National Reference Tests are on target to be trialled in schools between 7 and 15 March 2016.

Ofqual has reported that over 300 schools have agreed to take part in this year’s trial.  At each school, up to 24 students will take the maths test and another 24 students will take the English test.

A few examples of the tests are now available to give students and teachers an idea of what to expect.

As reported in December’s OCR Policy Briefing, these tests have been developed on behalf of Ofqual to provide additional information to support the awarding of reformed English language and maths GCSEs. However, students taking part in this year’s trial are studying for current GCSEs, so as some of the material in the tests may not be quite as familiar, this will be taken into account when the results are analysed.

Legislation will come into force on 1 September 2016 with the first full National Reference Test taking place in March 2017.