THE waiting was finally over for hundreds of nervous teenagers across East Cambridgeshire as they collected their GCSE exam results on Thursday morning.
Nationwide there was a fall in the proportion of GCSE exam entries that were awarded top grades, for the second year in a row.
The proportion of exam entries graded between an A* and a C was 68.1%, down from 69.4% in 2012 and the proportion of students acheiving an A* or an A fell from 22.4% to 21.3%.
The overall pass rate also fell, for the first time to 98.8% compared to 99% last year.
Locally, Ely College were first to declare its results and the college celebrated a record year as 54 per cent of students achieved 5 A*-C GCSEs including English and maths, up from 52 per cent the previous year.
Although the college was still awaiting complete results for its overall A*-C pass rate, it was expecting to achieve at least 70 per cent.
Head teacher Catherine Jenkinson-Dix, said: “We are delighted for these students, who all worked extremely hard for the results they have collected today.
“With universities and employers saying that they consider GCSE results as a key indicator of a candidate’s potential, these students have set themselves up for future success.
“It is their hard work, together with that of all our staff, that was recognised by Ofsted in the spring when they judged us to be a good school.”
At Soham Village College, students were celebrating the school’s best ever GCSE results, with 68% students achieving at least five passes at grades A* -C including English and mathematics, the governments’ key performance measure for all schools.
The college had nearly 100 students who sat separate GCSEs in chemistry, physics and biology. Despite the much tougher grading in Science subjects this year, they achieved a high proportion of top grades, nearly half of them achieving an A* or A.
Helen Nuttall achieved a staggering 11 GCSEs with A* grades with a number of other students also achieving top grades, including April Atkinson; Lucia Amoroso; Lauren Pettit; Charlotte Mc Greavy; Hanif Osman; Torrin Cooper Bennun; Molly Gillroy; Bethany Peryer and James Walsh who achieved an average of 12 GCSEs each at A* and grade A. Soham Village College Principal, Dr Carin Taylor said: “We are absolutely delighted with this year’s results. Our students and staff have worked very hard to achieve such high standards in all curriculum areas and for students of all abilities. I should like to thank everyone whose support for our young people has paid such dividends.”
AT King’s Ely, 28% of all grades received were A*, more than half (54%) were A* or A, and more than three quarters (76%) of grades were A* to B.
Despite a warning from the government that schools should expect science results to dip, students at King’s Ely bucked national trends by improving on last year’s results. A total of 78% of chemistry students scored an A* or A as did 75% of physics students and 63% of biology students. More than half (52%) of all students scored an A* or A in Science.
Mathematics results were also up, with 43 % of all students achieving A*s, 65% scoring an A* or A, and 84% with an A* to B.
There were also many individual successes. Maddy Pinto (Mepal) achieved a remarkable 12 A*s, while Alexander Piggot (Over) received an impressive 11 A*s. Alex even managed to score 100% in his history, religious studies, biology, chemistry and physics papers.
Many students achieved all A* and A grades in every one of their chosen subjects, including Gemma Gow (Ely), Megan Laud (Witchford), William Stephens (Ely), and Christopher Le (Ely).
Principal of King’s Ely, Sue Freestone, said: “This day in August is one of the best of the year as we witness our students’ delight when they open those envelopes and discover what they have achieved.
“Many of our young people have done a fantastic job and achieved above expectation across the board. Congratulations to all involved: students, teachers and all-supportive parents.”
Some 92 per cent of pupils achieved A*-C grades, including English and maths, with 94 per cent of pupils achieved five A*-C grades in all subjects.
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