Background information for Progression Statistics

 

Purpose

The Progression Statistics publication provides insight into learners’ attainment as they progress through different levels of the same, or similarly disciplined, subjects.

Status

These data are classified as official statistics in development.

Description

The Progression Statistics publication presents a summary of progression in attainment grades and proportions of learners in National Qualification subjects from National 4 to National 5, National 5 to Higher, and Higher to Advanced Higher, or when re-sitting either National 5 or Higher.

The figures are produced in accordance with the Code of Practice for Statistics.

Approach to awarding

Prior to 2020, SQA used its well-established awarding procedures to evaluate the performance of the course assessment. Following a period of different awarding approaches (detailed below in ‘Approach to awarding, 2022 to 2024’), SQA returned to well-established awarding procedures from 2025, in line with our Awarding and Grading for National Courses Policy.

Approach to awarding, 2022 to 2024

In 2024, awarding used the well-established procedures to evaluate the performance of the course assessment and, where appropriate, considered the impact of changes to assessment brought about by the return to full course assessment for many courses. These changes to assessment included the removal of optionality in some question papers and the reintroduction of:

  • coursework components (projects, assignments, dissertations)
  • optional content into question papers
  • course content examined in question papers
  • an exam component

Further details about the approach to awarding in 2024 can be found in the methodology report.

In 2023, awarding operated using the established procedure as far as possible, but with consideration given to the following factors:

  • impact of the reducing legacy of disruption to teaching and learning caused by the pandemic.
  • impact of modifications to course assessment.
  • impact of the removal of revision support.

Awarding decisions were therefore ‘sensitive’ to these factors, ensuring that grade boundary decisions recognised that performance continues to be impacted. This was informed by the full range of qualitative and quantitative data used during awarding, with additional data from 2021–22 on the impact of modifications. Further details about the approach to awarding in 2023 can be found in the methodology report.

In 2022, SQA worked with partners across the education sector, including teachers, lecturers, learners, parents and carers, throughout the year to agree the wide-ranging package of support that was put in place to enable learners to demonstrate what they know, understand and can do, despite the disruption to learning caused by the COVID–19 pandemic. SQA implemented various modifications and revision support to reduce the assessment requirements for courses and increase learning and teaching time. Further details about the approach to awarding in 2022 can be found in the methodology report.

Source of data

The National Qualification certification data used in this publication is the same as those used in Attainment Statistics (December) publications. It covers certifications in Scotland between consecutive academic years, starting from 2022–23.

Methodology

The Progression Statistics publication focuses on the progression in attainment grades in National Qualification subjects from one level to the next, or when re-sitting a level. In the majority of cases, it reports on progressions between identically named, or very similarly named, subject courses that exist at more than one level.

Similarly named subjects include progressions between:

  • Mathematics courses and Applications of Mathematics courses
  • Higher Mathematics and Advanced Higher Mathematics of Mechanics
  • Biology courses and Human Biology courses

Where a subject exists at only one level, consideration is given to whether it can be categorised to be within the same discipline as another subject. For a subject in a similar discipline, we scrutinise the course specification documents to determine whether the two courses are connected in terms of levels of ‘Recommended Entry’ or ‘Progression’. In addition, we examine the number of learners and proportions of learners progressing to ensure that any reported statistical figures are sufficiently large so that they are not suppressed in the publication. For a subject that exists at only one level, no more than three other subjects are included for either progression to, or from, that subject.

The course progressions of subjects which exist at only one level, that are included in this publication, are:

  • National 4 Science to each of National 5 Chemistry, National 5 Biology, and National 5 Physics
  • National 4 People and Society to National 5 Modern Studies
  • National 5 Art and Design to Higher Photography
  • National 5 Modern Studies to Higher Politics
  • Higher Politics to Advanced Higher Modern Studies
  • Higher Mathematics to Advanced Higher Statistics

Figures for courses available in different languages are combined and reported as a single course. These courses are listed below:

  • Mandarin (Traditional), Mandarin (Simplified) and Cantonese are reported as Chinese Languages.
  • Mathematics and Matamataig are reported as Mathematics.
  • Applications of Mathematics and Gnìomhachas Matamataigs are reported as Applications of Mathematics.
  • Geography and Cruinn-eòlas are reported as Geography.
  • History and Eachdraidh are reported as History.
  • Modern Studies and Nuadh-eòlas are reported as Modern Studies.
  • Biology and Bith-eòlas at National 4 are reported as Biology.

Progression from National 4 to National 5 is reported as the number of learners progressing from any National 4 result to each of the available National 5 grades (A to No Award). Only learners who have been entered at National 4 in the earlier academic year and an A to No Award grade at National 5 in the following academic year for the subjects in the progression pathway are included in the calculations.

Progression from National 5 to Higher and Higher to Advanced Higher is reported as the percentage of learners progressing from the individual given grades (A to No Award) at the lower level to each of the available grades (A to No Award) at the higher level. An example is progression from a grade A in National 5 to each of the grades (A to No Award) at Higher. Only learners who have an A to No Award grade at the lower level in the earlier academic year and an A to No Award grade at the higher level in the following academic year for the subjects in the progression pathway are included in the calculations.

Figures for re-sitting either National 5 or Higher are reported for learners who gained, for the same qualification, any of the given grades (A to No Award) in one year and then any of the given grades (A to No Award) in the following year.

This publication does not contain information on learners who were re-sitting any National 4 qualification, because they are ungraded qualifications and we do not record any previous fails. In addition, there is no information on learners who re-sat any Advanced Higher qualification, as the total number of learners who re-sat any individual Advanced Higher qualification was fewer than 10 in all instances. Those re-sits would therefore be reported with the shorthands of either [z], for no data, or [c] for suppressed data.

Confidentiality and rounding

Any numbers of learners figures between one and nine (inclusive) have been suppressed to protect against the risk of disclosure of personal information. They are marked up with the shorthand [c]. Remaining figures are rounded to the nearest ten.

If the number of learners figures have been suppressed, then all of their associated percentage figures are also suppressed.

Courses that had fewer than 500 learners progressing, have had further suppression applied to small percentage figures for each of the grades A to No Award. The use of the shorthand [c] for a grade percentage represents a figure that is greater than or equal to zero, and less than or equal to the smallest reported percentage value from across the other grades for that course.

The shorthand [z] is used where no learners have progressed between the named course(s).

Percentages are calculated using figures prior to rounding. Percentages are rounded to the nearest whole number, with a value greater than zero and less than 0.5% marked up with the shorthand [low].

In the Excel workbook, total values of rows are calculated using figures prior to rounding; the sum of rounded figures may differ from the total reported.

Limitations

SQA external assessments returned in 2022, but significant assessment modifications were put in place with the aim to increase learning and teaching time. The course assessment modifications were retained for 2023. In 2024, SQA returned to full course assessment for many of the graded National Qualifications. The different awarding arrangements in place between 2020 and 2024 mean that it is not possible to compare attainment between years without full consideration of this contextual information.

The data show learner attainment between two consecutive academic years for large groups of learners. It does not take individual circumstances of any learner into account. This means it should not be used to make future study choices for a particular learner, for any subject or qualification level.

Revisions and corrections

Further information about revisions and corrections is available in our policy document.

Official statistics in development

Official statistics in development are official statistics that are undergoing development; they may be new or existing statistics, and will be tested with users, in line with the standards of trustworthiness, quality, and value in the Code of Practice for Statistics.

To ensure the statistics are developed in a way that is useful we invite users to provide their views and feedback on future developments or improvements that could be made to these statistics to meet your needs. If you have comments or questions, please contact us: .