FE college learners and parents

We have now issued all results for students with UCAS applications that are eligible for a BTEC National Level 3 qualification. We have contacted every school or college with currently ineligible learners to discuss their cases and are grateful for the support from exams officers and other colleges in resolving queries and providing information.

We will continue to work with a handful of schools and colleges to review queries and to confirm whether or not they expect learners that are currently ineligible to meet the qualification criteria.

Our dedicated team will work closely with schools and colleges to obtain and validate information for any new claims that we receive. We are also sharing regular updates with UCAS and higher education institutions.

We are grateful for the patience of students, and our partnership with schools, colleges and UCAS to get results to students as soon as possible. Thank you to everyone involved.

We understand that this situation has been very difficult for students and their families. We will be undertaking a detailed review into this awarding series. Starting in September, we will be seeking input and feedback from students, schools, colleges and the wider education community. We look forward to working with all our stakeholders to identify improvements to future awarding cycles.

We wanted to share the progress we are making to reduce the number of ineligible BTEC National Level 3 results for students who need them for university admissions.

• By Results Day on Thursday 18 August, we had issued around 200,000 results
• We continue to award BTEC National Level 3 results to students with confirmed UCAS applications, with another 110 released in the last 24 hours
• As of today, this leaves approximately 790 ineligible claims for results for students’ UCAS applications because we do not have all the information we need to award a grade.
• Our dedicated team continues to work closely with schools and colleges to obtain and validate any outstanding information.

We are sorry that some of you are still waiting. Our priority is to ensure that all eligible students receive their results. We are grateful for the patience of students, and our partnership with schools, colleges and UCAS to get results to students as soon as possible.

We understand that this situation has been very difficult for students and their families. We will be undertaking a detailed review into this awarding series. Starting in September, we will be seeking input and feedback from students, schools, colleges and the wider education community. We look forward to working with all our stakeholders to identify improvements to future awarding cycles.

For more information on how BTECs are assessed and awarded please see here.

We want to share an update on the progress we are making to reduce the number of outstanding BTEC National Level 3 results for students who need them for university admissions. 

• By Results Day on Thursday 18 August, we had issued around 200,000 results 
• Since 18 August we have sent an additional 2,200 BTEC National Level 3 results to UCAS, including nearly 300 in the past 24 hours.  
• As of today, there are approximately 1,100 outstanding claims for results for students’ UCAS applications that do not meet the BTEC Level 3 qualification criteria.  
• We have a dedicated team in place to work around the clock with schools and colleges to obtain and validate any outstanding information. 

We understand that this is a very difficult time for those who are still waiting for results. Our priority is to ensure that all eligible students receive their grades.   

We want to reassure students that exam boards have well established procedures to share data with UCAS throughout this period while they work through clearing.  

We are grateful for the patience of students and our partnership with schools, colleges and UCAS to get outstanding results to students as soon as possible.  

If I am a learner with a missing result, what should I do? 

Please contact your school or college. We are sending grades to them all the time so please keep checking in so that they know you are still waiting. 

If you are holding a university offer, UCAS has told us that the best thing to do is to call the university and let them know you are still interested. Places will be held for you until at least August 31st. If helpful, we can also call the university for you to explain the situation. 

Please contact us on 0345 618 0440 (from 8:30am- 7:00pm), DM us via @PearsonBTEC on social media, or via our online portal for further support. 

If you are a school or college with missing results?

Please call us on 0344 463 2535 and we will work with you to resolve any queries as fast as we can. Common action that you might need to consider taking includes: 

• making a ‘claim’ for the result 
• completing unit grades for learners (such as submitting all unit grades, UTAGs, or a special consideration application) to make them eligible for the grade you are claiming 

Please rest assured that we will work with you to resolve these as quickly as is humanly possible.  It may also help you to refer to our existing guide (PDF | 2.8MB).

We are very sorry that some of you are still waiting for your BTEC National results. We awarded hundreds more results over the weekend and will continue to work around the clock with schools and colleges to obtain and validate any outstanding information. However, we appreciate how difficult it must be if you are still waiting.

We wanted to give you an update on progress so far for those learners who need their result to secure a university place:

• By Results Day on Thursday August 18, we had issued around 200,000 results
• Of those, 100,000 BTEC National results were provided to UCAS for those learners using their BTEC as part of an application to progress to university, with the rest using their BTEC results to go straight into a fulfilling career
• Since Thursday, we have sent another 1,950 BTEC National results to UCAS.

We understand the pressure on students and we want to reassure them that it is normal for exam boards to send updates to UCAS after results day for all qualifications. That’s exactly why we have tried and tested procedures in place with UCAS to share data with them throughout this period as they work through clearing. The numbers we are sharing here are similar to what they were in 2019, when exams were last sat.

As a reminder, BTECs are a modular qualification and in order for us to be able to award an overall result, we require grades to be provided for each unit and a claim made to receive the qualification. Many BTEC National students use their BTEC to apply to university through UCAS and just as many use their BTEC to go straight into a fulfilling career at different points in the year.

