OCR wants teachers to have access to a wide range of different styles and types of resource to support their students’ learning.
Endorsed resources have undergone a stringent quality check by an expert reviewer to make sure they have sufficient breadth or depth of coverage of a specification, unit or topic so that the resources can form a good basis for your planning and teaching. If the resources meet the endorsement criteria they will be listed on the OCR website. In addition, endorsed resources will bear the OCR endorsement logo, along with a statement about their endorsement.
Any publisher can submit their resources for endorsement, and both publisher partners and non-partners go through exactly the same process. We charge a fee for this to cover our costs only and we arrange for the resource to be reviewed by a paid expert reviewer.
This information below explains the different types of endorsement and how we work with publishers.
What resources can be endorsed?
OCR will endorse textbooks, ebooks and digital resources that are designed to support the teaching and learning of an OCR specification.The different categories of endorsement are below.
OCR will not endorse resources that focus primarily on revision or assessment preparation.
An OCR endorsed textbook
Texts and ebooks which substantively support an OCR specification at unit/component/module level or above may be eligible for endorsement. This type of resource will bear the OCR logo with the statement: An OCR endorsed textbook.
An OCR endorsed supplementary resource
Texts and ebooks which support at least one entire topic of an OCR specification at topic level or above may be eligible for endorsement. This type of resource will bear the OCR logo with the statement: An OCR endorsed supplementary resource
An OCR endorsed teaching and learning tool
Digital resources which support at least one entire topic of an OCR specification at topic level or above may be eligible for endorsement. This type of resource will bear the OCR logo with the statement: An OCR endorsed teaching and learning tool.
How to submit a resource for endorsement
Please download and complete the submission form.
Where to find endorsed resources
If there are endorsed resources available to support an OCR qualification, they will appear on the qualification page under the heading, 'Textbooks and endorsed resources'.
Publisher partners
For many of its qualifications, particularly GCSEs, AS and A Levels, OCR appoints a publisher partner. These are mainly major educational publishers and are usually selected by open tender. We do this to ensure that teachers have at least one good textbook/set of resources available to them for first teaching.
Publisher partners work closely with our subject specialists and have access to the new specifications that they support during their development. They do not, however, get any preferential treatment when it comes to the endorsement of their resources.
On some occasions we do establish commercial relationships with publishers, where we pay for the development of a resource. This is usually where it is not financially viable for the publishers to invest in production of these resources themselves, or where they provide some technical expertise that OCR does not have itself.