Best 3 A Levels and Eng/Mat Progress reports

Best 3 A Levels shows the grades behind the DfE’s best 3 A levels measure, student by student. Eng/Mat Progress shows the English and maths progress measures. They cover students who did not get grade 4 or above in GCSE English or maths by the end of KS4. Both take a figure from the Headlines report in Sisra Analytics down to the students who make it up.

Where to find them: select Best 3 A Levels or Eng/Mat Progress under STANDARD REPORTS, or on the REPORTS bar of any report. See Open the KS5 reports.

Who can see them: authority groups with View EAP KS5 Reports and View Headline Report, which Admin and User have by default.

Both need a data set published with Produce DfE-based Headlines figures on. Eng/Mat Progress also needs the students’ Prior English (Challenge Points) and Prior Maths (Challenge Points) baselines. Your administrator imports them: see Set up KS5 baselines and EAPs.

The worked examples use the demo school’s 26/27 cohort, this year’s year 13, and its Y12 Spring collection of predicted grades.

Best 3 A Levels

The measure adds up the points of each student’s three best A level grades. A student’s average is that total divided by 3, even if they fill fewer than three slots. The figure for everyone is the total for all students divided by three times the number of students. Best 3 A levels explains who is included.

Options

Option	What it does	Default
GROUP REPORT DATA BY	Groups or Students	Students
UPDATE STUDENT INCLUSION	Shows only the students included in the measure	Every student
ADD FILTER, Grade Measures tab	Narrows the report to grades included in, or left out of, Grades Included in Best 3 A Levels	None
BREAKDOWN DATA BY	Splits each row by the values of a filter. Not available at Groups	None

KS5 report tools and options describes each one.

Read the report

At Students, each row is one student:

Column	What it shows
Included in Best 3 A Levels?	Y, in light green, if the student counts in the measure under the DfE’s rules
Total Points	The points of the grades in the student’s three best A level slots
Avg Pts per Slot	Total Points ÷ 3
Avg Grade	That average as a grade
Grades	The grade in each slot, in a blue box. An empty slot is grey
Slots Filled	How many slots the student fills, up to 3
Qualification 1, Qualification 2, Qualification 3	The qualification in each slot, best first

At Groups, each row is one filter value. Its columns are Student Count, Students included in Best 3 A Levels, Average Total Points, Avg Pts per Slot, Avg Grade and Average Slots Filled.

In the demo school’s predictions, after UPDATE STUDENT INCLUSION:

• Barraclough; Abbie has A, A and B- in English literature, geography and Spanish. That is 50 + 50 + 40 = 140 points, and 140 ÷ 3 = 46.67, an A-
• Dobson; Aaron has two A levels, at A- and B+, so his third slot is empty. That is 50 + 40 = 90 points, and 90 ÷ 3 = 30.00, a C=
• across the 158 students, Average Total Points is 90.38 and Avg Pts per Slot 30.13, a C=, with 2.73 slots filled on average

The +, = and - on a predicted grade make no difference to its points: Dobson; Aaron’s A- is worth 50 and his B+ 40. He still counts in the measure with two A levels, because his third qualification is smaller than an A level.

The average divides by three, even with two slots filled.

Points to watch

Select UPDATE STUDENT INCLUSION before you quote a summary figure. Until you do, the report includes students the measure leaves out. In the demo school, the summary then shows 86.80 average total points, against 90.38 in Headlines.

AS levels, General Studies and Critical Thinking do not fill slots, and a double award A level fills two. If two grades tie for the third slot, only one of them counts.

Dividing by 3 for every student lowers the figure for students with fewer than three A levels, as in the DfE’s measure. A low average can mean a student took two A levels, not that their grades were low: check Slots Filled.

The AAB measures, in Headlines, use the same students. To list the students achieving one, select its figure in Headlines, or use the AAB section of the Student Measures tab in ADD FILTER. In the demo school’s predictions, the 11 students achieving AAB with at least two facilitating subjects average 49.39 points per entry, an A=.

Eng/Mat Progress

The measures cover students whose prior English or maths, from KS4, is worth less than 4 challenge points: below grade 4 at GCSE. A student’s progress is the challenge points of their best grade in the sixth form, minus their prior points. Any score below −1 counts as −1. English and maths progress explains the measures.

Options

Option	What it does	Default
The view	English Progress or Maths Progress	English Progress in the demo school. Your administrator can choose the other in KS5 Report Settings
GROUP REPORT DATA BY	Groups or Students	Students
UPDATE STUDENT INCLUSION	Shows only the students included in the measure	Every student
BREAKDOWN DATA BY	Splits each row by the values of a filter. Not available at Groups	None

The report opens at the GCSE / Other performance level, where GCSE resits sit.

Read the report

At Students, the Maths Progress view has these columns. English Progress has the same for English.

Column	What it shows
Included in Maths Progress?	Y if the student is in the measure
Prior Maths	The challenge points of the student’s KS4 maths result, imported by your administrator
Qualification	The maths resit qualification the student takes in the sixth form
Class	Their class for it
Grade	Their best grade in a maths resit qualification
Challenge Points	That grade’s challenge points. A GCSE grade’s challenge points equal the grade, so a grade 4 is worth 4
Maths Progress	Challenge Points minus Prior Maths, with any score below −1 counted as −1. Students in the measure with no grade still get a score. Shaded green above 0
Uncapped Maths Progress	The same without the cap, for internal use

At Groups, English Progress gives each filter value’s Student Count and Students Included in English Progress. It then gives Avg Prior English, Avg Challenge Points, Avg English Progress and Avg Uncapped English Progress.

In the demo school’s predictions, after UPDATE STUDENT INCLUSION, 15 students are in Maths Progress. All of them take Maths Resit GCSE in class 13MA-R:

• Cartmell; Tyler has Prior Maths of 3.00 and is predicted a 4: 4.00 − 3.00 = 1.00
• Fairbrother; Connor has 3.00 and is predicted a 3: 0.00
• Pollitt; Isla has 1.00 and is predicted a 1: 0.00

The summary row averages 2.40 prior points and 3.13 challenge points. So average progress is 3.13 − 2.40 = 0.73, as in Headlines. No student is below −1, so the capped and uncapped averages are both 0.73.

Progress is the resit's challenge points minus the prior points.

Points to watch

Select UPDATE STUDENT INCLUSION before you quote a summary figure. In the demo school, the Maths Progress summary shows 3.73 until you do, against 0.73 in Headlines. Students outside the measure who have maths grades are averaged in.

A student whose prior result is worth exactly 4 is not in the progress measure. Students with prior maths worth 4 or more count in the level 3 maths measure instead. It has no view of its own, and its figures are in Headlines. To list its students, use Students Included in the L3 Maths measure on the Student Measures tab of ADD FILTER.

A student in the measure without a grade scores 0 minus their prior points, capped at −1. In the demo school’s 25/26 leavers’ Exams, the resit qualifications have no grades. So every student in each measure scores −1, and Average English Progress and Average Maths Progress are both −1.00.

In its 16 to 19 consultation (April to July 2026), the DfE proposed moving the cap from −1 to −2. Its response was still awaited on 15 October 2026, so Sisra uses −1.

Related pages

• KS5 report tools and options
• Headlines and Performance Cohorts reports
• How Sisra calculates the KS5 measures
• Set up KS5 baselines and EAPs
• Student reports