News
GCSE results rise for 23rd year in a row
24 Aug 2010
The GCSE pass rate rose for the 23rd year in a row, in results published today for candidates in England, Northern Ireland and Wales with 98.7% of entries being awarded A* to E. Almost seven out of ten entries were awarded a C grade or above, up 2 percentage points on last year from 67.1% to 69.1%.
22.6% of papers were graded A* and A- a rise of one percentage point in the last 12 months.
Girls are still doing better than boys. More than seven in 10 (72.6%) girls gained at least a C compared with 64.5% of boys. The gap in passes between the sexes is slightly wider than last year, when girls achieved 70.5% of passes compared with 63.6% for boys.
There has been a big rise in the number of pupils sitting English and Maths GCSE a year early. More than one in 10 pupils sit Maths at 15 or younger - up 37% on last year- and just under a tenth sit English early, up by 50% on 2009. This new trend combined with the rise in A* to C passes has prompted concerns that GCSEs may be getting easier. The Association of Teachers and Lecturers has warned that the exam system is in ‘disarray’ and that even those who achieved ‘a string of A*s’ were not well served by GCSEs.
Figures suggest that students are starting to return to tough subjects favoured by employers and leading universities mirroring a trend in last week’s A-level results.
Modern Languages continue to decline since the previous government decided that the subject would no longer be compulsory after the age of 14. Today’s results show that French and German entries were down by 5.9% and 4.5% respectively. However French is still the most popular choice with 177,618 students taking the exam this year, despite an 11,070 drop in numbers. More teenagers are also opting for other modern foreign languages - entries for Chinese are up by 5.2%, Portuguese by 9.6% and Polish by 12%.
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