Head of Bootham School Chris Jeffery said it was a day to celebrate the students, rather than share stats or argue over education systems.
“This is not a year for schools to be bandying around their exam statistics as these, by very definition, have to be in line with previous years’ performance and thus can’t always reflect the performance or ability of these individual students,” he said.
“Today is also not the right time to be decrying or defending the system that has led to the results that have been given to students today.
“It is, however, a day for us to be celebrating all the achievements that our wonderful students take with them from their time at Bootham; to marvel at the resilience they have shown in coming through – and growing through – the most extraordinary and challenging few months that education has known for very many years; and to rejoice that the overwhelming majority of them have gained places on a chosen university course.
“Well done to ALL of them: we couldn’t be more proud, or more confident that the world will be a better place as we send them out them into it as fine young adults!”
Mr Jeffery said he was delighted by how many students remained engaged in learning even after the exams were scrapped. “By valuing learning and keeping at it, they will be really well set to commence their degree studies or other ‘next steps’ over coming months.
Our congratulations to them today – and our celebration of them today – are not diminished or dampened by the situation they find themselves in, but actually enhanced by it. I truly hope that our students will feel some of that for themselves, too. They all deserve to.”
He also paid tribute to his ‘extraodinary’ team who “worked incredibly hard to provide our students with meaningful work during lockdown”.