The General Certificate of Education set out to provide a national standard for matriculation to university undergraduate courses. It had two levels, Ordinary and Advanced, which rapidly became known throughout the education system as “O levels” and “A Levels.” Where to buy fake Cambridge GCE statement, make a fake GCE a level transcript, buy fake Cambridge certificate.
Ordinary levels were usually taken at the age of 16, and Advanced levels at the age of 18 after a further two-year course. Both the O level and A level courses were examined by subject, and matriculation (the minimum standard for university entrance) was set at five passes in different subjects, of which two had to be at A level.
Though the GCE was considered a national standard, there was no national syllabus, and it was run by a number of different Examination Boards, each of which set their own syllabi and papers. These included the Northern Universities Joint Matriculation Board (“Northern”), the University of London (“The London Board”) and the Oxford and Cambridge Board.
Examination sessions were held bi-annually in May and November and successful candidates received a certificate listing the subjects they had passed in the session, together with the marks achieved in each. In the earliest years of the system subject marks were given as percentages at both Ordinary and Advanced Level. In later years ordinary level pass marks were graded 1–6, with 1 being the highest. The grading system was further simplified in 1975 when the six pass marks were reduced to three, graded A, B, C. In normalised terms at O level the lower bound for A was then 70% and the lower bound for C 45%. For matriculation purposes C was the lowest pass grade. D, E and F grades were also shown for the first time—indicating that a paper had been sat but the student had not achieved a pass mark.
