New Hall, Essex - poor 2023 A level results

[AvigileN]

Hi,

We are considering either Brentwood or New Hall for our child next year and have been looking at recent and past results. Bizarrely, this year New Hall A level results at grade 7-9, have been significantly lower than previous years. (12% attained this grade, and before this it was well over 50% year on year). Brentwood 2023 stands at 41% attainment. Does anyone have inside information as to why this happened or any insight into how the schools compare? thank you

Most schools were lower this year because they increased the boundaries of the marking to pre covid levels

So students who got an A would have got an A star had they taken the exam last year or those that got C would have got a B last year

This grades are for GCSE rather than A Level. I know that New Hall loses students at various stages to the local grammar schools which can have an impact. And it isn't as academically selective as some of the other Essex schools.

Looking at the school's results page, it's very easy to get confused as to whether they are talking about A-levels or GCSEs as they've mixed the two in together.

However looking at the Astar to A figures for A-level, it's
2019 51%
2020 65%
2021 75%
2022 57%
2023 37% (12% is just Astars)

The comparison should be with 2019, as nationally the results awarded returned to 2019 levels this year. 2020/21/22 are higher as was the picture nationally. 37% is quite a bit below 51%, so perhaps ask the school about this. It might be that they lost a lot of brighter students in that cohort to other sixth forms. (The question then is why they wanted to leave, and whether that has repeated with the current sixth form cohorts.)