Rushcliffe Spencer Academy reports over 30% of A-level grades at A* or A and 34 students with straight A*/A. How that compares with its 2025 figures.

Rushcliffe Spencer Academy says more than 30% of its A-level grades this summer were awarded at A* or A, and that 34 students achieved straight A*/A grades across every subject they took. The West Bridgford school published the figures on its own website on results day, Thursday 13 August.

Leavers from the sixth form are heading to the University of Oxford, Durham University, the University of Nottingham and the University of Manchester, among others. Two are going on to study medicine at Nottingham. One has taken a degree apprenticeship in engineering with the consultancy AECOM rather than a university place, and vocational students are moving on to Manchester Metropolitan University and Loughborough University off Distinction* grades in health and social care and in commercial management and quantity surveying.

Principal Sarah Sismey said: “We are incredibly proud of this cohort of students and all they have achieved. These results are a reflection of years of commitment, hard work and determination and I would like to pay tribute to them, alongside their families who have supported them throughout and our dedicated staff team who have expertly guided them every step of the way.”

How this compares with last year

The school’s own announcement a year ago reported over a third of all grades at A-A, nearly 70% at A-B, and nearly 40 students with straight A* and A grades.

Set the two side by side and the honest reading is that this is a broadly similar year, not a step up or a slump. “Over 30%” and “over a third” overlap, so the A/A share cannot be called either way from what has been published. The straight-A count has moved from “nearly 40” to a precise 34. The school has not published a cohort size for either year, and a sixth form that varies by twenty or thirty students changes that headcount without anything else changing at all. This year’s release also drops the A-B figure that last year’s carried, so there is no like-for-like comparison to make on that measure.

None of that is unusual. Schools choose which numbers to put in a press release, and the verified, comparable data does not arrive until the Department for Education publishes performance tables later in the academic year.

What the sixth form takes in

One detail in both announcements is worth pulling out for parents comparing options. Rushcliffe runs an open sixth form, and several of the strongest results each year belong to students who joined at 16 from other schools. Two of this summer’s A*AA students came in that way, one going on to medicine at Nottingham and one to psychology at Manchester.

The sixth form’s inspection record backs that up. Ofsted inspected the Boundary Road school on 13 May 2025 and published its report on 20 June 2025, grading it Outstanding on all five judgements: quality of education, behaviour and attitudes, personal development, leadership and management, and sixth form provision. Worth knowing when you compare schools: since September 2024 Ofsted no longer gives state schools a single overall effectiveness grade, so a school with five Outstandings has no headline word attached to it any more.

What it means for you

If you are a Year 11 parent weighing up post-16 options, the useful comparison is not one year’s press release against another. Ask each sixth form for its cohort size alongside its grade percentages, and check the Department for Education performance tables when they land, because those are like-for-like and a release is not.

If you have a result you were not expecting today, the school’s exams office is the first call, not the exam board. Post-results services, including a review of marking or an appeal, have to be requested through the centre that entered you, and the deadlines are short.

If your place did not come through, UCAS Clearing runs into the autumn, and a degree apprenticeship is a route Rushcliffe leavers are visibly taking: one of this year’s AAA students went to AECOM rather than to a university.

GCSE results follow on Thursday 20 August, and we will cover them the same way, from what the schools themselves publish.

Related: things to do in West Bridgford and house prices across the borough, which the catchment argument tends to turn on.