Final year sixth formers at Sydenham High GDST have been celebrating their exam success and confirmed university places, following the release of national A level results.
Along with a hundred per cent pass rate, three quarters of the Sydenham High students achieved A*/B grades with a third securing A*/A grades. There were also celebrations for places on a wide range of courses at top universities including Cambridge, Edinburgh, Exeter, Manchester, St Andrews and York.
Amongst the highest scoring students were Rosie Cope and Elizabeth Treece who both achieved A*AA in their subjects. Rosie will be heading to Cambridge to study French. Meanwhile Elizabeth will be following her dream to be a professional dancer with a place on the theatre dance honours degree course at the London Studio Centre, including a first year scholarship.
In addition to A levels, two other high flying students, Olivia Muir and Aggie Dell, gained an A* in the Extended Project Qualification (EPQ). The EPQ allows students to pursue independent areas of study, supervised in a similar way to a university dissertation or thesis. More and more universities are therefore viewing the EPQ as an important indicator of university potential and taking it into account if an offer has not been fully met with subject grades.
Headteacher Kathryn Pullen, who was away on a school fact finding trip to set up a student exchange programme, started morning celebrations in the Sixth Form Centre with a video Skype call to congratulate the assembled girls. She said: “In perhaps the most challenging A level exam year for more than a decade, our girls have worked hard to achieve these results and we are extremely proud of them. Their resilience and determination will stand them in good stead in approaching their futures – at university and then in the world of work.”
There was further excitement with a reporter from the local paper interviewing girls and staff about the results.
There has been an anxious build-up to this year’s results for the school’s students along with their peers across the UK, following warnings of a further fall in the awarding of top grades. The 2014 cohort is also the first not to have been able to complete January retakes under the new rules.
