LONDON: The government’s breakneck programme of turning secondary schools into academies looks set to accelerate further after increased minimum targets for GCSE passes saw the number of schools deemed to have failed almost double inside a year.

GCSE results for more than 4,000 state and private secondary schools and colleges in England showed there were 195 schools where fewer than 40% of pupils reached the benchmark level of at least five grades C or higher, including English and maths.

While this was lower than the equivalent figure of 251 for 2011, the minimum standard has gone up from 35%, which only 107 schools did not reach.

The higher target means the 195 schools will now be targeted for takeover by academy chains, a move the Department for Education says brings improved results. This argument received some backing in the latest GCSE figures, which showed the proportion of students reaching the five good GCSEs mark rose by 3.1 percentage points in sponsored academies, as against a national rise of 0.6 percentage points.

There was, however, some worrying data in the parallel figures for A-level results, also released in the DfE.

A new set of figures this year showed the numbers of students at each institution getting at least two As and one B in “facilitating” subjects, the type of A-levels identified by the Russell Group bloc of leading universities as their preferred routes to entry. These are maths and further mathematics, English literature, the three sciences, geography, history and languages.

The data showed just over a quarter of all schools and colleges, around 600, did not have a single pupil reaching this standard.

The DfE, however, focused on the perceived success of sponsored academies, of which there are 600 throughout England, the majority of them secondaries.

The figures showed “further evidence of the great success of the academy programme in turning around our weakest schools”, a DfE spokesman said. “This shows we are right to continue to support the sponsored academy programme. These brilliant sponsors have a track record of arresting decline, and then reversing it.”

Some sceptics say certain academies improve their figures by taking advantage of the ability to set their own admissions criteria and so cherry-picking more able pupils. This claim was supported by an independent report into academies earlier this month, which said it had heard evidence of some academies “finding methods to select covertly”, for example by holding social events for prospective parents or asking them to fill in lengthy forms. The report, headed by Ofsted’s former chief inspector Christine Gilbert, said such methods could “enable schools to select pupils from more privileged families where parents have the requisite cultural capital”.

However, any effect of this would be likely limited in the current league tables given that most GCSE pupils would have joined sponsored academies when they were still under local authority control.

The largest teachers’ union, the NASUWT, said the tables were being used for “another round of denigration of schools and teachers by the government”.

Chris Keates, the union’s general secretary, said: “Today’s figures show that even on the basis of the government’s flawed measures, the overwhelming majority of schools are securing the highest levels of attainment for the young people they teach. They should all be congratulated.

– Guardian