Academic Excellence

At St. Mary’s College, academic excellence comes as standard and we have a proud tradition of outstanding academic achievement.

Our 2023 examination results were extremely pleasing:

More than a third of all GCSE passes (35%) were at the highest 9-7 grades

A fifth of our GCSE candidates (20%) achieved seven or more 9-7 grades each

Two thirds of candidates (65%) celebrated ten or more GCSE passes, with many achieving 11 or even 12 GCSEs. This reflects the broad and balanced curriculum at St. Mary’s and the fact that we do not restrict the number of GCSE subjects students can take.

Our A Level candidates recorded a 99% pass rate with almost a third of students (30%) achieving three or more A*, A or B grades.

A fifth of all A Level passes (20%) were at the highest A*/A grades and more than half (52%) were A*, A or B grades.

This year’s A Level candidates also included a significant proportion of ‘straight A’ students with almost a fifth of the cohort achieving three or more A* or A grades, an increase on last year and very encouraging in the context of the downward trend nationally.

St. Mary’s College finishes top of the GCSE results table for Sefton most years and last year was no exception:

Our Attainment 8 score of 60.3 is higher than all other state and independent schools in Sefton. This official top ranking reflects the breadth and quality of our curriculum and the excellent academic achievements of our pupils.

St. Mary’s has a great track record in improving students’ performance: we are regularly in the top 5% nationally for ‘value added’, a measure of quality reflecting the extent to which the educational experience enhances pupils’ knowledge, abilities, skills and performance at public examinations beyond predicted levels.

The Mathematics Department annually enters the UKMT Maths Challenge and achieves a range of Gold, Silver and Bronze medals.

St. Mary’s College has been honoured as an Associate School by the Royal Society in recognition of the high quality of science teaching at St. Mary’s over many years.

The vast majority of our students achieve their first choice of university.