ABBEY School staff, students and their families were delighted with the exam results achieved this summer.

Teachers, with the support of a dedicated and highly-skilled team of teaching assistants, have gone to great lengths to provide the differentiation required to make sure that the students, each of whom has a unique set of learning and emotional difficulties, all realised their own potential.

Armed with functional skills and entry level certificates in maths, science, English, computing, geography, PE, art and/or media, all of the 16 boys and five girls from year 11, have secured places at further education colleges, Carwarden House sixth Form or Waverley Training.

From this year, students will also be able to study for accreditation in history, catering and childcare.

Determined to maximise opportunities for the most able, the school management and governors organised extra classes to allow some students to sit GCSE examinations in maths, science and English.

Three students achieved a GCSE grade in maths, including Kiya Giles who gained an 8, the highest ever for a student at the school (grades 7 to 9 equate to the old A/A* grades); Kiya also achieved A grades for science and additional science.

GCSE English was added to the syllabus in September 2017, so according to staff, it is “remarkable” that eight year 10 and 11 students were able to complete the course and sit the examination in just one year.

The students needed support from their families as well as the school in order to succeed, no more so than Leo Long, who achieved GCSE grade B in Japanese, short course speaking and listening, thanks in part to it being his mother’s first language.