LUMEN Christi College in Londonderry is Northern Ireland’s top secondary school, according to The Sunday Times Parent Power guide, which is published today.

The guide also reveals that when compared to population, Northern Ireland grammar schools perform better than their equivalents in England and Wales.

Lumen Christi heads the first league table to analyse both controlled and voluntary grammar schools in Northern Ireland together. It ranks 24th in the overall league table of the best UK state schools.

With 76.8% of A-levels obtaining A or B grades and 72.5% of GSCEs graded A* or A in 2004, it ranks 33rd for A-level results and 29th for GCSE results among all UK state schools.

The Parent Power rankings are determined by the percentage of A and B grades obtained at A-level (which is given a double weighting in the overall ranking) and the percentage of A* and A grades obtained at GCSE.

The table of the top 20 Northern Ireland secondaries includes both the controlled sector, where most pupils are Protestants, and the mainly Catholic-run voluntary sector, allowing direct comparisons for the first time. Catholic-ethos schools, which accept pupils of all denominations, occupy the top two places. St Mary’s Grammar School in Magherafelt, which ranks number 40 in the UK, comes second. However, the next 12 places in Northern Ireland are taken by controlled grammar schools, led by Enniskillen Collegiate at number three.

On average, grammar schools in Northern Ireland score better than their equivalents in England and Wales, occupying a greater share of places in the UK league table than statistics would predict. There are 25 schools from the province in the top 200 schools although Northern Ireland accounts for only 2.9% of the UK population.

Throughout the UK, the study shows that top state schools now rival and often exceed the quality of their independent competitors. The findings are based on an analysis of the top 500 schools, covering both sectors.

In the league table, 161 places — almost a third — are occupied by state schools and there are 19 among the top 100.

The highest places in the secondary sector are all taken by an elite of independent schools, led by St Paul’s Girls’ in Hammersmith, west London, where 98.1% of A-levels were graded A or B this summer.

In the second tier of schools, however, state grammars and some comprehensives are now competing strongly. The highest scoring state school, Colchester County High school for girls, in Essex, is ranked at 27.

The strong state sector showing suggests parents should not assume that paying for education automatically leads to better exam results. At leading state schools, results may well be better than those at a middle-ranking independent school.

The results are published in full in an insert in today’s News Review section and on the Parent Power CD-Rom. For the first time, using the CD, parents can carry out a search for extensive profiles of all the high-ranked schools in their area.

The performance of leading state schools shows an improvement on last year, when The Sunday Times produced a combined state/independent ranking of only the top 100 schools. Then, five of the top 50 schools were in the state sector compared with seven this year.

The achievements of many state schools are largely due to the policy that most of them adopt of selecting pupils on the basis of academic ability.

Another factor may be that a high proportion of students come from educated middle-class families — many grammar schools are in areas where property prices are high.

Despite improvements in the state sector, research from Durham University reveals the lead still enjoyed by independent schools.

Robert Coe, a senior lecturer in education at Durham, has found that an independent school education is worth on average an extra two-thirds of a grade at GCSE — in French it is worth a full grade.

“We’ve looked at GCSE results over five years in about a third of secondary schools,” said Coe. “If you take pupils that are slightly above average — a score of 110 in our tests — the independent school pupil will get better GCSE results than their state school equal.”

Coe is, however, cautious over an explanation for the difference: “I don’t think there’s a simple answer. Independent schools do tend to have better qualified teachers, but there will be other factors. Pupils in independent schools have more money spent on them. Independent schools can get rid of trouble-makers.”

High-quality teaching in the independent sector is exemplified by Magdalen College school, Oxford, the Sunday Times independent school of the year, where 20 of the 60 teachers are Oxbridge graduates.

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