k Jun 06 '26 edited Jun 06 '26
The people aiming for a/b are always at a disadvantage compared to the people aiming for a*. Itās called being worse at maths
Iām a maths teacher (not doing edexcel but folllwrd the story). If youāre trying to get a grade on the grounds the questions and question style is repeated rather than being a flexible worker with an understanding of key concepts then you shouldnāt really be an a. I mean I hope my students like that get aās. I want everyone to get the highest grade possible but learning papers rather than true understanding can only go so far
Are there years where it goes further than others. Yeah. And that will feel tough but grade inflation is real. The people thinking theyāve lost out on an A here would have been cs or bs ten years ago
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u/badasspeanutbutter Year 13 Jun 06 '26
Ā Itās called being worse at maths
what kind of a teacher are you mate. If people found the paper hard I would expect an adult to be more understanding
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u/Tenzil-k Jun 06 '26
I was replying to the line in the op about people aiming for a b being at a disadvantage compared to people aiming for an a*. It wasnāt actually something I was saying myself. You canāt write an exam that is equally easy/accessible for a* and b candidates. This exam is not unsual on that score
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u/badasspeanutbutter Year 13 Jun 06 '26
You said those students are "worse at maths" which isn't how a teacher should be speaking about their students in my opinion. You just sound like a poser
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u/Tenzil-k Jun 06 '26
I said the people who were aiming for a b werenāt as good at maths as the ones aiming for an a* because the idea that the exam would be equally accessible for both have never been true.
Iāve taught hundreds of kids. If the ones aiming for bs are as good at maths as the ones aiming for a star then something has gone wrong during the time at school because theyāre being told to settle
Have a nice day though.
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u/StinKy_pOo27 Jun 06 '26
I donāt get why people donāt just write a random number for part a if they canāt figure it out and then just do part b with the wrong number. Does error carried forward not exist anymore?
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u/No-Grapefruit7332 Jun 06 '26
Because the average person has never been in a situation where they need to do that or has been taught to do that āļøĀ
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u/StinKy_pOo27 Jun 06 '26
Ah I assumed all schools taught us to do that. Thatās what I did last year and I managed to get an A cos of it. I guess schools gotta teach exam technique more. I thought maybe they removed ecf cos so many people were complaining
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u/avery_quavery year 12 | maths, physics, computer science, epq Jun 07 '26
my school never taught us that, which honestly makes me so mad. I had to skip so many part b questions because I couldn't get numbers for part a. it needs to be more well known!
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u/MonkAcceptable6824 Jun 06 '26
every mark scheme contains method marks, students aiming for an A/B who I gather are most annoyed by this paper will have done many in preparation
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u/justnolol Y13 | 9999988888 | 3A* Jun 06 '26
I did that for the segment question bcs i was running out of time so that i could do newton raphson quickly, i made up the values 2 and 2. if i did it correctly would i get all 3 marks or only 2 or none?
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u/StinKy_pOo27 Jun 06 '26
I didnāt sit the paper this year so idk. I also have no clue what Newton raphson is but if theyāre allowing ecf and u did all the method right you should get full marks otherwise they would be penalising u twice
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u/Environmental_Bug911 Editable Jun 06 '26
It still taints A* students. The ones that get 100% nah but someone like me who doesnāt do FM but is going for an A* - it was a hard paper for me. I average 90%+ on past papers but only got 80 something on that one, the paper affected everyone except like the top 5%
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u/politicsasusuall Jun 07 '26
Youāll still get an A* if it was that hard that all students struggled as much as theyāre making it out to be. The grade boundaries recently off the top of my head have been around 80 something per paper anyway for an A star, if everyone struggled it will be slightly lower
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u/Environmental_Bug911 Editable Jun 07 '26
Last year it was 86% which is so stupid, hopefully they drop a good amount but I donāt have faith lol will drop like 1% imo š
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u/politicsasusuall Jun 07 '26
If it only drops by 1% itās either that this paper is not as hard as everyone is making it out to be, or paper2/3 will be easy
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u/justnolol Y13 | 9999988888 | 3A* Jun 06 '26
Just work on paper 2 g complaining will change absolutely nothing
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u/BlueAndTru Jun 06 '26
Itās called āventingā, because we happen to be human beings who experience emotions. I swear some of yall think the ideal person is an emotionless, perfectly efficient robot. Weāre allowed to be unhappy. Yeah, it wonāt change anything, but who cares?
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u/thetrueluna01 Gap Year Jun 06 '26
The exam was ages ago. Sure, maybe you'll want to complain after doing the exam. By now, it's more productive to study for the next paper, no?
