Year 11 and Year 10 Mock Exams, November/December 2023
Mock exams for Year 11 students will take place towards the end of November and beginning of December. The French Speaking tests will be on Tuesday 21st November, while the remainder of the exams are timetabled from Monday 27th November to Friday 8th December 2023. Year 10 students will also take a mock exam in Religious Studies.
These exams are an important part of the preparation for the ‘real’ exams due to take place in summer 2024. Furthermore, they may inform the final grades that students achieve if anything happens that means exams cannot take place in May and June 2024.
Ofqual and the Exam Boards have instructed schools to keep mock exam papers safely in case they are required as evidence for ‘Teacher Assessed Grades’. While we very much expect that the exams will go ahead as normal in the summer, we cannot ignore the very small possibility that they may not and we must prepare accordingly. As such, we hope and expect that all students will take the mock exams as seriously as they would the final exams, that they will prepare for them and sit them in such a way as to do the best that they can.
The timetable for the mock exams can be downloaded using the link on the right of this page.
If you have any questions about the mock exams, please email Stuart Willis, Exams Officer at exams@uws.n-yorks.sch.uk.
Summer Exams 2026
The summer season of external exams (exams scheduled and set by exam boards that will lead to the completion of students’ qualifications) will start in April 2026 with the GCSE Art and Design practical exams for Year 11 students.
Please note that the dates and times for the external exams are set by the exam boards and as such, they cannot be changed. If a student misses any of the exams, there is no opportunity to sit them on an alternative date as there would be with internal mock exams.
Year 10 students will sit their final exams for GCSE Religious Studies in this season. Their internal summer assessments will take place during the afternoon of Thursday 11 June and from Monday 15 June to Tuesday 23 June. Note that not all subjects will have summer exams – some, for example, History, will conduct their summer assessments during lessons.
Students have been provided with their individual exam timetables for both external exams and summer assessments (email and paper copies) along with the Exams Handbook which gives details of the processes and regulations for the exams.
The timetable for all exams and the Exams Handbook can be downloaded using the links.
If you have any questions or worries about the exams, please email Stuart Willis, Exams Officer at exams@uws.n-yorks.sch.uk.The
Exam Board Information
The qualifications for which students are entered in 2025-26 along with the exam boards and specification codes, are listed below.
GCSEs
- Art and Design (Fine Art) – AQA – 8202
- Biology – Pearson Edexcel – 1BI0
- Business – Pearson Edexcel – 1BS0
- Chemistry – Pearson Edexcel – 1CH0
- Combined Science – Pearson Edexcel – 1CS0
- Design & Technology – Eduqas – C600QS
- Drama – AQA – 8261
- English Language – AQA – 8700
- English Literature – AQA – 8702
- French – Pearson Edexcel – 1FR1
- Geography – AQA – 8035
- History – Pearson Edexcel – 1HI0
- Mathematics – Pearson Edexcel – 1MA1
- Physical Education – Pearson Edexcel – 1PE0
- Physics – Pearson Edexcel – 1PH0
- Religious Studies (Full Course) – Pearson Edexcel – 1RB0
- Religious Studies (Short Course) – Eduqas – C125QT P3
BTECs
- Level 1/2 Tech Award in Digital Information Technology – Pearson Edexcel – RIT03
- Level 1/2 Tech Award in Health and Social Care – Pearson Edexcel – RHS03
Other
- Level 1/2 Vocational Award in Hospitality and Catering (Technical Award) – WJEC – 5409QA
Access Arrangements
The following information is from the JCQ document, Guidance for parents, carers and students about access arrangements that can be downloaded from JCQ-Parent-guidance-information-sheet-2025_26.pdf.
What are access arrangements?
- Access arrangements allow students with specific needs, such as special educational needs or disabilities, to access an exam.
- They allow students to show what they know and can do without changing the demands of the exam.
- Access arrangements for exams are different from the ongoing support we provide for students according to their specific needs that is provided throughout their time at UWS.
How will the process start?
- Parents and carers should let the SENCo know as soon as possible if their child has additional
needs. Good and open communication is important. - The SENCo will work with teachers and the student to identify possible arrangements.
