A-Level Grades for 2016

The results of the A-level exams have been released and it is interesting to observe the latest trends following the introduction of the new AS and A-Level system. This year marks the first year for the de-coupled AS-levels, which are now standalone one-year courses instead of the first module of a two-year A-level.

From the recent article posted by The Guardian newspaper, the key findings from the results this year are as follows:

• Proportion of students receiving A or A* grades fell from 27% in 2011 to 25.8% in 2016. There has been a slight reduction (from 25.9%) achieved in 2015.
• In particular, the gap between boys and girls achieving the top A* grades narrowed, with male students gaining 8.5% of the grade compared to 7.7% for female students.
• The overall pass-rate of the exams has been the same as last year, at 98.1%, albeit with a slight reduction in students achieving the top grade.
• Maths was the most popular subject for the second year in a row, ahead of English.
• Entries in modern languages has continued to fall, with numbers taking French down 6%. However, the percentage of students receiving A* grades in languages has increased with a 0.7% increase in students achieving the grade in the French language.
• There has been a large reduction in students taking up subjects such as music and art and design, with a 8.8% reduction in students taking A-level music and a 33% drop in students taking art and design at AS-level.
• UCAS has placed 242,000 students in higher education on results day, up by 3% from last year which is the highest number of students placed on the A-level results day.

Moreover, the Telegraph newspaper has summarised the A-level results from 320 state schools across the country with the top 10 highest ranked being shown in the table below:

Rank

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

School

Queen Elizabeth’s

Henrietta Barnett

Tiffin Girls’

Wilson’s

King’s Coll London Maths

St Olave’s Grammar

Dartford Grammar

Pate’s Grammar

Altrincham Gram. for Girls

Colyton Grammar

 

Location

Hertfordshire

London

Surrey

Surrey

London

Kent

Kent

Gloucestershire

Cheshire

Devon

 

Entries

518

389

483

491

209

750

1632

730

521

401

 

Type

G

G

G

G

G

G

G

G

G

G

 

Gender

B

G

G

B

M

M

M

M

G

M

 

% Achieve A*, A or B

98.84

95.89

95.65

94.91

94.74

94

90.5

90.41

90.4

90.02

Further information regarding this article can be found on the web-links below:

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2016/aug/18/a-level-results-show-another-drop-in-a-and-a-grade-students

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/2016/08/19/a-level-results-2016-results-from-300-state-schools/