Monitoring centre assessment – CASS arrangements

All awarding bodies including OCR are committed to making sure everyone can trust that students’ awards provide an accurate reflection of their skills, knowledge and assessment performance in the subjects they undertake. From 1 September 2021, Ofqual will require all awarding organisations (AOs) to follow the same standard of Centre Assessment Standards Scrutiny (CASS). This new terminology covers the methods AOs have to quality assure assessment decisions made by centres.

As an OCR centre you will probably notice very little change as many of these new standards are already part of our current processes. However, for clarity, the new requirements are:

1. Quality assurance of moderation for all general and vocational qualifications must take place before results are issued, allowing us to adjust any results as necessary before they are issued.
2. The only other form of CASS is verification of some industry-based vocational qualifications. This review must take place before or after results are issued and we'll consider the appropriate action to take for any results discovered that are not in line with the required standard.
3. We (and all other AOs) are required to comply with, and keep under review, a strategy for all qualifications that are marked by centres (including those that are subject to moderation).
4. Where we discover an incorrect result, it must be corrected in line with Ofqual guidance and the original certificates must be returned to us.

At OCR, we want to make sure all of our centres are confident in delivering assessments and so we'll continue to provide online training and support for all teachers and centre assessors of our qualifications. We'll also let you know the arrangements for moderation visits in plenty of time.

If you have any further questions about how these new Ofqual requirements will affect your centre then please call our Customer Support Centre on 01223 553998 or email support@ocr.org.uk.