Latymer Upper School students are celebrating the school’s best ever A Level results with some outstanding individual performances.

An astonishing 33% of all results were A* grades, with 75% at A* and A grades.

A significant number of students took four A Levels or more, and the average UCAS points per candidate give the equivalent of well over three A* grades per student.

Head David Goodhew says: "I congratulate the class of 2014 on their well-deserved success, and I am delighted that so many will be going to their choice of course at top universities in the UK, the US and Canada.

" I also commend their teachers, whose dedication and skill has helped to make these results possible. Nationally, there was concern that the abolition of January modules this year would limit re-sit opportunities and therefore harm results.

" At Latymer Upper, we took the decision to abandon modules and re-sits three years ago; this has given our sixth formers valuable time and space to undertake additional research or extra-curricular activities.

"Today we have achieved our best ever A level results, which shows that genuine academic excellence doesn’t depend on a treadmill of endless exams.

" The Sciences and Engineering have been particularly popular this year, especially with our girls, who have done very well in Maths and Science. Christina Alishaw achieved 4A*s with brilliant marks, averaging 96% on all papers sat and will now study Chemistry at Imperial College. Tilly Singer achieved 3 A*s and 2 As and now goes to Cambridge to study Natural Sciences.

" As usual, a number have also chosen to go to Art Schools and Drama College, winning places at prestigious institutions. Peter Thickett, who achieved 2 A*s and 2 A grades will go to Oxford to study Music with a Choral Scholarship, the fourth year in a row a Latymer pupil has won a Choral Scholarship to Oxbridge.

" A number of pupils who joined Latymer Upper School two years ago in the Sixth Form did exceptionally well, including Callum Hale Thomson, who scored full marks for every English paper he sat and is off to Cambridge to read English. Ivana Smokovic, who, like Callum, joined at Sixth Form from a state school, also achieved 3A* and an A and is going to Imperial College to study Physics."

August 20, 2014