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A remarkable 98.4% of A-levels taken at Queen Elizabeth’s School in 2015 were graded A*-B. The figure represents QE’s second-best performance ever and means that the widely recognised A*-B benchmark figure for the School has topped 98% for three of the last four years.

Almost four out of every ten A-levels taken at QE this year (39.6%) gained the very highest A* grade, compared to 36.7% last year, while 84.9% received A* or A grades (82.4% in 2014).

Congratulating the 142 Year 13 leavers, Headmaster Neil Enright said: “These superb results are a testament to the strength of character of our boys. For achievement at the very highest level, natural intelligence on its own is not enough; qualities such as grit, resilience and self-control are essential, too. These boys have been a joy to teach because they have those attributes.

“I would like to thank my inspirational colleagues for helping the pupils to cultivate such qualities; the achievement of these outstanding examination results should be seen as a by-product of that process of character development. The contribution of our teachers in gently guiding boys to discover where their academic and wider interests lie through encouraging them to take part in extra-curricular opportunities at the School must also be recognised.”

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Top State School – The Daily Telegraph, Friday 14 August 2015

Top State School – The Times, Friday 14 August 2015

Triumph for boys who thrive on competition – The Times, Friday 14 August 2015

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The extra-curricular opportunities include not only clubs and societies, but also the Extended Project Qualification (EPQ), which has been for a number of years a popular option among many QE pupils. New figures released this month show that a record number of sixth-formers nationally are thought to have taken the dissertation-based qualification this year in pursuit of university places.

Among the large number of individual success stories at QE is former School Captain, Adam Hilsenrath, who gained an A* for his EPQ project on the impact of Emperor Constantine on Roman Christianity.

Adam will be taking up a place to read History at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, this autumn, having gained A* grades in English, Maths and Politics, and an A in History. Adam has shown great character by carving out the time to play the piano, get involved in School debating and play rugby, as well as chairing the School’s Jewish Society, writing online for the Jewish Chronicle and, since 2009, running a weekly children’s service at Elstree’s Ohr Yisrael Synagogue.

Milan Kundra earned straight A*s in his four subjects, Biology, Chemistry, German and Mathematics, which not only meets the requirements for a place at Imperial College London to read Chemistry but also means he will receive Imperial’s President’s Scholarship. “The scholarship gives me £3,000 in the first year and also means I become an Ambassador for Imperial,” he says.

Milan chose to complete his EPQ on limb regeneration in urodeles (an animal grouping that includes salamanders) – a “crazy” topic that fascinates him, not least because it is so little understood. “I have always wondered why we as humans cannot regrow limbs, so studying the animals that can is really interesting.”

Looking back on his time at QE, Milan said he found it “extremely rewarding, but challenging”. He certainly threw himself into School life, taking part in clubs for badminton, science, engineering, languages and table tennis, to name just a few.

Analysis of the A-level results reveals that:

• • This year’s results are the School’s second best-ever, beaten only by the fractionally higher 98.5% of A*-B grades achieved in 2012

• • The 98.4% of A-levels gaining A* or B grades in 2015 is up 2.4% from last year’s 96%

• • There were 490 A-level entries this year, compared to 471 last year

• • Mathematics was the most popular subject, with 125 boys taking this subject, followed by Chemistry, which was taken by 73 boys.

 

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A-level results 2015: results from 400 state schools, The Telegraph Online, Monday 17 August 2015

Wait is over for A-level students at QE boys who are heading to Oxford and Cambridge, Barnet Times, Thursday 13 August 2015

Harrow students kick off the celebrations as first round of results flood in, Harrow Times, Thursday 13 August 2015

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Almost seven out of every ten GCSEs sat at QE were awarded the top A* grade, with 99.3% of examinations at the school graded A*-B.

The results are QE’s best-ever performance at GCSE. They follow last week’s excellent A-level results, which saw it ranked as the country’s top school in league tables published by The Times and Daily Telegraph.

“This has proved to be a vintage summer for our school and I congratulate both boys and their teachers on their success,” said Headmaster Neil Enright.

“Although QE is a competitive academic environment, it is emphatically not an ‘exam factory’. We strongly encourage our boys to take advantage of the abundant extra-curricular opportunities we offer so that they explore their interests both academically and in areas such as sport and the arts.

“We also place a high value on helping boys develop character attributes such as self-control, empathy and optimism, laying early the foundation for success in later life.”

The 1,201 A* grades at the school represent 67.8% of the total – 4.5% up on 2014 and the fourth consecutive year in which the proportion has topped 60%. More than a fifth of boys achieved straight A*s across their GCSEs.

All 179 boys in Year 11 achieved at least five GCSEs at grades A*-C. In total, 99.4% of QE boys achieved the Government’s benchmark English Baccalaureate (Ebacc) measure, which requires a grade C or above in English, Mathematics, History or Geography, Science and a foreign language. In June, the Government announced that all pupils starting Year 7 this year will have to take the Ebacc subjects when they reach their GCSEs in 2020.

