Maximising Achievement with Y13 in the final 15 weeks before the 2026 examinations in England

Maximising Achievement with Y13 in the final 15 weeks before the 2026 examinations in England

A companion piece to our Alps Champions Webinar on Monday 19th January 2026.

At Alps, we are with you all the way as you face the challenge of maximising Y13’s attainment and progress in 2026. 

The Context
  1. In England, A Level results in 2025 were marginally higher than in 2024 across all thresholds as shown in Table 1 (adapted from JCQ data). 
    Table 1
  1. Based on the provisional results published by the Department for Education (DfE), the average A Level Points Score (APS) in 2025 increased slightly by 0.39 and the average grade was B- as in 2024.  


We appear to be firmly back in a ‘comparable outcomes’ era for A Levels. The 2026 and 2027 results are likely to be awarded in very similar proportions to those awarded in 2024 and 2025. 

What steps will you take to maximise your share of the higher grades in 2026? 

Although male students achieved a slightly higher percentage of A* grades in 2025, female students at A Level continued to outperform at other grade thresholds, as illustrated in Graph 1 (DfE data). 

Graph 1


Do your A Level results show similar gender gaps? What can you do to motivate all your male students to compete with their female peers? They are competing for the same university places, degree apprenticeships & future careers. 

Data published by the DFE shows attainment gaps at A Level between the performance of both disadvantaged students and SEN students and their peers, as shown in Table 1. 

Table 1

Do your A Level results tend to show similar disadvantage gaps? 

With the new Ofsted Framework placing greater emphasis on disadvantaged students, those with SEND and pupils currently or previously known to children’s social care, are you confident in tracking and demonstrating the progress of these groups in your school or college? 


Graph 2 from the FFT shows the % of D*-D grades rose in 2025 across all Applied General qualifications. 

Graph 2

What are you doing / what will you do to maximise your share of the higher vocational grades in 2026? 

Are you starting to consider the impact on your curriculum of the phased introduction of V Levels and the phasing-out of all other vocational qualifications?  


Some possible priorities 

1. Maximising your share of high grades to improve student pathways and destinations, as well as aiming for outstanding attainment and progress. 

2. Maximising your share of high grades to gain above or well-above Average Grades, 16-18 Progress scores and Alps red-hot grades. 

3. Narrowing any cohort gaps, for example:

  • Males v Females.
  • Disadvantaged students and their peers. 
  • SEN students and their peers.

4. Focusing on attendance to reduce the negative impact of persistent absence. 


Our Ten Top Tips to support you: 

1. If you are in an 11-18 school, make sure ‘the Sixth Form matters.’ 

  • Is the same priority given to robust data analysis / support / intervention as happens for Y11? 
  • Is the Sixth Form a regular item on SLT agendas? 

2. Get everyone on board if you want to achieve your goals. Ensure all middle leaders and set teachers understand their role in achieving the school’s ‘goals’ and feels responsible for helping achieve them. 

3. Your main goal might be set at either A Level or Applied General. It might be based on the Alps’ Quality Indicator or the Performance Tables Average Grade or 16-18 Progress score.  

Whatever it may be, do all Heads of Department (HODs) and their set teachers know what they must do to help achieve the school’s goal?  

Do they know who their key ‘marginal’ students are and what they need to do to help them achieve the next higher grade? 

4. Use Connect to ensure you are on top of the subjects, sets and student groups that need to improve to gain outstanding value-added progress / outstanding achievement. 

Our webinar on Monday 19th January 2026 will guide you through how to add custom columns and how then to be on top of analysing your data in Connect by attendance and how to identify gender, SEND and disadvantage gaps. Register your place here. 

5. Use Connect to ensure you are on top of the students who need support to achieve their Post-18 goals. 

6. Focus on raising outcomes and progress by concentrating on improving the performance of targeted students in specific subjects.  

7. Make sure sustaining / improving performance at A*-A (Di*) and A*-B+ (Di*-Di) is a priority in your school and college. 

8. Pay most attention to your largest cohort subjects that will have the biggest impact on this cohort’s outcomes and destinations, your Alps value-added and your Performance Tables Average Grades and 16-18 Progress scores. 

9. Ask HODs to run department meetings based on:

  • Past papers and mark schemes (especially 2025) 
  • Command words 
  • 2025 Examiner reports & QLA – identifying those ‘silver bullets’ that will improve grades. 

Share this invaluable information with your students.

10. Ensure Mock exams are marked to identify individual and collective learning gaps (skills / knowledge) so that these can be addressed, re-assessed and closed before the summer. Based on what commonly lost students marks & grades in your Mocks and what the Examiner Report / QLA reveals lost students marks & grades in 2025, ask HODs to identify 5 main priorities to work on from January to May to aim to make sure students do not make these same errors in the summer. 


Five Top Tips for getting the most from Connect 

1. Discuss with HODs and teachers which students on their course have the greatest potential to improve their mock / predicted grades.  

2. Use the ‘What-if’ tool in Connect to demonstrate the impact on subject value-added of those students achieving a higher grade. Ensure all teachers understand what needs to be done to enable each of these students to master the skills or knowledge the lack of which currently blocks them from achieving the next higher grade. 

3. Use our comparison and filter tools to understand how the student groups in each subject or set are predicted to perform by disadvantage, gender, ethnicity & PA.  

  • Set up custom columns, so you can track the progress of additional groups such as your SEN students and your disadvantaged students.  
  • Set up attendance groups so that the impact of persistent absence is clear and visible, so all can act to improve attendance. 

 

 4. Use our Monitoring Accuracy tools to identify: 

  • which subjects predicted most accurately in 2025?
  • which subjects are predicting outcomes most different to previous monitoring grade-point or are predicting much higher outcomes / higher VA than in 2025?

5. Identify students who are underachieving in two or more subjects for intervention. 


About the author: John Philip 

 

 

John started working with Alps in 2008, while he was working at Little Heath Comprehensive School. At Little Heath, John used Alps to achieve top 2% performance in value-added terms. He also worked with schools regionally and nationally through the Raising Achievement Partnership Programme. Since leaving Little Heath in 2010, John additionally works as an associate for 22 secondary schools through PiXL. 

 

This blog is a companion piece to our Alps Champions Webinar on Monday 19th January 2026. 


Register for our webinar  

 

Led by: Senior Education Consultant, John Philip

19th January 2026 at 3:30 PM GMT 


This webinar will give practical advice on how to use Connect effectively to ensure you are on top of the subjects, sets and students who need support if you are to maximise achievement for your Year 13 cohort as you approach the final 15 weeks of the academic year.