Best-ever A-level results at Queen Elizabeth’s School

Queen Elizabeth’s School has recorded its best-ever A-level results, with A*s making up more than four of every ten grades awarded.

The School saw widespread improvements on last year’s already-strong results. With 98% of grades at A*-B and an average points score per pupil of 504, the boys in the Upper Sixth demonstrated academic strength across the board.

Boys at QE took the Extended Project Qualification (EPQ) for the first time this year and here, too, there is success, with 26 of the 27 candidates (96%) gaining A* or A grades.

Among the individual success stories are twins Jin-Min and Jin-Xi Yuan, who amassed seven A* grades between them and have won places to read Medicine at Cambridge. They are among 24 boys with confirmed places at Oxford or Cambridge.

Neil Enright, who takes over as the School’s 40th Headmaster in September, said: “These are tremendous results by any standards. QE is emphatically a meritocracy, open to boys of ability from any social or ethnic background, and, according to Ofsted, we rank as average in England for social deprivation. It is very encouraging to see pupils from a diversity of backgrounds achieving highly.”

“We seek to provide an enriching educational experience which does far more than merely prepare pupils for examinations. By the time they become undergraduates, we aim to have helped boys discover where their academic interests lie and to have instilled in them an intellectual curiosity and a passion for their university subject.

“Our academic symposia, debating competitions and encouragement of independent research – not least through the EPQ – all contribute to this enriching experience, as indeed do the wide variety of trips that we offer and the School’s strengths in music, drama and sport. Of course, none of this would be possible without the dedication and expertise of our staff, and I know that they will justly derive great satisfaction from these results.”

Mr Enright added that close study of this year’s results reveals that the School has performed well across the breadth of the curriculum. “I was delighted, for example, to see the remarkable English results, with more than three-quarters of our A-level candidates gaining A*, while seven of our 11 Art students also achieved A*,” he said.

Economics and Mathematics were among other subjects in which performance was particularly strong, with just over 50% and 45% respectively gaining A*.

A large majority of the Year 13 boys will now go on to Russell Group universities, including 27 boys reading medicine and five studying dentistry.

Key statistics at the School, which became an Academy in September 2010, include:

• 40.98% of all A-levels were given the A*grade (up from 32.4% last year)
• 84% received A* or A (79.5% in 2010)
• 97.8% received A*-B (95.7%)
• Average points score per A-level was 124.3 (121.2).

Mr Enright added that the Year 12 AS results were also strong. A and B grades were awarded for 94.9% of examinations taken (up from 94.2% last year), while A grades accounted for 79.4% (79.1% in 2010). (There is no A* grade at AS.)

“I am delighted to become Headmaster at a time when our Sixth Form has never been stronger. At QE we take pride in sending our boys to top-flight universities already equipped with an academic curiosity and a commitment to excellence that will later enable them to contribute greatly to society,” Mr Enright concluded.

Click any of the thumbnails below to open a slideshow of photographs taken at the School on Thursday, 18th August 2011. 

How boys from state academy joined the top performers in a cast of stars, The Times

40 per cent of grades were A* in record year at Queen Elizabeth’s School, The Barnet Times

Twins get top marks at Queen Elizabeth’s, The Barnet Times