DfES research shows ethnic minority students rising above national average

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Bangladeshi students have recorded the highest percentage increase in gaining 5 A* to C grades at GCSE, the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) has revealed.

Further, Black Caribbean and Pakistani students have posted percentage rises well above the national increase of 2%: 2.7% and 2.5% respectively. Bangladeshi students posted an increase of 3.5%, with the percentage achieving five “good” GCSEs now at 56.2%; 50.9% for Pakistani, and 44.4% for Black Caribbean.

Schools Minister Andrew Adonis commented on the figures, published last week: “These are encouraging results and a real testament to the hard work of pupils and teachers. Targeted programmes like Aiming High and London Challenge are working and taking us in the right direction. Last year, Black pupils demonstrated nationally the greatest progress in GCSE results of any ethnic group, improving more than twice as fast as the average, and this year’s results build further on that foundation”.

“A recent evaluation report on Aiming High also gives more promising signs for the future. The project boosted test results for 14 year olds, which are a good guide to future GCSE results. I am also encouraged by the increases for Pakistani, Bangladeshi and Black pupil at Key Stage 2 which shows that more children are making the grade in the basics at primary school”.

Other findings revealed that nearly 80% of Chinese students and over 70% of Indian pupils achieved five or more A* to C grades, while over 60% of Irish pupils achieved similar.

The Minister added: “We are also rolling out project to tackle underachievement amongst Black pupils to over 100 secondary schools across 25 local authorities, and doubling the scale of the Minority Ethnic Achievement Programme for Bangladeshi, Pakistani, Somali and Turkish pupils, covering 85 schools in 18 local authorities”.

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Vijay Pattni.

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