Today we are celebrating the tremendous achievements of our young people after seven years of excellence. It was lovely to welcome back many of our students this morning to DHSB to congratulate them together with their friends and family.
This has been an extremely challenging year for all of us, particularly our Year 13 students who have worked extremely hard for many years with such great determination, dedication and commitment to their studies culminating in this results day.
Although this is a unique results day, it does not take away the achievements of our wonderful students, they have worked incredibly hard to achieve these results and they deserve the recognition and rewards to progress to their next steps. It is also important to recognise the turbulent conditions that have created such uncertainty and anxiety for our students including the last minute changes and lack of clarity from the government.
I would like to convey my sincerest thanks to all of the staff who have worked tirelessly over the years to support our students, with particular note to the meticulous and robust nature of the way they have had to determine the teacher assessed grades as a replacement for the normal examinations and recognising the significant workload and emotional pressure this has put on them during the pandemic. I am extremely proud of working alongside our staff they are simply amazing.
Joe our School Captain, pictured with Sharon Davidson and Dan Roberts is off to Sheffield to study Architecture with 4A*s
Soteris pictured with his mum and dad is off to study Medicine with 3A*s
Ms Davidson, Assistant Head Post-16 said:
We hope that our students feel proud of all that they have achieved. We are certainly proud of them. The transition from GCSE to A levels is always demanding and our leavers this year, have been adaptable, resourceful and remarkably resilient despite the many challenges thrown up by the pandemic. They should be as thrilled by their evident personal strengths, skills , friendships and relationships sustained throughout their final year at school, as the academic results earned by their hard work in these complex times. Extraordinary and well deserved grades achieved by extraordinary young people!
It is important to note the difference between teacher assessed grades and normal examinations:
Grades this summer are based on Teacher Assessed Grades (TAGs). TAGs were submitted to the exam boards by the school as a holistic assessment of students’ performance in a subject, following a rigorous process of assessment, moderation and quality assurance.
These grades were then approved by the relevant exam board, following external quality assurance checks.
In some cases, the TAGs we submitted may have been reviewed by the exam board, who may have asked us to submit an alternative grade. However, any changes to the grades we submitted were done by professional teachers or reviewers; this year no grades have been changed as a result of an algorithm.
Our teachers know our students well and we were able to assess grades with a high degree of accuracy.
I would also like to convey my sincerest thanks to our parents and carers who have provided relentless support to their son/daughter over the years and in particular have had to guide them through a extremely challenging time during the last few months, together with the fantastic efforts of our young people they are celebrating an excellent set of results and most importantly the vast majority are progressing to their next exciting adventures.
We wish all of our Year 13 students every success with their next steps and we look forward to hearing from them in the future on how they are getting on.
A lovely atmosphere as students collect their results
Good luck!
You can download the JCQ Guidance for students and parents here