Dear Charlie

Further to your FOI below comparing the information provided in response
to 3 previous FOIs the answers are provided in red below. We can only
answer an FOI based on the wording of a question that is presented to us.

Regarding Swati’s FOI:

Your statement: In your response to Swati on 9 November 2023, it was
stated that "There are 3 papers across 2 exams: 1 is the SET (Stage 1 test
paper) which has 4 components and is one hour long; the other 2 are the
Stage 2 papers which are an hour of Maths and an hour of English.  All 3
papers carry equal weighting with the scores being standardised and
aggregated to produce a final rank order."

Our response: the answer we provided, as rewritten by you above, is
exactly right.

Regarding Balakrishnan’s FOI:

Your statement: In your response to Balakrishnan on 6 November 2023, there
was a spreadsheet table with the SET score and Stage 2 scores and it said
that the SET was out of 60 and the Stage 2 was out of 200.  This gives the
impression that the total scores are marked out of 260.

Our response: Thank you for highlighting this; the total scores for the
Stage 2 elements were out of 260 in 2023. In 2023, Maths was out of 100,
English was out of 160. There is an error in the Balakrishnan data table
which states that all Stage 2 scores for 2020-2023 were out of 200; this
was the case in 2020-2022, but not in 2023. Irrespective of the raw
scores, each paper was then standardised, with the SET paper, the Stage 2
Maths paper and the Stage 2 English paper each carrying equal weighting.
This piece of information resolves several of the other questions which
you raise.

You suggest the data contradicts that given to R. Patel (below).
Balakrishan asked us for the “lowest and highest score attained by an
individual offered child”. R. Patel’s dataset is for all applicants – not
just those offered a place.

Regarding R. Patel’s FOI:

Your statement: The data released to R Patel on 6 March 2024 confuses this
further because the highest English score was 122 and the highest Maths
score was 97 and the highest SET score was 55.  So this seems to
contradict the data released to Balakrishnan.  Also, the rank order does
not follow the aggregation of the 3 scores as the no.1 ranked child's
total score was 240, but the 2nd ranked child's aggregation was 243.

Our response: this is due to the equal weighting applied across all 3
papers. If you look at the data in R. Patel’s response, child number one
(who scored 240) outperformed child number two in 2 out of the 3 papers
and so obtained a higher ranking overall. We have addressed what you
viewed as a contradiction with the Balakrishnan data in our response
above.

To answer the 4 queries from the bottom of your email:

Your section:

So, based on the above:

1. Is the data released to Balakrishnan and R Patel standardised or raw
score? Raw score for both

2. If all 3 papers carry equal weighing, shouldn't they all be indexed to
the same standardised score? They are, but this information has not been
disclosed in any previous FoI – only the raw scores. We do not disclose
standardised scores.

3. Whilst the aggregation of the two Stage 2 scores is below 200 in all
candidates in the disclosure to R Patel, this does not fit the statement
that all 3 papers are equal weighted because the English score is much
higher - why is that? As above, this is because the raw score for English
in 2023 was 160 rather than 100.

4. Why is the rank order in the data released to R Patel different to the
aggregation of the scores shown in that same table? These are the raw
scores; not the standardised scores. Aggregating the raw scores does not
yield the rank order. Only aggregating the standardised scores (which, as
above, we do not disclose) would yield the rank order.

In addition to the above, our Admissions Policy follows certain
oversubscription criteria which will supersede the usual rank order.

We trust this assists you.

Regards

St. Olave’s Grammar School

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