Amid strong performances by all the departments, the results for Mathematics, the sciences and Geography were truly exceptional:

• • Mathematics was taken by all boys and passed at A* by 170 of them, or 95%

• • A high proportion of QE boys take three individual sciences. For both Biology and Physics, 98.3%, or 117 pupils, achieved A*, while 96.6% of Chemistry GCSEs (115 boys) were graded A*

• • Eighty-two of the 99 geographers, or 83%, achieved the top starred grade.

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Teenagers celebrate GCSE success across Barnet, Barnet Times, Thursday 20 Augus 2015

Top Boys’ State School – The Times, Friday 21 August 2015

Top Boys’ State School for % A*-A – The Daily Telegraph, Friday 21 August 2015

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A QE team has won a national award for its efforts in raising awareness of a charity’s education work in the developing world.

The Year 9 team, named Be the Change, triumphed in the Community Action category in The Wings of Hope Achievement Awards (WOHAA) and were presented with their award at a ceremony at the Royal College of Surgeons, London.

The six boys arranged events including book sales at Queensmead School, Barham Primary School and London Tamil Market. They raised £1,295 and increased awareness of the work of Wings of Hope to improve educational facilities in two schools in India and Malawi.

They had previously given a presentation at the House of Lords to a panel of judges who included actor Sir David Jason as well as Old Elizabethan Christopher Sandamas (1978-1983), Chief Clerk in the Private Secretary’s Office at the Royal Household.

Teacher and extra-curricular enrichment tutor Martin Bassett-Jones said: “These boys have shown determination and perseverance, despite busy school schedules, to raise awareness for WOHAA. The success they have had is down to their own initiative and they have considerably developed their skills in communication and working. The events they have organised have been varied but all have been successful in raising funds and awareness.”

The six boys were: Shiva Pingle; Vikrant Rasalingam;  Sujen Ravindra; Eshan Patel; Michael Levitt and Rohan Rangra.

Nearly 300 guests attended the awards ceremony at the prestigious venue, including teachers, parents and students. Co-founders Dr Sri Ram and Mrs Rajni Sriram gave inspirational speeches about the Wings of Hope’s vision as it enters its tenth year. Over 25,000 students from more than 400 schools have taken part in the awards since 200, which are open to pupils from Year 9-13.

Winners and runners-up were treated to an Oscars-style evening, with trophies, video montages of their work and on-stage photographs. Trophies were presented by VIPs including BBC TV newsreader Babita Sharma, Neil Roskilly, CEO of the Independent Schools Association, and Dawn Butler MP.

In their press release on the awards, the charity highlighted the “stellar robot-esque breakdancing performance” given by Year 10 QE boy Abhinav Vudathu, who was a member of a previous QE team which reached the awards semi-finals.

Two QE boys battled it out to become the London schools U13 table tennis champion.

Year 8 pupil Zaiim Premji emerged as boys’ champion for his age group after overcoming classmate Jamie Watkin–Rees in the final of the Jack Petchey London Schools’ Table Tennis individual finals at the University of East London’s SportsDock.

Zaiim did not drop a set in the whole competition, but the final was nevertheless close; he beat Jamie 11-9, 11-9, 13-11.

Interviewed by Table Tennis England’s Paul Stimpson after taking his first title, Zaiim said: “I feel really pleased because I haven’t won it before and I think I had some really good competition.

“It’s always hard when you play someone from the same school, and we train at the same club as well (Urban).”

He was congratulated by Mr Petchey, a London entrepreneur and philanthropist, who posed for photos with all the winners and runners-up.

Urban Table Tennis Club operates at a number of different venues and schools within Barnet and South West Hertfordshire and visits QE to run master-classes.

Two QE debaters have been asked to attend future international sessions of a prestigious debating competition.

School Captain Norbert Sobolak and fellow Year 13 pupil Sahil Handa received the request from the lead juror after performing strongly in the four-day national final of the European Youth Parliament competition in Liverpool.

The pair were members of the nine-strong Year 12 team who took part in the final with around 130 delegates from other schools. The QE team had reached this stage by overcoming strong opposition in the regional final.

In the national final, each student delegate from every school was put in a committee group with 9-11 other students from other schools. This group then represented one committee of the EU Parliament, such as the Committee for Civil Liberties and Justice or that for Foreign Affairs.

On arrival, the students took part in a series of activities and games to get to know their new team mates. Then on the evening of the first day, each team represented a country at the Eurovillage Food Fair, while auditions also took place for the Euroconcert taking place the following evening.

On the first full day, pupils spent the time engaging in committee work, which was centred around writing resolutions on European affairs to do with their committee.

Pupils attended the EYP General Assembly on the following day, where they defended and debated the resolutions they had spent the previous day preparing.

Two private schools – Howell’s School and Warwick School – were selected to represent the UK at an international session of EYP in Belfast and Dublin next year.

Although the team were disappointed not to reach the international session, they enjoyed taking part in the competition and gaining a flavour of university life through staying at the Liverpool Hope University campus.

Besides Sahil and Norbert, the QE team comprised Ali Humayun, Calum Johnson, Jun Ming Shik, Raj Singh, Pranesh Varadarajan, Jason Yau and Ryun Pang.