26 October 2007
Ministers have vowed to keep up the pressure on exam results after the latest figures showed a slight improvement in GCSE results.
Provisional statistics published by the Department for Children, Schools and Families on October 18 showed that 46.5% of school pupils achieved five A* to C GCSEs including the core subjects of English and maths – a rise of 0.7 percentage points over the previous year.
The government wants 53% of children to reach this benchmark by 2011, which would mean a doubling of the current rate of improvement.
Schools minister Jim Knight said: 'I'm impatient to go further and faster so every pupil reaches their full potential.'
There was a bigger increase in the proportion of pupils gaining five top grades in any subject – 60.3% of pupils did so this year, up from 58.5% the year before.
Knight said the overall, long-term trend was one of sustained improvement. 'We've now passed our initial target of having 60% of 15-year-olds getting five A* to Cs a year early,' he said. 'Whatever the carping from the usual doom-mongers, that means 470,000 more young people since 1997 have got a better start in life.'
Knight added that children in the most deprived local authorities were making the most progress. There was an improvement of 8.5 percentage points in Halton in Cheshire, while Salford improved its GCSE results by 7.7 percentage points.
Teaching unions were largely pleased with the results, which they said were a testament to the hard work of teachers and their pupils.
But National Union of Teachers general secretary Steve Sinnott said the achievements of less academically inclined youngsters should also be measured.
'What we don't get with such a narrow attainment measure is a picture of the successes of other young people who do not hit the magic target of five A* to Cs at GCSE,' he said.
Martin Johnson, acting deputy general secretary of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers, said the figures masked the fact that many were turned off education by the exam-focused curriculum.
'Our current system encourages proficiency at exam-taking, but gives little emphasis to acquiring the skills pupils will need to meet the challenges in their future lives,' he said.
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