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A school in Sunderland has seen incredible GCSE results this summer, defying the Education Secretary’s claim that “too many” white working-class children are “falling behind” in their education.
Hetton Academy in the ex-mining town of Hetton-le-Hole saw 80 per cent of its pupils achieve a pass grade of at least a 4 in maths and English.
Almost all pupils at Hetton Academy come from white, working-class backgrounds.
The results come after Education Secretary Lucy Powell acknowledged that “too many white, working-class children are falling behind at every stage of their education”.
This week also saw the launch of the second phase of an independent inquiry into Ms Powell’s claims.
Led by former Cabinet minister Baroness Morris, the inquiry will investigate why children from white, working-class communities are “behind their peers” at school.
The school’s results have earned the institution a place among an elite group of schools.
Hetton Academy is now both a mainstream secondary school that doesn’t select pupils academically.
Only 339 non-selective schools in England hit an average 80 per cent pass rate in maths and English over the three years to 2025, out of around 3,000 that published the relevant data.
Schools that average an 80 per cent pass rate have fewer children from the lowest-income families and are less likely to be in deprived areas.
They also have fewer children with special educational needs.
The school’s headteacher, Vicky Pinkney, does not believe that low income households should mean low results for pupils.
She told the BBC: “I don’t think we should be accepting less just because of the community you work in.”
The parents see her as “just another Mam”, she says, who wants their children to do their best.
Ms Pinkney said some of the parents may have had a poor experience of school, or simply been able to get into work without many qualifications themselves.
But it’s now the “school of choice” for local families, she declared.
She told the BBC that Hetton-le-Hole is a community that mostly “stays in the area”, and it’s the school’s task to “open their horizons”.
Ms Pinkney was questioned on whether she believes other schools across the country could replicate her success.
She told the BBC that she too was raised by a single mother with little money, and still thrived academically.
She said: “I feel really strongly about that. My school helped me to be able to achieve.”
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