High Prior Attainers

At Wyvern St Edmund’s, we provide a range of opportunities to help High Prior Achieving (HPA) students realise their potential but also drive them on to succeed beyond the results they will achieve at school.

Who are our Higher Prior Achieving students?  

These students are those whose progress and attainment significantly exceeds age-related expectations (or those with the potential to achieve this). HPA students comprise around 5-10% of the academy population.

HPA students will be identified on entry by:

• Having a KS2 scaled score in Maths or English of 115 and above (or 112 and above if they are a disadvantaged student).  
• Having an averaged scaled score of 109 or above (107 and above if they are a disadvantaged student).

Students may be added to this group by:

• Showing exceptional progress and attainment in a range of subjects.
• Teacher consultation – we will consider teacher nomination and welcome any evidence that suggests a student has abilities developed to a level significantly ahead of their year group.
• Parent consultation – we will consider parental nominations and welcome any background, knowledge or evidence of a pupil’s work done at home if appropriate. This information will be cross-referenced to performance data and the academy decision is final.

In-Lesson

We want all of our students to be in the ‘stretch zone’ in lessons; this is equally true for our HPA students. Teachers at Wyvern St Edmund’s know who our HPA students are, have high expectations of them and will provide sufficient challenge for them in lessons.

High Prior Attainment Enrichment

WSE HPA students will be invited to targeted enrichment opportunities.

We also run University visits and actively seek out opportunities to provide our HPA students with enriching experiences e.g. by inviting in guest speakers.

The Super Curriculum

Launching in 2026, Wyvern St Edmunds aims to provide HPA students (and students with a keen interest in a specific subject) with an optional additional ‘curriculum’ to follow in every subject. The content of this will vary depending on the subject and year group, but will involve wider academic reading or research around an area that may not be examined at GCSE level.

An example of this (from Maths) is shown below:

Super Curriculum in Maths