Friends' school Lisburn is named Northern Ireland Secondary School of the Year

One of eight non-denominational Quaker schools across the Britain and Ireland, Friends’ School has jumped 46 places in the state league table this year making it 33rd in the UK and 3rd in Northern Ireland. The school has seen some fantastic gains academically with 80.3% of grades at A-level being A*-B compared to 74.3% in 2016, and 74% of GCSEs at A*/A, a 10.6 percentage point rise on last year. Alastair McCall, editor of Parent Power, said: “It is rare for a school to win one of our School of the Year awards twice, all the more so when a second title comes just six years after the first as has happened at Friends’ School. “The award is indicative of the sustained success the school achieves with and for its pupils. But it is no examination factory. Children are encouraged to “live adventurously” and they achieve great success in sport, music and drama to complement their prowess in public examinations. The school’s award is well deserved.” The top performing schools in Northern Ireland are revealed in Parent Power, The Sunday Times Schools Guide 2018, published in The Sunday Times and online this Sunday, November 26. The 25th edition of Parent Power identifies the 2,000 highest-achieving schools in the UK, ranked by their recent examination results. A fully searchable database by school name, local authority, town and postcode, together with new regional rankings are available to Times and Sunday Times subscribers at: thesundaytimes.co.uk/parentpower As well as assessment of all academic results on a school-by-school basis, Parent Power enables parents to compare the performance of a given school with other schools in the same town, local authority or nationally. There are also live links to school websites and schools’ most recent inspection reports. Parent Power is widely acknowledged as the most authoritative survey of the country’s best schools. The rankings in the secondary school league tables are determined by the percentage of examination entries gaining A* to B grades at A-level this summer (which is given double weighting) and the percentage of entries returning A* and A grades at GCSE. They are published several weeks ahead of the official Government tables for secondary school performance.