Understanding The Difference Between Raw Mark and UMS
Raw Mark and UMS
Raw mark and UMS always happen to appear in university admission requirements, and people always discuss them after their A Level exams, but what actually are they? What are the differences between the two?
UMS stands for Uniform Mark Scale; unlike GCSE or IGCSE, UMS is a “virtual mark” that is used to standardize exams from different exam boards. Raw marks would literally be the marks you get in your exam; maybe a 78/80, your raw mark would always be 78.
So how is UMS calculated? Similarly to the “grade boundaries” you get in GCSEs, the conversion from raw marks to UMS changes every year according to the performance and the difficulty of the paper.
As an example, we would take WJEC 2024 Chemistry A Level as an example.
The following data would be listed as RAW/RAW TOTAL -> UMS/ UMS TOTAL:
42/80 -> 70/100
51/80 -> 80/100
64/80 -> 95/100
69/80 -> 100/100
etc…
Grade Boundary
Max UMS 80 A - 64 B - 56 C - 48 D - 40 E - 32
To get an “A” grade in AS for this paper would only require you to get 80% of the UMS, which is 51/80, as A is [(64/80) 80%] of UMS. For a maximum UMS unit of 80, 51 marks are required. The same concept applies to the Chinese University of Hong Kong, where the MBChB (medicine degree) has a minimum requirement of 64 raw marks for THIS PAPER in order to meet the minimum requirement.
For further reference, please visit https://exam.igchkshop.us.kg/gce/wjec/others/ums for conversion.
Requirement for getting a A* in A Level (GCE)
As you now understand how to convert raw marks into UMS, let’s talk about how to get an A*, which everyone aims for. There are two general requirements for getting an A*:
- Getting 450/500 UMS (or equivalent subjects) for AS and A2
- Achieving 90% of the UMS in A2 units
For example, if person A achieved 80/100 and 80/100 UMS for AS, which is 160/200, and got 300/300 for A2, the total UMS is 460/500, and for A2, they definitely got over 90%, which means they would get an A* in their report.
However, if person B got 100/100 and 100/100 for both AS units, but only got 250/300 (83.3%) in A2, although they have got 450 UMS, they only have 83.3% UMS in A2, so they would only get an “A” grade.
If you have any questions, feel free to contact JCQ or the equivalent exam board that you are taking for help.
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