When to align Unit and Summary Grades
You may have experienced times when students' Unit Grade differs from their Average Unit Grade. This tends to occur because the tracker uses notional grade boundaries for each unit, while the Summary section uses overall grade boundaries for the course.
For a further explanation on why this occurs, take a look at the article below👇
While the Average Unit Grade is recommended for an accurate working-at grade, you do have the option to ensure Summary Grades match Unit Grades.
This can be useful for courses with varying unit boundaries that students might have not sat yet, and when you want to report a mock grade.
💡 Note: This option is available on all trackers apart from those using UMS conversions.
How to align Unit and Summary Grades
Within the tracker grade boundaries, School Admins and Leaders of Subject Areas have the option to select one or multiple units' boundaries to use for the Summary Unit, instead of the exam board overall boundaries.
Choose your Summary Grade Boundaries
Open Live Tracking for a class or a Year Group Overview.
Go to Tools > Change (below Grade Boundaries).
Within the pop-up, go to Choose your Summary Grade Boundaries and select Scale boundaries to selected units.
On the left side where the actual grade boundaries are listed, you'll see a tick box below the Max row. Select the box below the unit(s) you wish to use to calculate the Summary Unit grade boundaries.
Select SAVE & CLOSE to confirm. A pop-up message will appear in the bottom-left corner to flag that the tracker is updating, and again once it has finished updating.
If you return to the Grade Boundaries menu, you can see the recalculated Summary Unit grade boundaries within the Summary column.
💡 Note: Changes made to grade boundaries within a class will be activated for all classes within the year group.
Example: Scaling Summary Boundaries to Multiple Units
In GCSE Geography (Edexcel A), Mo has sat assessments for Paper 1 and Paper 2 and has achieved a Grade 6 in both, with total Scaled Average Unit Marks of 148.
If using exam board boundaries:
Because Mo is at the lower end of a Grade 6 at unit level, when their Scaled Average Unit Marks are compared against the June 2025 Summary Grade Boundaries, their Average Unit Grade comes out as a Grade 5.
If using unit 1 and 2's boundaries:
Alternatively, when selecting to scale the Summary Grade Boundaries to unit 1 and 2, both Mo's Unit and Average Unit Grade now align as a Grade 6.
💡 New Summary Boundaries are calculated using the following formula:
(sum of raw marks of selected unit(s)/ sum of total marks for selected unit(s)) x Scaled Average Unit Marks
Can I use Flexi Grade instead?
While Flexi Grade can also be used to match unit and summary grades by copying selected unit grades into a new Summary grade column, this feature allows you to continue using the Average Unit Grade, safe in the knowledge that it will match the unit grade.
Customising the Summary Grade Boundaries also keeps the Target Grid applicable, so that you can see how many marks students are from the next grade up.
You can then use Flexi Grade for other purposes, such as storing UCAS grades or college application predictions.