Staff and pupils at King’s Academy Ringmer are celebrating a 20% improvement in English GCSE results.

This year the provisional overall pass rate is the school’s best ever, it said in a statment.

Under the new exam specifications, pupils performed very well in both English and Maths with 62% per cent achieving a Grade 4 or higher, which was an increase on 49 per cent achieved last year.

The school said subjects which their students performed particularly well in included were: Food Technology, with a 100 per cent A*-C pass rate; Art, with 84 per cent; and Geography, in which 80 per cent of students achieved a grade A* to C.

Several individual students excelled, including: Ellie Richards who achieved grade 9s in both English Language and Literature as well as 4 A/A*; Will Hugall who achieved a 9 in English Literature and 6A*/As; Isabelle Jones who achieved 8s in English Language/Literature and Maths and A*/A in her 6 other subjects; and Gemma Longley who achieved a 9 in Maths along with 6 further A grades.

The school’s new Principal Matt Hillier, who took over in February this year, said: “We are thrilled to see that all our students’ hard work has paid off. I would like to congratulate all of our Year 11 students on their results and wish them every success in the future.”