Cobham Hall students are today celebrating a wealth of superb GCSE grades – some of the best in the School’s recent history.
Our students’ performance is truly outstanding given the return this year to pre-pandemic grading, which has taken standards back to 2019 levels and stripped out an anticipated 300,000 top grades (7-9) across the UK compared with 2022. Counter to this national picture, at Cobham Hall, 43% of all grades achieved reached the exceptional 7-9 band (A*/A in the previous system) – almost double the 22% rate achieved across England, broadly in line with our performance last year and considerably higher than in pre-Covid 2019 when the figure was 36%.
At the very highest level, the achievement is even more impressive. An exceptional 29% of all grades this year fell in the 9-8 band (broadly equivalent to A* in the previous system) – astonishingly, this is not only up on last year’s position by 5 points, but almost double the level attained before grade inflation in 2019. Moreover, 13% of all grades met the ultimate gold standard – 9 – up from 8% in 2022 and 4% in pre-Covid 2019.
These fine results saw half of all our students achieve an average grade of 6 or higher, while a quarter averaged an exceptional 7 or more.
Performances in science were particularly strong – as they were, indeed, in the A Level results announced last week. In Physics, two-thirds of grades met the 7-9 exceptional benchmark; in Chemistry, this figure rises to 73%, and in Biology, to an outstanding 80%.
Among many individual student successes, special congratulations go to:
- Yuliia, who achieved an outstanding clean sweep of eight 8-9 grades (9;9;9;9;9;9;8;8)
- Nattakarn, likewise achieving 8-9 in all seven of her subjects (9;9;9;9;9;9;8)
- Amy, whose grades include one grade 9, six grade 8s and two grade 7s
- Poppy, scoring 9-6 (A*- B) in every subject, including three at grade 9, two at grade 8 and two at grade 7
- Panru, whose fine results include five grade 8s.
Headmistress Mrs Barrett said: “These results are truly exceptional. We are immensely proud of those students who have achieved such stellar results, and I send my heartfelt congratulations to them all. That they have done so while playing such a full and active part in school life – on stage, in our sports teams, in clubs, on expedition and helping in our local community – is remarkable. But Cobham Hall is not a selective school. Among this cohort are students whose grades may not have reached the very top bands, but are more than they ever dreamed possible, and have been achieved sometimes despite enormous life challenges. I am equally proud of every one of them.
I must also flag the outstanding performance of Yuliia and Anna, two of four Ukrainian students to whom we were delighted to offer fully supported places at Cobham Hall after their families fled the war in their homeland, and who today – after only one year of study with us – have achieved eight and seven GCSEs respectively, Yuliia having earned only the highest grades in every exam taken. To have excelled in this way against a background of such trauma and disruption is truly humbling.
As Head, it is a delight to receive such wonderful news a week after excellent A Level grades saw every single one of our students gain places at top universities – 90% at their first choice. I am immensely grateful to the staff who have supported all our students in the best possible way at every stage, and whose dedication shines through in every grade.”