Press Release

Date: Thursday 24 August 2006 (NR/24/06)

Northern Ireland Students still top of the class at GCSE

The Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment (CCEA) has published Northern Ireland GCSE examination performance figures on behalf of all the exam bodies operating here.

The key points are as follows:

Northern Ireland pupils have consolidated the strong performances of recent years with modest rises across the grades.
Northern Ireland pupils outperform their peers in England and Wales
GCSE entries have fallen for the second year in succession.

Performance

Northern Ireland has maintained its place as the top performing GCSE region but there has been a slowing down in the rate at which grades are rising.

In 2006 the percentage of entries gaining an A* to A grade has risen by 0.3% to 24.3%. The equivalent national figure is 19.1%. Entries gaining grades A* to C also rose slightly this year from 71% to 71.7%. The national equivalent stands at 62.4%.

Entries

GCSE entries have dropped again in 2006 but not as dramatically as in 2005. This summer saw the Northern Ireland entry fall from 198,891 to 195,530, a drop of 3,361 or 1.7% of the entry. Although the majority of this fall appears to be due to students pursuing alternative courses at 16, particularly Applied (work related) GCSEs, part may also be down to the falling school population at Year 12.

Nationally GCSE entries rose this year by 0.3% to 5,752,152

Most (almost 94,000) of Northern Ireland GCSE entries are in the core areas of English, Mathematics and the sciences.

This year has seen significant rises in subjects such as PE, up by 247 entries to 3608 and ICT, up 243 entries to 5,863. Notable declines were seen in Geography, down by more than 600 entries to 8211 and in French, down 580 entries to 10,857.

Gender

Girls continue to hold the upper hand at GCSE , but as at A Level the gender performance gap continues to narrow. In particular at grades A* to C, boys closed the gap by almost 2% from 8.9% of a difference in 2005 to 7.1% this year.

Commenting on the Northern Ireland performance figures, CCEA Director of Operations Neil Anderson commented:

“This is a very sound performance from our GCSE students. They can be very proud. Of particular note is that our pupils outperform their English and Welsh peers in key areas such as English, Mathematics and the sciences.

Whilst we have seen a drop in the numbers taking traditional GCSEs there has been a rise of almost 2,500 in numbers taking the new Applied GCSE courses. While the numbers overall are still small it marks steady progress in our work to ensure there are a range of relevant and challenging pathways for all pupils at 16.

We are very pleased to see the growth in numbers now taking CCEA’s pilot GCSE in Learning for Life and Work. Entries have more than doubled this year, rising to more than 4,000 in 2006.”

GCSE Short Course

GCSE courses have half the course content and are worth half of a full GCSE. In 2006 entry numbers increased from 6003 to 6138 (an increase of 2.2%).

This year, there was a 0.1% increase at A* from 12.1% to 12.2% Grades A*-A show a 1.2% decrease to 25.9%. Grades A* - C decreased by 4.3% to 59.5%. There was a 0.2% increase in grades A* - G to 87.9%.

GCSE Applied Courses

These are relatively new qualifications available as both single and double award courses. Awards in these courses were first made in June 2004.

Entries in Single Award rose this year from 2,121 in 2005 to 4,684 in 2006. Performance at A* to C rose from 44.9% of entries to 50.4%.

Entries in Double Award have fallen from 1,329 in 2005 to 1,185 in 2006. There has also been a very marginal drop in performance at A*A* to CC from 52.5 to 52.1 % of entries.

GCSE Full Course - Headline performance figures 2006 (2005 figures in brackets)

Entry numbers decreased from 198891 to 195530 (a decrease of 3361 or -1.7%)

This year, there was an increase at A* from 7.5% to 7.8%. Grades A*-A show a 0.3% increase to 24.3%. Grades A* - C increased by 0.7% to 71.7%. There was a 0.1% increase in grades A* - G to 97.9%.

Girls outperform boys at A* by 3.2% (2005- 3.4%), at A* - A by 7.7 %( 2005 – 7.8%), at A* - C by 7.1% (2005 - 8.9%), and at A* - G by 0.8 %.( 2005- 1.1%)

2006 prov	Overall
	NI	UK
%A*	7.8 (7.5 )	6.3 (5.9)
*%A - A**	24.3 (24.0)	19.1 (18.4)
*%A - C**	71.7 (71.0)	62.4 (61.2)
*%A - G**	97.9 (97.8)	98.1 (97.8)
Entries	195,530 (198,891)	5,752,152 (5,736,505)

GCSE Full Course - Results broken down by gender

2006 prov	Boys		Girls
	NI	UK	NI	UK
%A*	6.2	5.3	9.4	7.3
*%A - A**	20.3	16.4	28.0	21.8
*%A - C**	68.0	58.5	75.1	66.2
*%A - G**	97.5	97.7	98.3	98.4

GCSE Short Course Results 2006

2006 prov	Overall
	NI	UK
%A*	12.2	4.3
*%A - A**	25.9	14.7
*%A - C**	59.5	51.5
*%A - G**	87.9	95.5

Media enquiries to Ruth Maguire on (028) 9026 1216, Mobile 07796947993. E mail rhmaguire@ccea.org.uk

ENDS

Note to Editors

CCEA is the Northern Ireland Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment.

CCEA places learners and those who have a concern for their educational and personal development at the forefront of its thinking. CCEA's mission is:
"To enable the full potential of all learners to be achieved and recognised"

What we do

CCEA is a unique educational body in the UK , bringing together the three areas of curriculum, examinations and assessment.

Advising Government – on what should be taught in Northern Ireland ’s schools and colleges.

Monitoring Standards – ensuring that the qualifications and examinations offered by awarding bodies in Northern Ireland are of an appropriate quality and standard.

Awarding Qualifications

– as Northern Ireland’s leading awarding body we offer a diverse range of qualifications, such as GCSEs, including the new GCSE Double Award specifications in vocational subjects, GCE A and AS levels, Entry Level Qualifications, and Graded Objectives in Modern Languages.

- CCEA also offers a range of Awards and Certificates in Education, Training and Skills (ACETS) targeted at learners who want to get
the knowledge, understanding and skills needed
to hit the ground running in the world of work.