SEFTON: Schools slightly behind national picture

Jan 10 2008

SCHOOLS were only slightly below the national average for their GCSE scores.

The best performing school was Merchant Taylors’ Girls’ with 97% of pupils gaining five passes including maths and English.

Last year’s second best performing school in Sefton, Merchant Taylors’ Boys’ School, plummeted 21 places.

But this was explained by the fact that most of the school’s boys have sat and passed international GCSEs which have not been taken into account, leading to the somewhat misleading figure of 22% of pupils attaining five passes at GCSE including maths and English.

The Sefton average for passes was 45.5%, compared to the national average of 46%

Hillside High School, Bootle, came 46th nationally with a value added score of 1041.7.

Last year the district outperformed the national average by about 3% for pupils passing five GCSEs, but in 2007 fell behind by 0.5%.

Despite this performance Cllr Peter Dowd, Sefton's cabinet member for children's services, said: “Our pupils and staff work very hard in the build up to the GCSE and A-level exams so it is fantastic that both of these results have improved this year. We are very proud of the commitment and effort of our pupils, teachers and support staff and our congratulations go to everyone involved.”

TOP Five Schools: 1 Merchant Taylor Girl’s Schoo, 2 St Mary’s College, 3 Streatham House School, 4 Formby High School, 5 Range High School.