Thanks to the close co-operation from schools and colleges, where exams officers and other staff are working diligently with us to resolve queries, we will continue to issue results during the days ahead as new information becomes available to us. We are also working closely with UCAS and higher education institutions to keep them updated. We are grateful for their partnership, as well as that of parents, students, schools and colleges in resolving any outstanding issues and helping us get results to students as soon as possible.

If I am a learner with a missing result, what should I do?

Please contact your school or college. We are sending grades to them all the time so please keep checking in so that they know you are still waiting.

If you are holding a university offer, UCAS has told us that the best thing to do is to call the university and let them know you are still interested. Places will be held for you until at least August 31st. If helpful, we can also call the university for you to explain the situation.

Please contact us on 0345 618 0440 (from 8:30am- 7:00pm), DM us via @PearsonBTEC on social media, or via our online portal for further support.

If you are a school or college with missing results?

Please call us on 0344 463 2535 and we will work with you to resolve any queries as fast as we can. Common action that you might need to consider taking includes:

• making a ‘claim’ for the result
• completing unit grades for learners (such as submitting all unit grades, UTAGs, or a special consideration application) to make them eligible for the grade you are claiming

Please rest assured that we will work with you to resolve these as quickly as is humanly possible. It may also help you to refer to our existing guide here: btec-results-day-eligibility-guidance.pdf (pearson.com).

How are BTECs awarded and what happened this year?

BTECs are a type of modular vocational qualification. They were created and designed to give students flexibility and the option to choose their own learning journey. Learners can roll on and roll off the course depending on what’s happening in their lives and it’s often not the simple two year linear path followed by A level students.

Schools and colleges know their learners best and so we rely on them to let us know when a student has completed and is ready to claim their result. Students study a mix of internal units that are assessed by their school or college at the end of each module, and external units more like exams that are marked by Pearson.

In order to award an overall grade, we need the school or college to let us know the student is ready by claiming their award and giving us input on the student’s internally assessed unit grades. We then combine that with our external assessment data to award a final result. Without all the data we need, we are unable to award an overall result.

Covid certainly complicated things. This year, as well as the usual internal unit assessment data, in some cases different information was also needed. Some students have teacher assessed unit grades (U-Tags) from their studies in 2020 or 2021 where education was disrupted by lockdown, and there are others who missed whole units owing to illness and have been given special consideration grades for units they were unable to complete.

We will continue to work urgently on any missing results until resolved.

Thank you for your continued patience - our team are working closely with schools and colleges to resolve any remaining outstanding results as fast as possible. We have been releasing hundreds of results to students throughout the day today. If you haven’t already done so, please phone us on 0345 618 0440 or DM us @PearsonBTEC so we can support you directly.

If you’ve already given us your details, we will be in touch as soon as we possibly can. We may need to ask you for further information, so please check for any communications from us.

For those that have applied to university, UCAS has told us that the best thing a student can do is contact their university of choice directly, so that they know they want the offered place and can hold it. Or we are also happy to call their university to explain the situation.

We are very grateful to schools and colleges continuing to work with us tirelessly to resolve any remaining issues and get results to students as quickly as possible. Your ongoing support is much appreciated.

We are very sorry that some students are still waiting for their results. We are making progress – our team is delivering hundreds more results today and please rest assured we are here all weekend working to resolve this. But we understand how difficult it must be if you are one of the students still without your result.

We are grateful to the schools and colleges that are working with us around the clock to resolve any remaining issues and get results to students as quickly as possible. They are working tirelessly with us and their partnership is much appreciated.

BTECs are a modular qualification and in order for us to award an overall result, we require grades to be provided for each unit and a claim made to receive the qualification.

We urge any student still waiting for their results to please call us on 0345 618 0440, DM us via @PearsonBTEC on social media or via our online portal.

For those students that have applied to university, UCAS has told us that the best thing a student can do is contact their university of choice directly, so that they know they want the offered place and can hold it. But we are also happy to call their university to explain the situation.

We wanted to provide an update to you all on progress today. Although results for the majority of students have been delivered, we are very sorry that some of you are still waiting. We appreciate how difficult this must be for you.

UCAS has told us that the best thing a student can do is contact their university of choice directly, so that they know you want the offered place and ask them to hold it for you.

BTECs are a modular qualification and in order for us to award an overall result, we require unit grades and a claim to be made to receive the qualification. We are grateful to the schools and colleges who are working tirelessly with us to resolve any outstanding issues. We appreciate their partnership as we work together to get results to students as quickly as possible.

We have been resolving queries and releasing results to students throughout the day today. Please be assured we’ll be here all weekend to work on this and get more results out as soon as we can.

For anyone still waiting, please contact us on 0345 618 0440 (from 8:30am- 6:00pm), DM via @PearsonBTEC on social media or via our online portal for further support.