Ark Birmingham school praised in TES cover story

Ark St Alban’s Academy was today featured in a TES cover feature: “Birmingham’s shining bright.” The story reveals how schools in Birmingham, once thought of as underachieving, have recently seen an impressive increase in results. The TES notes that at Ark St Alban’s “80 percent of students qualify for the pupil premium, yet 69 per cent achieved 5 A*-C grades at GCSE including English and maths – well above the national average of 52.8 per cent.”

Overall, the city of Birmingham boasts GCSE results that are 8.8 points above the rest of the country, when taking into account economic disadvantage.

The TES spoke to Ark St. Alban’s Principal Mark Gregory, who they noted personally visited the family of every new student entering the school. History and IT teacher Fionnuala O’Connor was also featured. She discussed recent success stories of Ark St. Alban’s students being accepted into Russell Group universities. “I get goose pimples just talking about it,” said Ms O’Connor.

The school was also the subject of a Guardian newspaper profile piece earlier this year: Birmingham school unites faiths: not through grand gestures but hard work