Bridgwater College’s A level students have achieved outstanding results this year, it has just been announced.

The overall pass rate was 99.7 per cent, compared to the national average of 97.8 per cent. And 40 out of 42 subjects achieving 100% pass rates.

Of those passes, 80% of the passes were at grades A* to C, compared to the national average of 76 per cent, and 54 per cent were achieved at grades A*, A and B,compared to the national average of 52 per cent.

Neil Punnett, the retiring head of the area of access, science and humanities, said: “These A level results are outstanding and they follow on from our exceptional International Baccalaureate Diploma results in July.

“They reflect Bridgwater College’s position as one of the top colleges in England. The results have been achieved through the hard work of our students over two challenging years, by the dedication of our highly talented and experienced teachers and by the vital work of parents in supporting their children and the staff.

“These outstanding results should be a source of great pride for the Bridgwater community. It is particularly pleasing to see so many good grades achieved.”

He congratulated everybody concerned and said it was good to see positive publicity for teenagers this summer.

Louise Rowley will take over from Neil, having worked at City College Birmingham where she was a faculty head.

She said: “I am thrilled to be joining such an outstanding college as Bridgwater and I echo Neil’s comments about the tremendous success of our A level students.”

Alexander Hannam (formerly of Churchill School) achieved a magnificent four A* grades and is off to study Environmental GeoScience at the University of Cardiff. Thirteen students achieved three A or A* grades. Amy Difford (formerly of Robert Blake Science College) achieved 3 A* grades and an A and will read Law at Bristol University. Joy Cheung also achieved 3 A* grades and an A and will read Development Economics at the University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies. Christopher Ley (formerly of East Bridgwater Community School) achieved three A grades and an A*, and will study Maths at the University of Bath. The twenty five highest achieving students gained 73 A*/A grades between them.

Bridgwater College students also excelled in the AS level examinations. Rhiannon Larmont (formerly of Chilton Trinity Technology College) achieved an astounding five A grades. Amongst many other individual successes were ten students who achieved four A grades each. They were Alicia Bennett (Haygrove), Daniel Case (Chilton Trinity), Amy Chapman (Crispin), Peter Collett (Chilton Trinity), Elizabeth Fleetwood (Wells Blue), Ruth Gardiner, Joseph Myers (Haygrove), Leah Sidebottom (Haygrove), Jessica Simpson (King Alfred’s) and Lily Toland (Kingsmead). The twenty highest achieving students at AS level gained 72 A grades between them.

Over 400 students from Bridgwater College will be going to university courses in the new academic year.