GCSE English Results

As set out in our prospectus the Academies Enterprise Trust is committed to the following key aspects of our work:

1. Our ambition is to ensure that our students have every opportunity to fulfil their potential, broaden their horizons and become active, prosperous and successful citizens in the world around them.
2. We want to ensure that each and every one of us working in and across the AET academies is held to account to maintain and continually improve what we do for the benefit of all and to maximise educational opportunity for all.
3. We are committed to doing everything we can to ensure that our students can, in the future, compete on the world stage with the skills, confidence and flair to generate new ideas and new initiatives, and thereby make a full contribution to today and tomorrow’s worlds.

Our Mission Statement clearly states we ‘Will Inspire young people to make their best better’ and to this end we have challenge, support, monitor and intervene each and every one of our academies to ensure they are giving every young person the opportunities to succeed and fulfil their potential. In recent years the majority of our academies whether they be primary, special schools or secondary have seen significant improvement in their external examinations results. This year alone we have seen a further 2% improvement in the 5 A*-C including English and Maths GCSE results across out academies and a 7% improvement in 5 A*-C grades. This means that on average across all our secondary academies 48% of students achieve 5 or more A*-C grades including English and Maths, 8% above the government’s stated ‘floor targets.’

Whilst we are delighted that so many of our students have enjoyed considerable success this year, any celebrations have been muted by the unnecessary and unfair adjustment to the English Language Controlled Assessment grade boundary made by the examination boards. This has resulted in a two-tier English examination system with those students fortunate enough to take the examination early in June 2011 or January 2012 being assessed using a lower grade boundary to those who sat the examination in June 2012.

This action by the examination boards if proven to be factually correct is unfair, unjust and may well be in breach of the Equalities Act 2010. The AET will continue to fight in every way that it can to ensure that every one of our students it treated fairly, equitably and equally. These young people and their teachers have worked tirelessly in the belief that they were succeeding and we call on the examination boards to reinstate the grade boundaries used in January 2012 and to apply them to all students who took the examination in June 2012.