Mixed fortunes for Fenland schools in latest secondary school league tables

Newly published government league tables show mixed fortunes for the area's secondary schools based on last year's GCSEs.

The Thomas Clarkson Academy at Wisbech was the best performing locally achieving the highest score in the Progress 8 measure, which is used to assess how much pupils have improved during their time at the school, for the 2017/18 academic year.

The Neale-Wade Academy at March had the lowest progress score at -0.4; only Witchford Village College scored a lower progress score at -0.41.

TCA had a progress score of 0.1 - classed as average. The Sir Harry Smith Community College at Whittlesey was the only other Fenland school to have a positive progress score at 0.01.

The Cromwell's score of -0.12 was also classed as average. But the Neale-Wade's -0.4 saw it sit with 19 per cent of other school's nationally in the below average category.

But when it came to performance at GCSE it was the Cromwell which saw the highest proportion of its pupils attain the coveted grade 5 or above (the equivalent of a C/B in the old GCSE grading system) in both English and Maths with 42 per cent hitting the mark.

Once again Sir Harry Smith did well with 41 per cent attaining the grade 5 level in both. Thomas Clarkson again out-performed the Neale-Wade with 26 per cent of its pupils hitting grade 5 in both, while only 20 per cent of Neale-Wade pupils achieved the mark.

Chesterton Community College was classed as the best performing secondary school in Cambridgeshire.

The school achieved a 1.04 in the Progress 8 measure putting it in the well above average category achieved by only 17 per cent of schools in England.

It is the second consecutive year that Chesterton has been the highest-ranking school in Cambridgeshire. It had 69 per cent of pupils attain grade 5 in both English and maths.