The performances of west Dorset’s schools, based on GCSE results, have been revealed.

Provisional results released by the Department for Education show how well the county’s schools did in exams taken in the summer.

This is the second year schools have been ranked using the Attainment 8 grading system after major changes were made to how exams are assessed.

GCSE qualifications changed in 2017, when grades A*-G were switched to grades 1-9, with 9 being highest.

Attainment 8 is an average score across eight subjects, including English and maths. The higher the score, the better.

The average Attainment 8 score across all state-funded schools in Dorset in 2018 was 47.3 - higher than the national average of 46.4.

The Woodroffe School in Lyme Regis was the county’s best performer, with an Attainment 8 score of 54.8.

The Sir John Colfox Academy scored 46, while Beaminster School scored 45.1.

The new system also rates schools on the progress pupils make from the end of primary school to the end of secondary school – known as Progress 8.

The new performance measures are designed to encourage schools to offer a broad and balanced curriculum and reward schools for the teaching of all their pupils, measuring performance across eight qualifications. Every increase in every grade a pupil achieves will attract additional points in the performance tables.

The Progress 8 score shows how much progress pupils made between the end of Key Stage 2 and the end of Key Stage 4 compared to pupils across England – with 0 being the national average.

Pupils at the Woodroffe School were the most likely to exceed expectations with a score of 0.34, deemed ‘above average.’

Colfox and Beaminster School were classed as ‘average’ with Progress 8 scores of -0.07 and -0.04 respectively.

Contact was made with all three secondary schools. As the results are provisional, headteachers agreed to comment in January when revised figures are released.