SQA or Qualifications Scotland? What changed for your Highers

If you have noticed that some Higher Biology resources say SQA and others say Qualifications Scotland, you are not missing anything. The organisation changed its name and most of the internet has not caught up.

01What actually happened

On 1 February 2026, Qualifications Scotland replaced the Scottish Qualifications Authority as Scotland's national awarding body. It sets and marks your exams, publishes course specifications and marking instructions, and issues your certificate.

The qualification itself did not change name. You are still sitting a Higher. Your certificate still says Higher Biology.

02Are old SQA past papers still valid?

Yes. Every past paper, marking instruction and understanding standards document published under the SQA name is still valid, because the course content did not restart. A 2023 SQA past paper is exactly as useful as it was in 2025.

The one thing to watch is the exam structure. Higher Biology moved from two question papers to a single paper, so old papers are still valid biology but not a rehearsal of the current format.

03Which term should you search for?

Search both. "SQA Higher Biology past papers" still returns more results than the Qualifications Scotland equivalent, because most revision sites, teacher blogs and forum posts were written before the change. Anything hosted on the official Qualifications Scotland site is the authoritative version.

04Does this change your grades, appeals or results day?

No. Grade boundaries are still set after marking each year, results are still issued in early August, and the appeals service still runs for a short window after results day. Only the name on the letterhead changed.

05What it means for revision resources

Treat any page that talks confidently about Higher Biology without mentioning either the awarding body change or the single-paper exam structure with some caution. It is a good sign the page has not been updated in a while, and out-of-date structural information is the one thing that can genuinely cost you marks.