- Various access arrangements are available. For example, support for students who have difficulties
with reading, writing, speed of working or concentration. - Not all students with additional needs will require access arrangements. This depends on whether
their difficulty affects their access to exams. Additional needs or a diagnosis alone do not entitle a
student to access arrangements.
Who will make the assessment?
- If a student has learning difficulties, the school or college’s appointed assessor (Mrs Mukherjee) must conduct the assessment to determine the need for access arrangements, such as 25% extra time.
- The formal assessments for access arrangements cannot be started by Mrs Mukherjee until students reach the end of Year 9. Decisions about which students are assessed are determined on which students have received ongoing support through Years 7, 8 and 9, student that have been identified by teaching staff as having particular needs and information provided by parents.
- Our aim is to finalise the assessment for and awarding of access arrangements before Christmas in Year 10, so that students can start using them in exam conditions in the Year 10 mock Religious Studies exam that takes place towards the end of the autumn term.
- If an external assessor diagnoses a learning difficulty (for example, dyslexia or dyscalculia), the
assessment can only be used as evidence for access arrangements if the assessor has liaised with
the school or college and received the necessary access arrangements paperwork in advance of the
assessment taking place. - Specialists (for example, a medical consultant or a psychiatrist) are responsible for providing a
formal diagnosis. They are not responsible for decisions about access arrangements. - The school or college must decide which access arrangements a student has for their exams.
• Teachers must give evidence to show that an access arrangement is needed. The school or college
will record how effective the arrangement is in the classroom, in internal tests or in mock exams.
What else needs to be done?
- The school or college will have to apply for some arrangements.
- If a student has complex needs, a school or college can discuss their needs with the exam board.
Finally
- Schools and colleges must follow the rules. They are inspected and if they are found to be breaking the rules, this will be malpractice.
A leaflet with further explanation of what access arrangements are and what they involve can be downloaded at uws.n-yorks.sch.uk/how-to-use-your-access-arrangements-booklet.
If you have any questions about access arrangements, please speak to Mrs Mukherjee at school.
Exam Results Day, August 2025
We very much hope that as many Year 10 and Year 11 students as possible will be able to visit Upper Wharfedale School on Thursday, 21 August 2025 between 09:00 and 12:00 to collect their GCSE, BTEC and Vocational exam results.
There are four ways that students can receive their results:
1. Collect in person
Students will be able to collect their results from school between 09:00 and 12:00 on Thursday 21 August.
We encourage all students to come and collect their results in person as this allows staff and students to celebrate their many successes together. It also enables us to offer any support or advice to students where needed.
2. Nominate a family member to collect their results
If a student is unable to come into school to collect their results, they may ask a family member to collect them on their behalf at the times listed above.
The student must complete the online form at https://forms.office.com/e/Vhtnwnr6bt.
They must be signed in to their UWS computer account to do this (so that we are certain that they have completed the form) and all requests must be made before 17:00 on Tuesday 19 August 2025.
We will prepare a document for the nominated person collecting the results to sign to confirm receipt of the results. The nominated person will also be asked to produce proof of identity.
Please note that results cannot be released without the online form being completed and the nominated person’s proof of identity.
To access the online form, use the link above or scan the QR code above.
3. Receive results via email
All students results will be emailed to students’ school email addresses, regardless of whether they have collected their results from school. Results will be sent at the earliest opportunity after 12:00 and no later than 14:00.
If students would like their results emailed to a personal email address, they must complete the online form at https://forms.office.com/e/Wt1xddYFaS, detailing the email address the results should be sent to. Students will need to have signed in to their UWS computer account to access this.
The online form can also be accessed by scanning the QR code above.
Requests must be made before 17:00 on Tuesday 19 August 2025.
4. Receive results via post
Results can be provided to students, but a stamped addressed envelope must be provided to Mr Willis in the Exams Office at school. Ideally, the envelope should be single folded A4 size (C5 envelope size).
As well as their results, students will also be given information about the various post-results services that the exam boards offer.
If you have any queries about the results day, please contact Mr Willis by emailing swillis@uws.n-yorks.sch.uk.
