Three South Wiltshire secondary schools fail to meet government's standard

St Edmund’s Girls’ School in Laverstock, South Wiltshire UTC in Salisbury and Avon Valley College in Durrington ranked in the bottom 12 per cent of schools across the country following the government’s introduction of a floor standard for GCSEs which required all schools to reach a minimum Progress 8 score of -0.5.

The mark shows how much progress pupils made between the end of key stage 2 and the end of key stage 4.

But St Edmund's head teacher Nicola Bull said this was because the government statistics had not included early-entry English language GCSE results - sat by girls in year 10 rather than year 11.

The school said if these results had been included it would have scored around +0.1, placing it in the "average" category.

South Wiltshire UTC, in Wilton Road, fell well below the floor standard achieving a score of -1.41, which meant its pupils made less progress than other pupils across England with similar results at the end of key stage 2.

Avon Valley College, in Durrington, came out with a score of -1.1, and St Edmund’s Girls’ School achieved a rating of -0.71.

To be classed as "well below average" schools had to score between -0.83 and -0.41. Wellington Academy, in Ludgershall, achieved a rating of -0.4, placing it just inside the "below average" category.

The Stonehenge School (-0.35), Wyvern College (-0.31) were also classed as "below average", but St Joseph’s Catholic School and Bishop Wordsworth’s Grammar School were rated as average with scores of 0.08.

Sarum Academy also achieved an "average" rating with a mark of 0.14, along with Ringwood School on 0.05, Burgate School and Sixth Form with -0.14, and The Trafalgar School in Downton with -0.07.

South Wilts Grammar School for Girls was rated "well above average" with a mark of 0.55, placing it in the top 12 per cent of schools in England.

The mark is based on eight qualifications including include English and maths.