THE OLDBURY headmaster whose school offered cash incentives to pupils to pass their GCSEs has branded the scheme a success.

John Martin, headmaster of Oldbury Academy, hit the headlines when a Birmingham University fellow complained to Education Secretary Michael Gove about the incentives.

This week Mr Martin congratulated pupils after they attained 59 per cent five A* to C grades including maths and english and 89 per cent students attained five A* to C grades.

He said: “The total financial incentives for this year was £400 which is exactly what we expected.

“Youngsters have worked harder because of the incentives and they went to a broad range of abilities and not just “struggling” pupils which is what we were accused of.

“All students have access to our rewards system and the suggestion that there is a narrow focus on particular sub-groups of students is not in any shape or form accurate.”

Birmingham University teaching fellow Christopher Hill wrote to Education Secretary Michael Gove complaining about struggling pupils being rewarded financially whilst high flying pupils lose out.

Mr Gove declined to take any action about the incentives scheme.

Speaking of this year’s GCSE results Mr Martin said: “I am proud for all our pupils, we are down one percent in both categories but it appears there has been a national trend of less A-C grades this year.

“However, we have improved in another ten benchmarks in the exams and there has been a lot of progress in maths and english.”

Oldbury Academy, which moved into a multi-million new campus in Pound Road earlier this year, was described as an “outstanding” school by Ofsted inspectors two years ago.