Islington Tribune - News: Exam results: We're bottom

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Islington Tribune - by PETER GRUNER
Published: 4 April 2008

Exam results: We’re bottom

Town Hall accused of ‘failing pupils’

EDUCATION chiefs have been accused of “failing pupils” after it emerged that exam results in Islington are the worst in the country when GCSEs are combined with vocational qualifications.
Although GCSE results for grades A* to C improved by 2.3 per cent last year, the borough comes bottom of the league – in 149th position – when vocational courses are also taken into account.
Lib Dem education chief Councillor Ursula Woolley has admitted: “There were no local authorities/councils in England ranked lower than Islington for average points score per student at GCSE and equivalent in 2007.”
Labour’s children services councillor, Richard Watts, claimed: “These figures show Islington Council is failing its pupils. It’s a huge disappointment to parents that, despite millions of pounds of extra money for boroughs like Islington in recent years, they are still failing our kids.”
Cllr Woolley said Islington schools were higher up the table for pupils who had passed GCSEs in English and maths.
She said: “Cllr Watts has chosen the indicator where we came out bottom. We made a conscious decision to work with children to get maths and English GCSEs. For these, we were some way off the bottom.
“It’s really important to me as a parent that my children get their maths and English.
“Getting good grades is important but you need maths and English as a baseline.”

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