July 2023 Psychology Subject Update

Summer 2023 post-exam series teacher survey

To enable us to improve the experience of teachers using our qualifications and students sitting our exams, we gather feedback after each exam series. If you're a teacher, and your students have taken any of our exams in the May/June 2023 series we want to know what you liked or didn't like in this year's exam papers. We'll share your feedback with our senior examiners and across teams to ensure we continue to make improvements to our papers where appropriate so we can make sure your students have the best exam experience.

Getting Ready for Summer 2023 Results Day

Access key information and guidance for the Summer 2023 results period for GCSE,  A level and International A level Psychology, including key dates, details of post-results services and grade boundaries.

Multi-factor Authentication for Edexcel Online 

On 19 June 2023 we wrote to all registered Edexcel Online account holders, advising that we had introduced Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) as an additional layer of security to help protect your centre and learner data. While a lot of users have now accessed Edexcel Online (EOL) and successfully gone through the MFA process, we are aware that other roles may not use EOL and other related systems on a regular basis, and the next time to try and log in is on a learner results day. 

To make your results days as easy as possible, if you are a user that will need to access any of the following systems during the summer results period, please log into these now to check you can access them successfully. We are here to help you between now and the results period should you need us: 

• Edexcel Online (EOL) 
• ResultsPlus 
• MyBTEC 
• Exam Viewer 

Additional support for Multi-Factor Authentication can be found in our customer support article Accessing Pearson Services Using Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA). We also have these trouble shooting steps. 

Exam results 2023: 10 things to know about grades from Ofqual

This year GCSEs, AS and A levels are returning to pre-pandemic standards, with protection built into the grading process to recognise the disruption that students have faced. This blog from Ofqual provides a useful summary of this process for students.

Summer 2023 question papers are now available

The Summer 2023 question papers are now available to download securely from our website. You will need an Edexcel Online account to download secure materials.

Summer 2023 mark schemes will be available on our website from 18 July 2023.

AS/A level Summer 2023 examiner reports will be available on our website from 22 August 2023.

GCSE Summer 2023 examiner reports will be available on our website from 29 August 2023.

You will also be able to download examiner reports from ResultsPlus on results day.

Using practical work to deliver research methods content for A Level, International A Level and GCSE Psychology

I recently ran a workshop at the ATP (Association for the Teaching of Psychology) International Teachers' Conference on facilitating independent practical investigations. You can watch a video summarising the key ideas from the workshop and download two resources by following the link below - an Excel workbook which carries out statistical test calculations and a PowerPoint template for students to make academic posters reporting on their investigations.

Provisional dates for exam feedback training in September and October

For our UK qualifications we have set provisional dates for exam feedback training for each paper, which we will confirm shortly:

A Level Paper 1 - Tuesay 26th September - 4pm

A Level Paper 2 - Thursday 28th September - 4pm

A Level Paper 3 - Tuesday 3rd October - 4pm

GCSE Paper 1 - Thursday 5th October - 4pm

GCSE Paper 2 - Tuesday 10th October - 4pm

Details of IAL exam feedback to follow shortly.

Hot off the press: Pearson School Report 2023

The brand-new Pearson School Report explores education in England and how educators are pioneering change in 2023. Featuring the views of 6,000+ teachers and 1,000 students, the report shares experiences from both sides of the school desks and invaluable insights on:

• challenges and opportunities facing schools
• sustainability and climate education
• digital innovation – the positives, possibilities and problems to solve
• diversity, equity and inclusion.