IB results land in schools on Sunday. Physics teachers will have a role to play as Enquiries Upon Results (EUR) requests are alive and well (and charged at the same fee).

Grades will be determined by a "calculation" that takes into account the IA mark, the teacher's predicted grade and historic subject grades.

IAs have been marked by examiners - we learned in our most recent "Coffee with Chris & Emma" that examiners were instructed not to use teacher marks and at least one seed paper was chosen because the senior examiner had awarded 17/24 where the teacher had awarded 23. This examiner suggested that a 2- or 3-mark tolerance from the seed marks was acceptable. This is significant as grade boundaries in 2019 (for example) were tighter than this:

Candidates can request Category 1 remarks and may need your advice - because grades can go up, down or stay the same.

The Physics IA is marked out of 24. The IB have decided that, when remarked, the new mark must deviate by 3 or more marks from the original for them to re-run the "calculation" for the candidate.

• Eg 1: If a candidate is given 16 marks by the examiner and 17 marks in a remark, no change to the calculation will be performed and the candidate's grade will remain unchanged.
• Eg 2: If a candidate is given 19 marks by the examiner and 16 marks in a remark, the "calculation" will be rerun. This may result in a change of grade. If there is a change of grade, the candidate will receive a refund.

This may also be the year to consider your first Category 2 request. While paying to have materials returned may sound a little pointless (as examiners often don't write comments alongside their marks), for the first time you would have access to a complete set of criteria marks from a paid examiner to compare with your internally assessed criteria marks. This might provide fodder for professional development in your next department meeting - especially if your DP1 into DP2 students are yet to do their IAs.

There will be no Category 3 requests for Physics this year as no work has been moderated.

We'll be on hand for a chat about Results on Thursday 9th July at 1600 CET. By this point we will have the IA component marks available. Join us via Zoom.