Preparing for a moderation review

Register your learners

Make the most of the support available by registering your learners early. Learners can be registered through the Portal.

Prepare for your review

Read the Qualification Specification and all supporting documents on the qualification page
Attend our administration and standardisation training. This training will support you to make reliable assessment decisions and reduce any differences between Assessor and Moderator marks. Centre attendance will be checked as part of your annual monitoring review (AMR)
Enter marks for all learners on the Portal before the end of the assessment window, as outlined in the Key Date schedule, available on our qualification pages
Withdraw any inactive learners on the Portal. Failure to withdraw learners in a timely manner will result in an action on your AMR report

Before the end of the assessment window, we’ll contact your Programme Contact and ask them to send a sample of learner evidence. All requested evidence must be sent by the end of the assessment window.

All moderation reviews will take place remotely, unless outlined in the Qualification Specification.

You’ll receive details of the moderation outcome and the final marks awarded to each learner on results release day.

Understand our approach to moderation

Moderation occurs before results are issued and helps us to ensure assessment judgements made by centres are in line with NCFE’s guidelines and are reliable across centres.

During moderation the Moderator will re-assess a sample of learner non-external assessments (NEA) marked by Assessors within the centre.

Moderators will look at a sub sample of learner work (either remotely or through a visit), unaware of the marks awarded by the centre's Assessors. The sample size will be selected using JCQ sampling guidelines (Table 1) and include assessments from across a range of centre marks which include a learner with the highest centre mark and a learner with the lowest non-zero centre-mark. Where an assessment has been carried out by more than one Assessor, all Assessors will be included in the sample, where possible.

Table 1

No. of learners at provider	*Stage 1 sample (sub-sample)**	*Stage 2 Sample**	*Stage 3 sample**
Up to 5	All	All	All
6-10	5	All	All
11-15	6	10	All
16-100	6	10	15
101-200	6	15	20
Over 200	6	20	25

When awarding marks, Moderators and Assessors will make professional judgements based on their knowledge and experience. As with any professional judgement we understand it is unlikely that there will be precise agreement, so a small tolerance is allowed on the NEA.

During moderation the marks awarded by the Moderator for the sub sample of NEAs will be compared with the marks awarded by Assessors. If the differences between the Moderator marks and Assessor marks are within tolerance Assessor marks will be accepted. If the marks for one or more learners in the sample are outside the tolerance, the Moderator will expand their sample and re-assess additional NEAs. This is stage 2 sampling.

Following this sample, if marking is considered consistent, we’ll apply an adjustment to all learners in the cohort using a linear regression mechanism.

If marking is considered inconsistent (marking is deemed inconsistent if the difference between the most extreme values of the Moderator mark minus centre mark, is greater than twice the tolerance), the Moderator will further widen their sample. This is stage 3 sampling.

If learner marks can be adjusted satisfactorily using the linear regression mechanism, we’ll apply an adjustment to all learners in the cohort. Alternatively, if Moderator marks are available for all learners in the cohort, Moderator marks will be applied.

At this stage it may be necessary to apply different adjustments across the mark range, depending on the findings from stage 3 moderation, the action will be determined by the Chief Moderator, who will consider if:

the Moderator should re-assess the work of all learners at the centre, in which case the Moderator’s marks will be applied.
the centre should re-assess the work of all its learners, in this case and a fresh sample will be re-assessed by the Moderator.
internal standardisation within the centre has not been effective, in this case separate samples may be taken from Assessors, and adjustments applied to, individual teaching groups.
centre assessment decisions is inconsistent across options within the occupational specialism practical activity assessment, in this case separate samples may be taken from, and adjustments applied to, individual options.

Points to note around mark adjustment:

No learner will be treated differently by virtue of having been included in the moderation sample. Mark adjustments, when made (following re-assessment of the stage 2 or stage 3 sample), are determined on the basis of the pattern of differences between the centre and Moderator marks, with a view to bringing centre marks into line (such as to reduce the mean of those differences to zero) and applied to all learners.
Mark adjustments should always maintain the centre’s rank order of merit unless moderation moves on to stage 4. Where teaching groups are treated separately at stage 4, each group is moderated as though it is a distinct centre (and the failure to internally standardise will be followed up with the centre).
For small centres, all learners will have been selected before stage 4 of the sampling process is reached (for example, if there are 7 learners at a centre, the stage 2 sample includes all of them), in these circumstances adjustments (if needed) will be applied in the same way as for a larger centre, retaining the centre’s rank order. The final marks will be the Moderator marks only where the sampling would have moved to stage 4 if the centre had been larger.