ISC Daily News Summary

Pupils in England, Wales and Northern Ireland are receiving GCSE, BTECs and other Level 2 results today. The gap in GCSE pass rates between boys and girls has narrowed to 5.9 percentage points, down from 6.1 percentage points in 2025 and 6.8 percentage points in 2023. However, more pupils are failing to achieve a standard pass in English and maths, continuing a trend seen since the pandemic. This year, 40 per cent of pupils of all ages failed to achieve a standard pass in English language, compared with 39.8 per cent last year. The Times (Nicola Woolcock, Georgia Lambert, Mark Ludlow, George Willoughby, Millie Brigaud and Constance Kampfner) and The Guardian (Taz Ali and Mabel Banfield-Nwachi) are reporting live as students open their results.

Speaking to The Times, Lucy Powell, the new education secretary, pledged to crack down on the "pernicious" system of GCSE resits that leaves hundreds of teenagers locked out of continuing their education each year. She said her department will also look again at last year's curriculum and assessment review, commissioned by her predecessor, Bridget Phillipson, and written by the education academic Becky Francis. By Nicola Woolcock.

Schools Week outlines seven key trends from this year's data. Ofqual data shows that grammar schools recorded the highest proportion of top grades, at 63.2 per cent, the same figure as 2025. The figure for independent schools has fallen since last year, from 49 per cent to 48.4 per cent, which is the first time the grades have fallen since pandemic grading ended in 2023. The proportion of top grades in academies, council-maintained comprehensives and free schools stands at 19.7 per cent, 20 per cent and 21 per cent respectively. All three saw increases from 2025. For all state schools, the percentage of top grades rose by 0.1 percentage points, to 20.6 per cent. The figures on centre type reflect grades from entries of all ages. By Esme Kenney and Ruth Lucas.

iNews reports that more GCSE pupils could secure a place at their first-choice sixth form or further education college this year, even if they achieve lower grades. This is because some oversubscribed colleges will be able to accept more students after the government announced additional funding for places earlier this week, according to the sector. By Alexa Phillips.

Numerous schools and colleges have distributed grades in person, but pupils at more than 750 schools in England were able to see their grades via an app on their phones for the first time. A record of their results will stay in the app for colleges and future employers to review, in a move the government hopes will reduce paperwork for students and teachers. By Hazel Shearing, BBC News.

As part of its coverage of this year's GCSE results, The Telegraph includes an interactive grade-comparison tool allowing readers to see how their results, or those of their child, compare with the wider cohort across the subjects they took.