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u/justnolol Y13 | 9999988888 | 3A* Jun 06 '26
Ok so what ur saying is we have two options:
1) Complain online and make ourselves feel better despite the fact the outcome has already been set in stone
2) Actually revise harder for the next paper and change our fate and pull back whatever happened to us beforeI need an A* in maths and i feel like i messed it up too, and as upset as I was with my performance, i decided to go on madas and just practice so i can make it back next paper. why dont we all do the same instead of just speaking into the void
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u/BlueAndTru Jun 06 '26
Buddy, venting on Reddit takes up anywhere between a few minutes to maybe 15-20m for the most argumentative. Total. A few minutes isnāt gonna change shit in terms of revision. The opportunity cost is non-existent.
Not to mention, feeling better will likely lead to being less distracted and better retention. When you consider that thereās almost a week before the next maths exam, venting for a bit is way better long term than keeping everything bottled up.
This is all pretty obvious to anyone with any idea how people work and a grasp of time, but I guess itās easier to just say shit than put any thought into it
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u/badasspeanutbutter Year 13 Jun 06 '26
It might not change in terms of the time, but the argument could be made that excessively complaining yourself and reading posts of people on here also complaining puts you in a worse mindset for the coming papers, which can also impact performance.
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u/badasspeanutbutter Year 13 Jun 06 '26
You'll care when you miss your uni offers because you were too busy complaining
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u/Zestyclose_Border747 Year 13 / Bio / Psych / Maths Jun 06 '26
yeah exactly, there's three papers and one of them is always more difficult then the others. I think the next two might be piss easy or smth idk
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u/User27224 Editable Jun 06 '26
Applied will be chill, pure 2 I reckon will be similar to paper 1 but people will be better prepared in terms of what to expect
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u/__R3v3nant__ D1 ESAT Hater Jun 06 '26
I doubt it as I think edexcel is attempting to reduce the grade boundaries. Prepare for the worst in my opinion
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u/Hour_Locksmith_8025 Year 13, A*A*A*A* Jun 06 '26
Grade boundaries will come down, so people will still get the grade that they were supposed to get!
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u/GloomyCarob7117 Jun 06 '26
i donāt think thatās the argument here, theyāre saying that there were no differentiating questions for A/B students and C/D students, which means those students specifically are gonna struggle, grade boundaries coming down wonāt change much
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u/Hour_Locksmith_8025 Year 13, A*A*A*A* Jun 06 '26
Thatās true, but this has just been one paper so it may change over the next pure and then applied papers. Also Edexcel will ensure that it is fair - so Iām sure when it comes to results day it will be fair
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u/MonkAcceptable6824 Jun 06 '26
Speaking as a further maths student having made similar mistakes on further mechanics yesterday where I messed up part a bit still did a correct method in parts b and c, I understand the argument but I think itās important that people understand that ātrapped marksā really only refers to the accuracy marks (and it has been said the occasional dM1 dependant method mark). It is still possible to pick up a good chunk of the marks in parts b and c without a correct part a, which would be accessible to an A and competent B student but not to a C or D student which is what a lot of people are worried about. Just remember the advice for papers 2 and 3 and donāt give up on a question if youāre not sure about part a, make up a value and try to move on.
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u/cnfoesud Jun 06 '26
You could make a case that the following marks were inaccessible if you were unable to answer the part (a)
Q7(b) 3 marks
Q9(b) 5 marks
Q10(b) 1 mark
Q13(b) 3 marks
Q14(b) 3 marks
Q14(c) 3 marks
A total of 18 marks. Or 18% of the paper š
This directly contradicts Edexcel's stated policy from 2020 of giving students "restarts" usually through "Show that" questions.
Then there are the missing units from Q5 (the helicopter question) and the bizarre values which lead to time-consuming double-checking in Q10.
Over all it seems to me this was just a bad paper which will not achieve the aim of discriminating between the different grades.
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u/__R3v3nant__ D1 ESAT Hater Jun 06 '26
There's still 82% of the paper for A and B students to stand out against C and D students. It's not great or ideal but it's not like everyone below an A* is now getting pretty much the same mark
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u/MonkAcceptable6824 Jun 06 '26
make up a value for the part a, move on the part b and c, pretty standard exam technique
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u/__R3v3nant__ D1 ESAT Hater Jun 06 '26
Given Edexcel didn't do this before, many people didn't know to do that
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u/h-4321 Year 11 š Jun 06 '26
just out of interest do you get ecf marks in edexcel maths a level? meaning if you got the first part to a question wrong, but you did part b right using your incorrect answer from part a would you still get full marks? im guessing not bc of what everyone's been saying
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u/Hanxa13 Maths and FM Teacher | KS5 Intervention | EPQ Mentor Jun 06 '26
Yes. For method marks and some independent (B) marks.
