Yesterday, over a thousand students and guests gathered at Charter Hall to celebrate the success of the students who completed their studies at college in Summer 2022.

 As the Principal explained in his address to former students: 

We are tonight, recognising where students have worked and achieved, sometimes against a background of coping with difficult health, personal or domestic circumstances.  We are also recognising a number of students who did not have strong academic backgrounds at age 16, but have, through their determination and commitment, been very successful in their sixth form studies. 

 The examination successes you achieved in the summer were really excellent – by both local and national standards.  The average ‘value added’ results you achieved – the comparison between your package of GCSE results on entry and your package of results on leaving, places your collective successes very significantly above the national average levels.  The highest achieving 100 second year students last year achieved an average UCAS point score equivalent to 2 A*s and 2 A grades at A Level - and we understand that this is a higher score than the 100 highest achieving students in any school in the country, including in all selective grammar and independent schools.  

 Your levels of academic achievement were really outstanding.  Very well done to you.

(Further details on news page)

(Above: Millie Fuller finds out that she's off to Cambridge, with A* grades across the piece)

Students at The Sixth Form College, Colchester have achieved really excellent A Level results in this summer’s examination series, with grades which are well up from the strong A level results achieved by students at the College in 2019 - (The last pre-Covid year students sat ‘normal’ A Level exams) – and indeed the very high grade and high levels are above the 2020 level (which involved a Centre Award Grade (CAGs) process.)

The overall A level, and Applied General Qualification results achieved by the cohort of students this year are described by Ian MacNaughton, the College Principal, as ‘’Really excellent. Our students’ achievements are very strong and they must be very warmly congratulated for their levels of engagement, resilience and hard work in a very difficult, covid affected, two-year period. We are really impressed with how well our students and staff responded to the very difficult context and circumstances.’’

Well over 1000 of the upper sixth students from The Sixth Form College have now obtained the necessary qualifications to be able to proceed onto university degree courses including a very large cohort of students who have now achieved the grades required for offers for places on prestige degree courses including, Medicine, Veterinary Science, Dentistry, Engineering, Maths, sciences, modern foreign languages, Economics, Architecture, Law, English and History, or have achieved places at Oxford or Cambridge or Russell Group Universities or Medical Schools or for other highly competitive universities or degree courses. Other students have achieved excellent opportunities in employment and training.

The year group of nearly 1400 students who studied A level programmes  in the years 2020 -22  achieved a grade  A* to E grade pass rate of over 98%, and an A* - B high grade rate of over 50%. Indeed, well over 90% of all the 18-year-old students at the College achieved 3 or more A level or equivalent Applied General Extended Certificate qualifications in their sixth form studies – a level of achievement which once again, will be very significantly above the national average level in sixth forms at school and colleges across England and Wales. The cohort of students at the College are also believed to have achieved a strong ‘value-added’ level of achievement; this compares the students overall package of results achieved by the end of sixth form to the package of GCSE results achieved at age 16.

100% pass rates have been achieved in a large number of A level subjects including in Philosophy, Politics, German, Spanish, Italian, History of Art, Music, Electronics and Art, with virtually all other subjects achieving 98% or 99% pass rates. The average level of achievement of the College’s top 100 upper sixth students is equivalent to grades A* A* A at A level and these ‘top end’ results, it is understood, will again match or exceed the results of the top 100 student achievers in virtually all of the selective grammar or independent schools in the country.

Applied General Extended Certificate (A level Equivalent) results achieved by students at the College are also very strong, and are above 2019 levels, with a 98% pass rate and a very high grade of close to 50%. Extended Project Qualification and AS level results awarded are also very strong.

Amongst a very large cohort of students who achieved top grades are the following;

Quinn Atkins – Achieved A* grades in A levels in Biology, Sport and PE and History and also a Distinction* in Business and will now study for a degree in Politics at the University of York.

Amelia Bell – Achieved A* grades in A levels in English, History and German together with an A* in Extended Project Qualification (EPQ) and will now study for a degree in History with Foreign Languages at the University of Cambridge.

Jakub Bala – Achieved A* grades in A levels in Maths, Computing, Electronics and in an EPQ, together with an A grade in Accounting, and will now study for a degree in Computing at the University of Sheffield.

Olivia Cooper – Achieved A* grades in English, History and Drama and Theatre Studies and will study for a degree in Law at the University of Warwick.

Noah Cox – Achieved A* grades in A levels in Maths, Computing and English, together with a Distinction* grade in Information Technology, and will now study for a degree in Computing at the University of East Anglia.

Millie Fuller – Achieved A* grades in History, Classical Civilisation, Film Studies and EPQ, together with the top grade in Personal Finance Certificate, and will now study Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Cambridge.

Freddy Clarke – Achieved A* grades in Electronics, Environmental Science and EPQ, together with an A grade in Computing, and will now progress to a Degree Apprenticeship Digital Technology Solutions Programme provided by BT.

Charlotte Hinds – Achieved A* grades in A levels in Maths, Physics and Psychology, together with an A grade in Chemistry, and will now study for a degree in Chemistry at the University of Oxford.

Lucy Hinde – Achieved A* grades in A level Biology, Chemistry and Psychology and now has a place to study Veterinary Medicine at the University of Cambridge.

Elizabeth Peck – Achieved an A* and indeed the highest mark in the country awarded for the A level English Language and Literature OCR board. She also achieved an A* grade in Sociology and A in History and will now study for a degree in History and Sociology at the University of Warwick.

Florin-Andrei Petra – Achieved A* grades in Biology, Chemistry and Spanish and will study Medicine at the University of York and Hull Medical School.

Jessica Pugh – Achieved A* grades in A levels in Maths, Art and Environmental Science, together with an A* in EPQ and will now study Architecture at the University of Sheffield.

Caitlin Skinner – Achieved A* grades in A levels in Biology, Chemistry and Psychology, together with a Distinction* grade in Health and Social Care, and will now study for a degree in Chemistry and Biomedicine at Kings College, University of London.

Krzysztof Wancerski – Achieved A* grades in A levels in Maths, Physics, Computing and Product Design, together with an A grades in Further Maths, and will now study for a degree in Design Engineering at Imperial College, University of London.

Isla Watterston – Achieved A* grades in A levels in Biology, Chemistry, Psychology and EPQ and will now study for a degree in Medicine at the University of Manchester.

Please note - Now that a degree of 'stability' has started to return to the national picture for A Level, after two years of covid-related measures, we will publish a full analysis of our 2022 data online during the Autumn Term, as an update to our 2020 booklet - see sidebar left

We were delighted to hear from the exam board that student Lizzie Peck achieved the highest score IN THE COUNTRY for her English Literature and Language A Level. This is well deserved;  Lizzie is a very talented English student, and the department are absolutely delighted that her creative and perceptive engagement with texts has been rewarded and recognised by OCR.  Achieving an A* in all five examined areas, plus the coursework, well reflects Lizzie’s extremely impressive skill set, her highly refined powers of analysis, interpretation and evaluation. It is a phenomenal achievement to be awarded the accolade of OCR’s highest performing English Language and Literature student in the country!