By Lisa O’Loughlin CBE, Principal and CEO, East Lancashire Learning Group

Today, hundreds of thousands of young people will open their GCSE results.

For many, it will be a day of celebration. For others, the grades they receive in two subjects in particular could have a significant impact on what happens next.

English and maths.

28.6% of learners have left school without their English GCSE and 28.1% without their Maths GCSE.

Behind that national figure are thousands of young people leaving school without qualifications that remain fundamental to what they can do next.

This is not simply an education issue.

At a time when over one million 16 to 24-year-olds in the UK are not in education, employment or training, I believe we need to look much more closely at the relationship between educational attainment and the risk of becoming NEET.

A grade 4 in English and maths does not define a young person’s ability or potential. But these qualifications still open doors. Without them, progression to some courses becomes harder and apprenticeship and employment opportunities can narrow.

For a young person who has already struggled or disengaged at school, that matters.

Over the past year, I have seen first-hand through the work of the independent Young People and Work review, led by Alan Milburn, the scale and complexity of the challenge we face in understanding why so many young people become detached from education and employment and what needs to change.

The causes are complex. Poor mental health, school absence, disadvantage, low attainment, disengagement from education and difficult transitions into employment all play a part.

But the review reinforces something we need to get much better at: prevention.

Too much of the national conversation begins when a young person is already NEET. By then, we can be trying to repair a disconnection that has been developing for years.

We need to look further upstream and recognise the points at which a young person’s options begin to narrow.

Not achieving English and maths at 16 is one of them.

For a young person who has spent 11 years in education and leaves school without a grade 4, being told they need to study the same subject again can feel like more of the same.

We see young people arrive at college convinced they simply “can’t do maths” or are “no good at English”. Some have missed the grade by a handful of marks. Others have struggled with the subject, or with education more widely, for years.

What happens next is important.

Handled badly, it can reinforce a young person’s belief that education isn’t for them. Handled well, it can open up opportunities they may already have thought were closed.

Not achieving English and maths at 16 is not the end of the road.

At East Lancashire Learning Group (ELLG), our latest results show what is possible.

This year, 43% of our 16–18 learners achieved a grade 4 or above in GCSE English, with 34% achieving the same in maths.

This means our students are more than twice as likely to achieve a grade 4 or above in GCSE English and maths compared with the national further education average

For me, what matters is what that result enables a young person to do next.

It can mean progressing to the next level of their course, securing an apprenticeship, going to university or meeting the requirements for a career that previously felt out of reach.

It gives them choices.

Nationally, however, too few young people who miss that grade at school go on to make the progress they need. In 2024/25, just 38.8% of those studying English and 33.3% studying maths improved their point score during their 16 to 18 education.

We have to do better.

Simply requiring young people to resit and hoping for a different outcome is not enough. We need to understand why they didn’t succeed first time and what needs to change.

That means high-quality specialist teaching, understanding the individual learner and rebuilding confidence alongside knowledge. It also means maintaining the

same ambition for a young person who arrives without a grade 4 as we do for every other student.

At ELLG, we know how important English and maths are to a young person’s future, which is why we are not only focused on improving outcomes for our own students, but on helping to improve them nationally. As one of the Education Endowment Foundation’s 16–19 Evidence Partnership colleges, we are undertaking research into GCSE English resits to better understand what works and help more young people achieve the grades they need to progress.

But colleges cannot solve this alone.

The Milburn review also highlights a wider challenge: young people are navigating a system that too often deals with different parts of their lives in isolation.

Schools deal with attendance and attainment. Colleges deal with resits and progression. Careers services deal with destinations. Employers deal with recruitment. Health services deal with health.

The young person experiences all of it as one life.

If a young person starts disengaging from school, has poor attendance, leaves at 16 without English and maths and then struggles to find a pathway that feels right for them, we should not wait until they become NEET before the system responds.

That requires education, health, employers, local government and national government to work around the young person, rather than expecting them to find their way between separate systems.

The review’s interim findings show why that matters. Nearly one million young people are outside education, employment or training and, among today’s 24-year-old NEETs, 45% have never had a paid job.

If we want to change that, we need to act earlier.

Improving attendance and engagement at school matters. So does excellent careers advice, clear pathways into further education, apprenticeships and employment, and addressing the health and wider barriers that stop young people participating.

English and maths need to be part of that same conversation.

For those opening their results today who have not achieved the grades they hoped for, the message is simple.

A GCSE result at 16 does not determine what you are capable of achieving.

We see that every year. Young people come to us without the grades they wanted and go on to achieve them, progress to university and apprenticeships and build successful careers.

But we need to make sure that opportunity exists for every young person.

If we are serious about reducing the number of young people who become NEET, we cannot wait until they have already disengaged and then try to bring them back.

We need to act at the points where their options are beginning to narrow.

English and maths is one of those points. Getting it right can keep opportunities open and change the course of a young person’s future.