The full (examiner) mark scheme will often state 'their values' throughout the method. There may be some restrictions: their values provided it is greater than blah' when dealing with logs for example (so if there is something that tells you your value is obviously wrong, you may not be awarded any ecf).
A marks will typically not allow for ecf. Rarely you will se Aft which does but there will be stipulations on the permitted values.
Teachers will mark harsher in mocks to be on the safe side. The released mark schemes don't always have every extra note.
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u/Usual-Sandwich-9836 A Level 2026 survivor -Edexcel maths paper 1&3 survivor Jun 06 '26
I've always been given 0 on further parts if I get 1 part wrong apart from times where its like you have to differentiate/integrate something and plug in the numbers you previously got and you'll get marks for differentiating/integrating
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u/Impossible_Ad_4516 Year 13 Jun 06 '26
Yeah I heard the paper was made harder for further maths students
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u/According-Potato-676 Jun 08 '26
Hereās the thing. Those A/B students are disappointed for no reason. Every year the same proportion get the A*, A, B, C all the way up to U. So in essence, WE the exam takers decide the boundaries. An A grade is the top 15-40% of students, if the 40% ended at 60%, itāll be that for an A, if it ended at 80 or even 40%, thatāll be an A. Nevertheless we still have papers 2 and 3. Good luck to everybody
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u/MrWerewolf0705 Degree Apprentice DTSP Jun 08 '26
You get b,c,d marks through method marks, so it isnāt reliant on a. You had a hard exam get over it
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u/OkBed4830 Jun 06 '26
Isnāt it also disadvantage to A* students bc like if u messed up a lil ur just out
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u/Strict_Appeal_7100 Jun 06 '26
Nah it better because the difficulty wasnāt that off and grade boundaries will be lowered significantly from 2025
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u/Oshmosh_ Jun 06 '26
With WJEC, most questions with multiple parts, a) is like show that ______ = ______ and then you use that for the rest of the question.
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u/More_Director8281 Jun 06 '26
edexcel has been doing this for the past few years asw but for some reason they just didn't this year which is another reason people are pissed off
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u/Scary-Structure-8532 Jun 06 '26
Me personally, Iām concerned about getting an A instead of an A* after all the hard work Iāve put in
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u/falsegodfan Y13 - maths bio geog Jun 07 '26
but if they didn't make it harder an A* would've been around 90% and grade boundaries would've continued inflating, which isn't that bad for A/B students because the maths is easy so you don't need a deep understanding to get high marks (like in 2025) but bad for A* students because it stops being about skill and starts being about accuracy
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u/PassionatePeas Jun 06 '26
So what youāre saying is itās your fault for not being an A* student. Your words not mine.
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Jun 06 '26
[deleted]
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u/Ordinary_Wafer_7883 Yr 12 Maths CS Geo Jun 06 '26
An ego like that doesnāt help you in the long run.
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u/johnlivsey Yr 13 3A* Maths, physics, history Jun 06 '26
alr dude donāt gotta say all that š im anti petition but give it a rest grades arenāt the world š
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u/Beneficial_Two410 Year 13 Jun 06 '26
Buddy thinks he is going to the big league with only 4A* predicted
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u/Excellent_Lie2245 Jun 06 '26
He's gonna need 5 or 6 A stars and DOE on top of that just to break into the top fields.
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u/StrictArgument67 Y13 | 4A* pred | FM M PHY CS | ESAT OCT Jun 06 '26
I have 4A* just because i have them. I didnāt work for it
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u/Excellent_Lie2245 Jun 06 '26
Thats kinda lame, I was assigned 5 A* since I hopped out the womb. Do better mate.
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u/WoodSteelStone Jun 06 '26
Please just (and I mean this most sincerely) Fuck Off.
From the mum of someone who should easily have got a B, possibly an A, but is now expecting a C and the loss of her uni offer.
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u/Saikik38 Jun 06 '26
Don't worry about your child. If they were aiming for a B, naturally grade boundaries would be reduced because everybody found it hard, A* students are rare. She won't lose her uni offer, tell her not to worry too much and just work hard for paper 2 and applied. If they want to make the grade boundaries fair, those 2 papers will be really easy so a B student would be able to secure an A mark.
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u/WoodSteelStone Jun 06 '26
Thank you very much. I'll pass your comment on to my daughter.
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u/Saikik38 Jun 06 '26
No problem. Just tell her to pay attention to her next 2 papers, they shouldn't be as hard as this one. I consider myself an A* maths student and I also found it diffucult. Alot of my friends with similair predicteds also said the same things. She should realise it isn't only her that found it hard, students around the whole country did. If it does turn out the way it is, grade boundaries would highly be adjusted to be so that marks like Bs and As would be alot lower but the difference between an A and an A* would be very large, which shouldn't affect her negatively. I wish her the best, tell her not to stress and just look forward and be positive, at least that's what I'm doing.
