NEW head teacher of Churchfields Academy Sandra Muir paid tribute to pupils and staff who had taken booster classes and after school sessions in the run up to their GCSEs.

The school recorded a significant increase in the number of pupils achieving A* to C grades in Maths and English and a total of 34 children earned at least one A* or A grade, with six of them reaching five or more A* or A grades.

Mrs Muir, who was appointed as permanent head earlier in the summer after a spell as acting head, said: “I am delighted with the results which have improved significantly since 2015. This demonstrates that the hard work and dedicating of the pupils and staff at Churchfields has paid off.

“Everyone has worked incredibly hard this year with booster classes and extra clubs after school and even at weekends. I wish to acknowledge the support of our parents who have supported their children in doing so well and I would also like to thank the staff who came in to celebrate the success with our pupils today.”

The school’s top performers were Eliza Shreesh, who earned three A*s, six As and one B, Mary Lam, who achieved nine As and a B, Alfa Pereira, with two A*s, three As and five Bs and Ammara Javed, who obtained an A*, five As and four Bs.

Mary, who will be moving on to New College next month to study maths, biology, chemistry and economics, was pleased with her results.

“I only felt confident about the sciences,” she said.

Ammara admitted she had butterflies in her stomach in the morning before picking up her results.

“We revised a lot for the maths after school and on Saturdays. I did a lot of revising myself for them at home.”

Chairman of the governors Jane Hext said the improved results followed changes made by the new head and her staff.

“These GCSE results are a great testament to the breadth and depth of teaching and learning improvements that Mrs Muir and her teaching staff implemented throughout last year,” she said.

“We are delighted for the children and wish them all well on the next step in their education.”