Collection of GCSE and BTEC Certificates, November 2023
We are very much looking forward to seeing as many of last years’ Year 11 students as possible at the UWS Presentation Evening on Thursday 23rd November. It will be great to see them again and celebrate their exam successes from last summer.
If you are not able to attend Presentation Evening, you will need to arrange to get your certificates. There are two ways to do this:
1. Pick up the certificates from Upper Wharfedale School
Students can arrange to pick up their certificates in school hours (9am to 3.20pm) between Friday 24th November and Friday 22nd December. Alternatively, if they are unable to pop in, they can nominate someone else to collect them. In this case, please download the Authorisation for Nominated Person to Collect Exam Certificates on Behalf of a Candidate form using the link on the right of the page, and complete a printed copy of it for their representative to bring to school. Please let us know when someone would like to pop into school so that we can have everything ready for collection.
2. Authorise us to post the certificates
Certificates can, with a student’s authorisation, be posted to their home address. However, as they are important legal documents, certificates will be posted by Royal Mail Special Delivery (including £750 compensation cover should they be lost or damaged in the post) and there is a £10 charge to cover the postage cost and packing them in a cardboard-reinforced envelope. The student will need to download, print and complete the attached Authorisation for Upper Wharfedale to Post Exam Certificates form from the link on the right of this page and send it to Stuart Willis, Exams Officer, either by post or scanning it and emailing it to exams@uws.n-yorks.sch.uk.
Please remember that qualification certificates are important legal documents that will be required when you apply for college or university places or for jobs in the future. They are literally, irreplaceable. If certificates are lost or damaged, we are unable to provide replacements and the Exam Boards will not reprint certificates. They will only supply ‘statements of qualifications’ and each Board charges a
considerable fee (some per subject) for doing so. The charge depends on the Exam Board, but currently it is about £45 for each statement.
Please keep your certificates in a safe place.
If you have any questions about obtaining your certificates, please email Stuart Willis, Exams Officer at exams@uws.n-yorks.sch.uk.
After Receiving Your Results
By the time you read this, you should have received – either in person at Results Day or by email – a Statement of Results that details your results as we received them from the exam boards on 20 August 2025. Please note that these results are provisional and are therefore subject to change. They have been issued pending any reviews or appeals that may be made. Your final results and certificates will be issued by the awarding bodies later in the year, usually in November.
We hope that you are pleased with your results. If you are not as happy as you hoped you would be, there are some options available to you in the exam board Post-Results Services.
You can ask an exam board for a Clerical Re-check or Review of Marking for any of your written exams. If you think you may need one of these Post-Results Services, you must discuss it with someone in school – either a member of the Senior Leadership Team or your subject teacher. As well as knowing what grades you were predicted, school staff have access to the breakdown of marks for each of your exam papers and the grade boundaries as set by the exam boards. Based on this information and what your wrote in your exam, we can make a recommendation. Please refer to the documents, ‘Post-Results Services‘ and ‘How to Apply for Post-Results Services‘ that can be downloaded from this page.
There are charges payable for Post-Results Services – details of how to apply for a service, what the fees are and how to pay them are also detailed in the documents listed above.
It is always best, before applying for a Post-Results Service, for UWS staff to see your exam paper. We can download your exam papers from the exam board secure sites using the exam boards’ Access to Scripts service for schools, but we need your permission to do this. Therefore, you must complete the online form at https://forms.office.com/e/0PFefW9aNx as soon as possible after receiving your results. You can also access this form by scanning the QR code.
Please note that the form will not be accessible until Results Day – JCQ regulations state that we are only allowed to collect your permissions after you have received your results.
If you had Access Arrangements for your exams (extra time, word processor, reader etc), the online form also allows you to give us permission to tell your next school or college about them so that you can have them in future exams.
Please make sure you complete this form – it really is important!
It takes approximately four weeks to get the results of a Post-Results Service (sometimes quicker), and you will be notified in writing (usually by email). Further information is available on the JCQ website at https://www.jcq.org.uk/exams-office/post-results-services.
If you require any further information or have any questions, please contact the Exams Officer, Mr Willis, by emailing swillis@uws.n-yorks.sch.uk.
Our Exam Policies
JCQ Exam Information
JCQ Candidate Information
You can find all the latest candidate information on the JCQ Website.