Plashet School Examination Results Press Release 24.08.17

‘One is not born, but rather becomes a woman’ wrote the French philosopher Simone de Beauvoir in 1949. She describes how we change throughout our lives and do not lose one phase but grow into another. I feel her quote captures the essence of today for our Plashet girls as they collect their GCSE examination results and finally leave us.

Today also marks a new era for England’s examination system with the first set of revised GCSE results in English Language, English Literature and Maths. The revised GCSEs have been deliberately designed to be tougher and are awarded as grades 9 to 1. All other subjects are legacy GCSEs and therefore still awarded A* – G grades. Over the last 2 years we have managed the introduction, students and staff have worked phenomenally hard and today we come together to mark an important milestone in the lives of our students.

Plashet School’s motto is ‘working together to promote and celebrate achievement’ and this totally sums up what Plashet has done again this year as we celebrated student’s GCSE results this morning. I am delighted to announce that once again students at Plashet School have performed superbly in their GCSE examinations with large numbers of Plashet’s young women excelling. We are proud of every single one of our 264 young women and, as they move on to the next phase of their education, today is their day to celebrate 5 years of hard work, commitment and resilience”.

The core purpose of Plashet School is to ensure that young women are happy and successful. Whilst exam results are not representative of the whole experience a student has during their time at Plashet, they do provide a vital passport on to life beyond Plashet’s walls and unlock the next phase of young women’s lives. At Plashet, a truly comprehensive school, this has always been a major focus but its importance has been highlighted this year in light of recent data revealing the continuing gender gap in pay and opportunity faced by women.

Justine Greening, the Secretary of State for Education has said that “The process used by Ofqual to avoid grade inflation will ensure that broadly the same proportion of pupils achieve the grade 4 and above this summer as achieved the grade C and above last year.” We are therefore delighted with our results. To give some context to the success our young women have achieved:

Our total top grades (A*, A, 7, 8, 9) pass rate across all subjects and entries is 33% – a third of all grades therefore being the gold standard.

30 girls gained grade 9s (11 in Maths and 26 in English). Anonna Chowdhury and Katelin Dharmajan both achieved 3 world class Grade 9s in all three new examinations.

34 girls (13%) gained 8 or more GCSEs including English & Maths at the golden A*, A, 7, 8, 9 grades.

188 (71%) gained 5 or more GCSEs including English & Maths at grade C or 4 and above.

I congratulate Plashet girls on their superb success and know they would want me to recognise Plashet staff for their care, expertise and support. Finally, I would remind everyone not to compare today’s results with previous years. We are now in a new educational landscape that will take time to settle and be understood.

Rachel McGowan
Head Teacher

Plashet School