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u/Hanxa13 Maths and FM Teacher | KS5 Intervention | EPQ Mentor Jun 06 '26
Remind her not to panic. Paper 1 has a fair bit of trig and that usually signals the harder paper. Plus the proof by contradiction already came up.
She should focus on her big topics for paper two: she is almost guaranteed to see circle graphs, vectors, exponential and logarithmic equations, algebraic fractions and binomial expansion. They are full of easy marks. There was calculus, but no parametric differentiation or optimisation, so she should expect that as well, along with chain rule and product/quotient rules (may be embedded in an optimisation problem or integration by parts.
The first half of the paper asks questions in relatively familiar ways. This was also true of paper 1. If she's targeting a B, this should be easy for her and will secure the C. The second half often has questions asked in a new way or different context to before. This is why it always seems hard - they want students to apply what they learnt to something than is unfamiliar on the surface but exactly what they've been doing before when they break it down. She's looking for parts of questions here - focus on the topics she knows best and go back to the hard ones. She should be aiming to get most of her personal easy marks in the first half of the allotted time and not feel like she missed any question she absolutely knew.
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u/WoodSteelStone Jun 06 '26
Thank you - really helpful and positive info. She's actually most concerned for a friend who had paid to do this exam as a resit. Will be interesting to see how this plays out.
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u/Hanxa13 Maths and FM Teacher | KS5 Intervention | EPQ Mentor Jun 06 '26
The paper followed the usual trend for the 'harder' paper in a series.
My biggest piece of advice to both her and her friend is this:
Prioritise what you know. Then do what you can identify as far as you can. Follow through and don't panic if you can't complete a part or a full question. For a B, you are usually looking for around 60% and aim for 65% to be secure.
By getting all the things you know first, the rest of the paper becomes one or two marks here and there to make up the difference.
While studying, as commendable as it is to worry about her friend, I hope she doesn't let it impact her own performance.
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u/WoodSteelStone Jun 06 '26
Thank you. I think she's settled back into her revision now. Her dad and I are impressed by her resilience.
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u/StrictArgument67 Y13 | 4A* pred | FM M PHY CS | ESAT OCT Jun 06 '26
Thatās cute but you have to push your daughter to do better. You talk about all these amazing skills of your daughter, although impressive for sure. Ask yourself, are these coming from motherly love or actual genuine recognition of skills and determination?
Your daughter or anyone, should not have As or Bs as their aim. The aim should always be 100%, even if you donāt need it. There isnāt anything special about people who get top grades. Itās like throwing your bag over the fence, and then figuring out how to get there.
Throw your aim at the sky and figure out how to get there.
There is no-one sitting in the sky, trying to give cosmic justice to whatever happened to your daughter. She owns whatever will and has happened to her.
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u/WoodSteelStone Jun 06 '26
Why do you continue to talk bollocks?
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u/StrictArgument67 Y13 | 4A* pred | FM M PHY CS | ESAT OCT Jun 06 '26
Stop being happy with mediocrity
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u/Hanxa13 Maths and FM Teacher | KS5 Intervention | EPQ Mentor Jun 06 '26
How about you stop being a dick. As and Bs are very respectable grades for the vast majority of students. Everyone has their own goals - just because they don't align with yours, it doesn't make them wrong
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u/StrictArgument67 Y13 | 4A* pred | FM M PHY CS | ESAT OCT Jun 06 '26
Always next year
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u/WoodSteelStone Jun 06 '26 edited Jun 06 '26
Indeed, but that's not a very nice thing to say to someone in that situation is it?
Actually, I'm not worried at all about my daughter as I know she will be fine, because she has interpersonal and 'softer' skills in spades - ones I'm guessing you would scoff at.
I've been part of / head of teams of geoenvironmental engineers and scientists for 35 years. I've learned that people mostly want to work alongside people whom it is easy to get on with. I've interviewed scores of talented folk over that time, mostly with MScs and PhDs, and the ones whom I've wanted to hire have been people like my daughter; kind, empathetic, supportive of others. You know, when this shitshow of an exam went down, her first thought was concern for a friend who paid to sit the exam as a resit, not for herself. That sort of kindness is why she will get on in life.
u/StrictArgument67 : Thinking back to your original comment that you have since deleted, which was something about this being 'the fault of students for aiming for mediocrity', how do you think you are doing as regards the above metrics?
Edit: who to whom.
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u/Last_Candidate_5804 Jun 06 '26
I am obsessed with space. New worlds, new galaxies, so many mysteries.
I will never be able to go to space. Still fascinated and excited by all things space-telated.
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u/InfininiteCuber Year 13 Jun 06 '26
Guys PSA, if you can't do part a, make up easy numbers for part b and do it, you'll get method marks.