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A Level, T Level, and BTEC Results 2026: North East students succeed as regional results highlights widening structural divide

Schools North East congratulates all North East students and staff for outstanding results across our region.  However, it must be understood that today’s regional table is a map of the structural divide, not a league table of school quality.

Summary

Schools North East congratulates all students across the region receiving their A Level, T Level and BTEC results today, alongside the teachers, school and college staff, and families who have supported them.

North East students have delivered another strong set of results, with the proportion of A Level entries achieving the highest grades increasing compared with last year. However, the gap between the North East and London has widened again.

Today’s regional results should not be interpreted as a league table of school quality. Instead, they highlight a much deeper structural divide in the circumstances, resources and opportunities available to children and young people in different parts of England.

Regional differences in outcomes cannot simply be attributed to differences in pupil ability, aspiration or teaching quality. Schools operate within profoundly different social, economic and public-service environments, with inequalities beginning long before children enter school and continuing beyond the school gates.

Headline A Level results

• 23.1% of A Level entries in the North East achieved an A or A*, up from 22.9% in 2025.
• 6.9% of entries achieved an A*, compared with 6.8% last year.
• North East top grades remain broadly in line with their pre-pandemic position, when 23% of entries achieved an A or above in 2019.
• However, the gap in A/A* grades between the North East and London has widened to 9.6 percentage points, the largest since the pandemic and well above the pre-pandemic gap (3.9 points in 2019).
• The gap in A* grades has also widened substantially, from 2 percentage points in 2019 to 5.1 points in 2026.

The figures show that the efforts of North East schools to address the challenges since the pandemic are ensuring that children and young people in our region can succeed. However, while North East outcomes have improved this year and remain comparable with pre-pandemic levels, London has pulled significantly further ahead.

This divergence cannot credibly be explained as a widening difference in the quality of schools or the potential of pupils. Instead, it reflects the very different contexts within which schools and young people are operating.

A structural divide, not a divide in standards

Young people in the North East have reached results day following another challenging year for schools and communities. High levels of long-term disadvantage and SEND, sustained absence, pressure on family finances, shortages in specialist services and stretched health, social care and local authority provision, all shape the environment in which schools operate.

Schools are increasingly absorbing needs that sit well beyond their traditional educational role, from mental health and family support to food provision and wider pastoral services. Rural and coastal communities also face particular challenges around transport, access to services and post-16 opportunities.

At the same time, different regions have benefited from very different histories of investment and access to opportunities outside school. This means that comparing regional examination results alone risks comparing fundamentally different systems and contexts. If the Prime Minister and this government is as serious about place as they seem, then proper funding needs to be assigned to Mission North East to tackle the challenges beyond the school gates.

Recent research has increasingly reinforced this point. The Independent Inquiry into White Working Class Educational Outcomes concluded that underachievement cannot simply be explained by low aspiration or lack of effort, while the Education Policy Institute has highlighted the continuing importance of geography in determining educational outcomes.

Simplistic narratives

Today’s results underline the need to move away from simplistic narratives about regional school performance and towards a long-term approach to tackling the inequalities surrounding children, families and schools.

The structural divide also matters beyond A Levels. University is an important route for many young people but should not be the sole definition of success. The North East needs high-quality vocational and technical routes, including T Levels, BTECs and apprenticeships, that command genuine parity of esteem with academic pathways and connect young people to opportunities within the regional economy.

A map of the structural divide

Chris Zarraga, Director of Schools North East, said:

“First and above everything else, congratulations to every young person collecting their results today, and to the teachers, staff and families who helped them get there. North East students have once again shown their talent, resilience and hard work.

“The important point in today’s figures is that our students improved, but the gap with London still grew. North East schools have worked in challenging contexts to ensure educational outcomes have returned to pre-pandemic levels. However, despite these efforts, London has moved significantly further ahead.

“That should tell policymakers something important. There is not a North-South divide in the quality of schools or in the potential and ambition of young people. There is a structural divide in the circumstances and opportunities surrounding them. Today’s regional table is a map of that divide, not a league table of school quality.

“Schools in different parts of England are not operating on a level playing field. In the North East, schools are working within communities facing entrenched disadvantage, intense pressure on public services, growing SEND needs and very different access to opportunities and infrastructure. Increasingly, schools are being asked to compensate for all of those things.

“That does not mean accepting lower outcomes. These divides are not inevitable. But we will not close them simply by demanding more from schools while leaving the conditions around them unchanged.

“Government needs to treat this as a system challenge. We need a long-term approach that connects education with early years, health, SEND, transport, skills and economic development, alongside high-quality academic and vocational pathways.

“Results day should reflect young people’s potential and hard work, not the structural advantages or disadvantages of where they happen to grow up.”

A call for long-term change

Schools North East is calling on government to:

1. Develop a long-term strategic vision for education, replacing short-term and piecemeal initiatives with sustained, targeted reform.
2. Recognise regional context in national education policy, with greater scope for schools, local authorities and combined authorities to develop responses around local circumstances.
3. Invest in the infrastructure surrounding schools, including early years, SEND, mental health, social care, family support and transport, recognising that schools alone cannot resolve wider social inequalities. Proper funding needs to be assigned to meet the aspirations of Mission North East and to tackle the challenges beyond the school gates.
4. Ensure funding reflects long-term disadvantage and levels of need, rather than expecting schools facing fundamentally different circumstances to achieve the same outcomes with the same support.
5. Create genuine parity across post-16 education, ensuring A Levels, T Levels, BTECs, apprenticeships and technical routes are high-quality, properly funded and connected to meaningful employment and progression opportunities.

The North East’s young people have the same potential, talent and aspirations as young people anywhere else in England. National policy must ensure they have the same opportunity to realise them.

For further information: Contact Schools North East on (0191) 204 8866, or alternatively email info@schoolsnortheast.com