STUDENTS at King Henry VIII School, Abergavenny (pictured above) have yet again achieved very pleasing results in this year's GCSE level examinations.

Some 198 students in Year 11 sat examinations and 51percent achieved five or more GCSEs at Grades A* to C, with 85 percent of students achieving five or more GCSEs at Grades A* to G.

Once again, there were some outstanding individual performances from Year 11 students, the most notable being:

Amy Bradley, 9 A* Grades, 1 A Grade, Eleanor Maddocks, 9 A* Grades,

Sophia Rigby, 8 A* Grades, 2 A Grades, Eleanor Haselgrave, 8 A* Grades, 1 A Grade, Tom Mogford, 6 A* Grades, 3 A Grades, Eleanor Wright, 5 A* Grades, 3 A Grades, 1 B Grade, Rebekah Baldwin-Jones, 5 A* Grades, 6 A Grades, Alys Evans, 4 A* Grades, 6 A Grades, Joshua Van-Male, 4 A* Grades, 4 A Grades, 1 B Grade, Kate Morgan, 4 A* Grades, 5 A Grades, 3 B Grades, Max Grabner, 3 A* Grades, 5 A Grades, 1 B Grade, 1 C Grade, Jonathan Sadler, 3 A* Grades, 5 A Grades, 1 B Grade, Chris McIndo, 3 A* Grades, 4 A Grades, 2 B Grades, Elaine Good fellow, 3 A* Grades, 6 A Grades, Catherine Eeles, 3 A* Grades, 6 A Grades, Alexandra Barrow, 2 A* Grades, 7 A Grades.

Headteacher, Nicholas Oaten said, "We are delighted with the success of all our students and recognise the effort and commitment shown by both the staff and the students in achieving such a pleasing set of results.  We are confident that as a result of this success large numbers of students will be returning to the Sixth Form to take advantage of the excellent teaching for Post-16 students provided by the school.  We share in the pride of the parents who have worked in partnership with the school and supported their children in helping to produce these excellent results."

Monmouthshire's GCSE results have improved once again.

The number of students achieving the high grade pass rate of five A* to C grades increased by 1.5 per cent from 2008 results and the overall pass rate A* to G as increased by 2.1 per cent.

Cabinet Member with responsibility for education, Councillor Liz Hacket Pain, said, "I am delighted with this further improvement in performance and would like to thank all those involved in achieving it, particularly teachers, parents and especially the young people who sat their GCSE's this summer.  I am very pleased that this will mean that so many more students will have a wider choice of options to progress into given this success."

Andrew Keep, Corporate Director for Lifelong Learning and Leisure, said, "I would like to thank the school staff for their professionalism in assisting the young people of Monmouthshire to achieve these excellent results.  I am aware of the hard work of our students and congratulate them for this and their resulting success."

Crickhowell High School has celebrated another excellent set of GCSE results achieved by Year 11 students (pictured left).

These results follow on from the outstanding A Level results achieved by Year 13 students last week.

Nearly 80 per cent of all examinations sat resulted in an A* to C grade and of these 25.54 per cent were at A* or A grade.

Almost 70 per cent of the year group achieved five or more A* to C and 66 per cent achieved the new level two threshold qualification of five plus A* to C, including maths and English.

The final measure of success was the level one threshold where 99.1 per cent of all the students achieved five or more A* to G grades at GCSE.

Headteacher, Andy Timpson, said, "We are delighted with these results because they do recognise the hard work and effort put in by our Year 11 students over the past two years.

"We are also grateful for the support that our parents have demonstrated to help their children achieve these results."

He was particularly pleased with the level one threshold figure where only one student from a year group of 106 left the school without achieving this qualification.

"This is a remarkable statistic given the nature of the year group and is a testament to the hard work undertaken by a very dedicated group

of teachers and support staff," he added.

"It looks as though the vast majority of our successful GCSE candidates have chosen to continue their education at Crickhowell High School, although a smaller number will be moving on to other schools and colleges in the area. We also have a number of other students joining our sixth form as a result of the excellent reputation that the school has developed over the years in terms of preparing students for higher education".

GCSE results at Monmouth Comprehensive School (see picture on previous page) were the highest ever achieved with 70 per cent of students achieving at least five A* to C GCSE grades.

In addition to GCSEs, the school offers other qualifications equivalent to GCSE and with these taken into account, the achievement rose to 75 per cent of the students achieving five A* to C grades.

With the fantastic achievement of 8 A* grades and 3 A grades apiece, Bethan Lloyd and Joanna Williamson were the joint highest achievers overall.

They were joined by Joshua Bamford, Bryony Lewis, Abbie Williams, Lily Tyler-Batt, Maddie Winder, Belinda Gorell, Bethan Price, Benjamin Gable and James McGrath – all of whom received A* and A grades in double figures.

Working in collaboration with Coleg Gwent, some students were awarded NVQs for the first time. Natasha Farrant achieved NVQ Level 1 in Animal Care; Matthew Brown, Nathan Fletcher, Mitchell Gleed, Adam Lester, Daniel Siggers and Shaun Williams achieved NVQ Level 1 in Basic Construction

Headteacher Carole Herman said, "I am always very proud of the achievements of all our young people and this year, achievement has been outstanding across the board.

"Results like this are a credit to our committed students and testament to the fact that this school has the promotion of learning at its heart.

"I am committed to school decision making and leadership always being guided by the principle of doing what is best for our young people and their learning.

"Such decision-making can be misunderstood and isn't always popular, but this is the proof that it pays off."

Pupils at BRYNMAWR SCHOOL were also celebrating their GCSE successes