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Issue 286, Friday 22 February 2013 - 12 Rabi' al-Akhar 1434

Blackburn based Muslim high school tops league table

By Elham Asaad Buaras

Former Year 11 students Humeirah Ougradar and Rukayya Waghat work in Tauheedul Islam Girls High School and Sixth Form College science labs

On average 53 per cent of Muslim schools managed to achieve 5 or more A*-C GCSE grades (including English and Maths) last year – 6 percent lower than the national average, that is according to statistics exclusively complied by The Muslim News.

Despite the dip in performance some Muslim schools continued to progress.

Students, staff and parents at Tauheedul Islam Girls’ High School and Sixth Form College celebrated the publication of the school league tables last month, which placed the school as the highest achieving in Blackburn with Darwen and one of the highest achieving in the country.

An amazing 95 per cent of students achieved 5+ A*-C (including English and Maths), while 76 per cent achieved the newly introduced English Baccalaureate.

This outcome of 76 per cent places Tauheedul top nationally of all non-selective schools.

Statistics from the Department of Education also confirmed that Tauheedul is the best school in the country for achievement by students with low prior achievement at primary school.

93 per cent of students from with low prior achievement achieved 5A*-Cs (including English and Maths) at Tauheedul, nationally, just 7 per cent of students achieve this result.

Tauheedul is ranked the best non-selective school nationally for students from disadvantaged backgrounds who achieve the English Baccalaureate, with 68per cent achieving this measure. Only one in twenty students achieved this nationally.

Principal Hamid Patel told The Muslim News the figures show that they “are achieving amazing results with some of our most vulnerable learners – those who have done poorly at primary school and those who are in foster care or from low-income families.”

The achievement is one of several accolades the school has received over the past year.

Last March, the school was shortlisted for ‘Secondary School of the Year’ by the Times Educational Supplement annual awards.

In May, the school was rated as “outstanding” following an Ofsted inspection, the first and only secondary school in the Borough to receive such an award. In their report, inspectors praised “highly effective” teaching, a “culture of high expectations” and “exceptionally polite and considerate” students.

Also celebrating great GCSE results is London based Tayyibah Girls’ School.

The school has topped 22 schools in Hackney with a whopping 100per cent of all of students achieving 5 + GCSEs at grades A*-C (including English and Maths) a 17 per cent improvement on its 2011 results.

The outstanding results were not exclusive to Muslim girls’ school.

Co-ed Al-Khair Secondary School along with the Church of England affiliated Trinity School in Shirley both topped Croydon’s league table by accomplishing a 100 per cent 5 + A*-C (including English and Maths) pass rate.

“I am delighted that the hard work of our Year 11 pupils and their teachers has been rewarded with such an outstanding set of GCSE results. At Al-Khair School we continually strive to stretch all of our pupils,” said Headmistress Aisha Chaudhry.

Chaudhry told The Muslim News the school “enjoys promoting academically challenging subjects” such as Biology, Chemistry and Physics as well as the other entire English Baccalaureate GCSE subject. “We are confident that our pupils will leave our school with a competitive advantage. Equally important for us, however, is the belief that pupils who leave our school understand that academic excellence is only meaningful if used to benefit society and indeed humanity.”

The 2012 stats revealed how students attending Muslim schools are excelling in historically underperforming local authorities; Excluding the results of Muslim schools on average only 47 per cent of students in the Tower Hamlets attained 5 + A*-C with English and Maths pass rate (12 percent lower than the national average).

The statistics are particularly poor for the Borough’s Muslim community who constitute the largest Muslim population out of all local authorities.

In contrast an impressive 62 per cent of students who sit their GCSE in the Muslim schools in the East End borough attain 5 + A*-C (including English and Maths) pass rate.

League table only available in the hard copy of The Muslim News newspaper.

Tel: 020 8863 8586 E-mail: elham@muslimnews.co.uk

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