In this research, I will focus on an under-represented group of young people classified as ‘EAL’ (English as an additional language). There are 1.7 million EAL students in our secondary schools in the UK (17.1%).  These students are required to learn the majority language, English, so that they can access the curriculum; they face the double challenge of learning English while learning through English. By investigating students’ writing in GCSE exams, I aim to cut through the socioeconomic and demographic factors and to identify linguistic features that are indicative of higher grades. I will investigate exam corpora to understand what works in highly graded papers and find out the extent to which EAL students’ grades are affected by their linguistic characteristics, after controlling for socio-economic and demographic characteristics.