HARINGEY'S GCSE results have shown an improvement on last year's grades but are still woefully behind the national average.

The provisional results, revealed at the end of last week, indicate that there was an improvement of about four per cent on last year's figures.

The number of students getting five or more A* to C grades went up from 30.9 per cent to about 34 per cent the national average is 57.9 per cent. The figure for pupils getting at least one GCSE at any grade went up from 92.1 per cent to around 96 per cent. The national average is 97.9 per cent.

Several schools in the borough made impressive jumps on last year while others did much better than expected.

At St David's and St Katherine's School in Hillfield Avenue, Hornsey, the results were well above the predicted grades for the year group and one student, Yves Ndombasi, was ranked in the top five students in the country for French.

At Hornsey School for Girls, there was an 11 per cent leap in the number of students gaining five or more A* to C grades. One of the best performers was Yan Qing Cao, of Harringay, who achieved four A*s, five As and two Bs.

She spoke to the Independent this week and said: "I am pleased I got better than my predicted grades."

She added that she would go on to study maths, further maths and physics at the Latymer School in Edmonton.

Speaking last week, Cllr Judy Bax, lead member for education, said: "We have seen an impressive set of GCSE results this year with many significant improvements for particular schools.

"I wish to congratulate all students and teachers who have worked so tirelessly to achieve these results."