THERE were plenty of cheers among the school leavers of East Cambridgeshire on Thursday as GCSE results were revealed.

Ely College

At the City of Ely College an impressive 74 per cent of students achieved five or more grades at A*-C, maintaining the improvement seen last year. The results constituted a 10 per cent increase in the number of students achieving at least three or more grades at A*-A; with a third of students achieving the benchmark overall.

Rachel Hope and Trudy McManus were among the top achievers at Ely, with both youngsters scoring 12 GCSEs at grades A* and A.

Sixteen-year-old Rachel Everett was among the first to open her envelope at the school and was delighted with her haul of six As, three Bs and two Cs. The Ely pupil will now go on to Ely Sixth Form College where she hopes to study to be a primary school teacher.

Principal Catherine Jenkinson, said: “These are great results for our students and my staff and I would like to congratulate them. We are also pleased to see the improvement in the achievement of the highest grades, which indicate a significant improvement in outcomes for our most able students.”

Soham Village College

Soham Village College maintained its high standards of performance in GCSE examinations with 63 per cent of students at the college achieving five A*-C passes including both mathematics and English and more than 70 per cent of students achieving passes in each of English, mathematics and science.

Liam Harlow, 16, and Ashley Pettit, 16, led the way at the college, collecting nine A* grades each.

Liam said: “It has taken a lot of hard work but I’m very pleased with my results. I did a lot of revision in the run up to my exams, at one stage even my mum told me to stop!” Liam is planning to go to Hills Road College in Cambridge and hopes to go on to university.

Elisa Pike, who achieved 8 A* grades, said: “I was very pleased and my mum and dad were delighted when I phoned them.” Sixteen-year-old Elisa will go on to study French and sociology at Hills Road College.

Principal, Dr Carin Taylor said

“There was a very pleasing increase in the number of GCSE passes at A and A*this year. Particular congratulations to Liam Harlow and Ashley Pettit who each achieved 9 A* grades. Heidi Fitchett, Elisa Pike and Alfie Mackie achieved 8 A* passes. John Smeaton, Emma Lowe ;Freya Taday; Louise Doughty; Matthew Cooke; Abigail Manley, Theo Ronay and Ben Elgar each achieved five or more A* passes this summer.”

Witchford Village College

At Witchford Village College, an excellent 72 per cent of pupils scored five or more A*-C grades, with a total of 49 per cent of students achieving five or more A*-C grades including English and maths.

Principal David Taylor, said: “This represents a great result for the students in this particular year group. There were far more vocationally inclined students in last year’s Year 11 compared to the other year groups currently in the college, and to the groups that have left in recent years.

“The students worked hard to achieve their results, and there were many notable successes for both the vocationally and academically inclined students.”

Kirsty Braybrooke, 16, from Witchford, was among the first to collect her results and did well enough to secure her place at Long Road College in Cambridge to study for a business diploma.

King’s School, Ely

There were double celebrations for King’s Ely students, twins Charlotte and Sophie Emms who each celebrated 10 A* GCSE passes, emulating the success of their elder sister, Holly, who achieved 10 A* passes when she in Year 11 at King’s in 2009.

The region’s oldest independent school recorded another set of excellent results this year with 51 per cent of all exams graded A* or A and 80 per cent graded A*-B.

Ninety-eight per cent of all pupils achieved five or more GCSEs at A*-C.

As well as being A* students, Charlotte Emms is a talented dancer who last year was awarded a coveted place with the DanceEast Academy, and Sophie is a member of Ely Cathedral Girls’ Choir.

Other top achievers included Luke Cave who got A* passes in 11 subjects and Leo Banahan with A* passes in ten.

Sue Freestone, the Head of King’s, said: “It is one of the best parts of the job to see the reaction of young people when they receive their GCSE results. It is a moment of personal validation and one that marks the culmination of their educational journey, their personal commitment to their own education and is just reward to our students and the teachers who have encouraged them to believe in themselves.”