🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Exam board
SQA revision,
with a team behind it
Scottish Qualifications Authority
Scotland's national qualifications — National 5, Higher and Advanced Higher, on their own calendar.
Scotland runs a separate system from the rest of the UK. There is one national specification per subject per level rather than competing boards, and the shape of the school career is different: a broad set of National 5s, then Highers, which are what Scottish universities actually make offers on.
SQA at a glance
- Qualifications
- National 3, 4 and 5 · Higher · Advanced Higher · Scottish Baccalaureate · National Progression Awards
- Grading
- A to D with bands 1 to 7 underneath, plus No Award. Band 1 is the top of an A.
- Exam series
- Exam diet runs from late April into early June — earlier than the English timetable.
- Results
- Results are issued in early August, ahead of GCSE and A-Level results.
Worth knowing about SQA
The specifics below are the ones that change how you should plan. Always check the current specification with your school or the awarding body — specifications get revised, and the version you are entered for is the one that counts.
Five Highers in S5 is a heavy but common load, and because universities make offers on them, S5 carries more weight in Scotland than Year 12 does in England.
The exam diet starts in late April, so the Easter break is effectively the last clear revision window rather than a mid-run breather.
Band numbers matter beyond the letter grade: a band 1 and a band 2 are both an A, but competitive courses sometimes look at the detail.
Advanced Higher includes substantial project or dissertation work in several subjects, assessed alongside the written paper.
Coursework and assignment components are submitted well before the diet, which means two deadlines to plan around, not one.
What each teacher does for SQA
All eight are AI, and we say so plainly. What is real is the output: sessions in your calendar, sources in your book, citations checked, cards queued until you can recall them cold.
Daniel · Study planner
Takes your SQA subjects and works backwards from the real timetable. Exam diet runs from late April into early June — earlier than the English timetable. Sessions land in your calendar as real events with reminders, and the plan adjusts when a week goes wrong.
Sarah · Subject tutor
Explains at the depth SQA actually assesses, with worked examples, then asks the questions that check you have understood rather than just followed along.
Tommy · Quizzer
Turns each concept you get into a spaced-repetition card and brings it back at widening intervals until you can produce it cold. A to D with bands 1 to 7 underneath, plus No Award. Band 1 is the top of an A. Most of the gap between where you are and where you want to be is recall under pressure, not understanding.
Margaret · Librarian
Finds sources, summarises them at three depths, imports them into your subject book and formats the citations in MLA, APA, Chicago or Harvard.
Eleanor · Writing coach
Reads your extended answers and essays for structure and argument, and shows you where a marker stops following you — without rewriting it for you.
Charles · Citation checker
Checks every in-text citation points at a real entry in your bibliography, and flags the ones that do not before a marker does.
Penny · Proofreader
Catches grammar, spelling, and the sentences that technically parse but will not survive a tired examiner.
Sam · Accountability
Tracks what you actually did against what the plan said, and tells you early when SQA preparation has slipped far enough to need a different plan rather than more willpower.
Subjects students bring us
These are the SQA subjects we see most. The teachers are not limited to them — if you are sitting something rarer, tell them during onboarding and the plan covers it the same way.
- Maths
- Applications of Mathematics
- English
- Biology
- Human Biology
- Chemistry
- Physics
- History
- Modern Studies
- Geography
- Business Management
- Computing Science
- Gàidhlig
SQA: fair questions
Do you cover National 5 and Higher?
Yes, along with Advanced Higher. The Scottish calendar is built in — Daniel plans back from an exam diet that starts in late April, not the mid-May English start, which is the single most common planning mistake Scottish students make when they use generic revision tools.
How should I plan five Highers at once?
By protecting the weakest two. Five subjects examined in one diet is where flat, even revision fails — Daniel weights sessions towards the subjects where your recall data is worst, and Sam tells you honestly when the plan has stopped being realistic.
What about the Advanced Higher project?
It has its own deadline, usually well before the written diet, so it needs a parallel plan. Margaret helps with sources, Eleanor reviews structure and argument, and Charles checks the referencing — the write-up is yours to produce.
Other boards in United Kingdom
AQA
The largest GCSE and A-Level board in England, used by around half of all entries.
Pearson Edexcel
GCSEs, A-Levels, International GCSEs and the BTEC vocational route, all under one board.
OCR
Strong in Computer Science, Classics, PE and the sciences, with a distinctive question style.
WJEC & Eduqas
The Welsh awarding body, sitting Made-for-Wales GCSEs in Wales and Eduqas specifications in England.
CCEA
Northern Ireland's awarding body, with its own GCSE grading scale including a C* grade.
Start your SQA plan today.
Seven days free, no credit card. Ninety seconds of onboarding and Daniel has your SQA subjects, your exam dates and a week you can actually follow.
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