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Educational achievement has improved markedly and the gap between County
Durham/
Darlington and the average for England as a whole has narrowed in recent years.
Scores for
literacy and numeracy at Key Stages 2 and 3 are now close to the national
average (Table 6). Both
County Durham and Darlington still have smaller proportions of pupils obtaining
five or more good
GCSEs compared with England as a whole. But performance, in County Durham
especially, has
improved a great deal over the past few years. In terms of achievement of
five GCSEs at grades
A*-C, both areas are not far behind the national average. However, the Government
has recently
opted for a new measure: five good GCSEs including English and Maths. On that
measure, County
Durham is well below the national average.
There are considerable variations within the sub-region. The highest achieving
private sector
schools have over 90% of Year 11 pupils obtaining five or more good GCSEs,
and the best
performing Comprehensives achieve over 70%, but some of the lowest achieving
schools manage
only 30-40%. There is still a gender gap, but that is narrowing; there are
signs that boys are starting
to catch up. However, some young people have very low levels of attainment,
notably looked-after
children and children from the travelling community.
Educational achievement has improved markedly
Table 7 presents data on qualifications held by the working age population.
NVQ2 equates to five
or more GCSEs at grades A-C, and can be regarded as the minimum requirement
for many
occupations; substantially increasing the proportion of the workforce with
NVQ2 level qualifications
is also a key Government target. NVQ4 equates to HND or Degree level qualifications.
The figures
mirror the occupational structure of the area’s labour market. County
Durham has a relatively low
proportion of people with the highest qualifications, NVQ4 and above. Darlington
is an interesting
case – suggesting a very divided labour market, with a relatively high
percentage of well-qualified
people and also a high percentage with no qualifications.
