Strapline: Despite the anxiety that can surround them, there are some strategies to take (some of) the stress out of A Level Politics exams and to help you put your best foot forward. As head of Head of Politics at Brighton College Dr Adam Burns is ideally placed to know about such strategies for those studying American Politics. In this post Dr Pete Finn, University of Greenwich, summarises how Adam explains such strategies.

On February 25th 2026 Dr Adam Burns, delivered a talk entitled ‘How to ace your A Level politics exam’ at an event aimed at A Level students taking part in an essay competition run by the American Politics Group of the Political Studies Association in collaboration with the Schools Programme of the Financial Times.* As Head of Politics at Brighton College, Adam is an ideal person to provide such advice.

Below are eight key points from Adam’s talk:

1. Answer the given question

Adam noted that perhaps the biggest issue that comes up with all exam questions is a failure to actually answer the question post. Instead of trying to reframe the question, or inadvertently drifting off topic, focus on ensuring that your answer deals with the question that was posed, rather than, perhaps, the question that you were hoping for.

2. Avoid describing or narrating a topic

You may have lots of knowledge that you wish to demonstrate in the exam. However, Adam advised students to only provide information that is needed to answer the question and avoid providing information for the sake of it. Instead, make sure that you discuss examples that can be used to illustrate your argument and explore counter arguments.

3. Include recent examples (but show variety)

Remember, A Level politics examiners are particularly interested in examples from recent decades. As such, though it may at times be appropriate to provide historical details or draw a historical comparison, in general, focusing on more recent presidents is what A Level examiners are looking for. In short, more Donald Trump, Joe Biden, and Barack Obama, and less William Howard Taft. That said, Adam cautioned students to avoid only focusing on a single president or congress. Instead, he urged students to think about how material related to multiple recent administrations or congressional sessions might be drawn on to illustrate an argument or explore a topic.

4. Don’t sit on the fence: engage in evidenced argument

Adam highlighted the importance of taking an evidence-supported side within an argument. He encouraged students to provide clarity about where they are locating themselves within a debate, and why they are doing so. This argument should be introduced in your introduction and then made clear throughout your essay. Put another way, the examiner does not want to be surprised at the end. So Adam urged students to tell them their argument at the start and to stick to this argument throughout.

5. Pairing paragraphs: compare apples with apples

An important element of the A Level politics exam is to engage in comparison. However, Adam advised students to remember that they should compare related material. As such, when, for example, drawing comparisons with a particular task carried out by Congress, students should compare like for like. Fleshing this out, Adam explained that rather than comparing how Congress carries out scrutiny with its role as a representative branch of government in a single paragraph, students should explore and compare examples that illustrate the success and limitations of Congress when it comes to scrutiny alone. Then, the next paragraph would assess the success and limitations of Congress in their representative role, and so on.

6. Make clear which argument is stronger in each paragraph

Rather than just assert which side of an argument is stronger, Adam said students should explicitly make clear why one is stronger than the other. Evidence should be provided to back up the claim, and students should avoid just asserting this at the end of a paragraph.

7. Evaluation and judgement are waited heavily in mark schemes, so invest time developing it in your essay

Reflecting on reports from A Level examiners, Adam noted that many highlight that evaluation and a failure to provide logical judgments are often lacking at the expense of students providing lots of information. Cautioning against this, he urged students to remember that the more analytical elements of an essay are heavily weighted within mark schemes. As such, Adam said students should focus on demonstrating the ability to engage in evaluation and come to (evidenced) logical judgements.

8. Rank paragraphs

At the close of his talk, Adam provided an example of how students may lean into the more analytical elements of an essay. Rather than just provide a series of paragraphs that are given equal weight, Adam suggested that the students could explicitly rank paragraphs within the essay in a manner that explained to examiners the amount of weight put on any particular example or highlights that one case study (whether a particular event, a presidential administration, or particular era of the supreme court) sums up your point better than others.

*The inaugural 2025-26 FT-APG A Level Essay Competition is part of a broader A Level engagement project funded via competitive funding from the excellence and impact fund of the Political Studies Association. 

Pete Finn is a Lecturer at the University of Greenwich. He is the co-editor of The Official Record: Oversight, National Security and Democracy (Manchester University Press, 2024) and Web Team Lead of the American Politics Group of the Political Studies Association.

Adam Burns is the Head of Politics at Brighton College. He is the Schools Lead on the Executive Committee of the British Association for American Studies and co-edited the volume, Sports and the American Presidency: From Theodore Roosevelt to Donald Trump (Edinburgh University Press, 2022).