Anxious wait finally over

Holly Richardson, Harvey Jones, Eleanor Prince, Zac Keane

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THE waiting is over for Oldham students who received their A-level results today.

Schools across the country opened their doors early for almost 300,000 teenagers to receive their grades.

Students could also log on to UCAS (University and Colleges Admissions Service) website from 8am to see if they had done well enough to secure their university places.

Some schools were preparing for worse results than last year after reforms to A-levels. As part of these, students can no longer sit papers in January and then do re-sits, with all exams taken in the summer.

The overall pass rate fell for the first time in more than 30 years, down by 0.1 per cent to 98per cent.

But the proportion of top A* grades handed out rose to 8.2 per cent.

The overall pass rate at both Oldham Sixth-Form College and Hulme Grammar School is 99 per cent.

Celebrating

Blue Coat school is celebrating its best ever results with 60 per cent of papers awarded an A*, A or B.

Five of its students are off to study at Oxford and Cambridge and head teacher Julie Hollis said: “These results reflect the hard work shown by our students this year.

“They really are a focused and ambitions group of young people who constantly impress us with their dedications.”

Over a third of pupils at North Chadderton school got an A* , A or B grade.

The number of pupils getting three or more A-levels has increased by 8 per cent and head teacher Joy Clark said: “We are absolutely delighted that the A-level exam results reflect the continued journey of success at the school.

Record numbers of students are heading to university this year, with almost 400,000 accepted on degree courses already.

Universities are being allowed to expand to take in as many students as they want with at least an A and two grade B passes. At the same time, the number of university places has gone up by 30,000.

The increase means that more students are likely to be accepted onto their first-choice course even if their grades are slightly lower than universities expected.

Available

The number of courses available in clearing — which matches students who did not get the required grades for their courses with available places — has increased

And universities are also encouraging students who got better grades than expected to “trade up” to a better course or more prestigious institution.