TWO teenagers from the same school are celebrating after gaining an amazing 12 A* grades in their GCSEs.

They also had one of the top five marks in the country for four different subjects.

Joel Beavers and Paul Cannon, both 16, collected their results at Egglescliffe School, Teesside.

Paul plans to take A-levels in history, maths, economics and physics.

The youngster had already passed his GCSE in German in year nine at school before taking a further 12 subjects.

He said: "It hasn't really sunk in but I'm obviously very pleased with the results. I was surprised to get quite so much but I put a lot of hard work into them.

"My parents were over the moon and my mum just started telephoning everyone she knew to tell them. I am going to celebrate with my friends but as far as the future is concerned I am just going to take my A-levels and see how things are after that."

Proud headteacher, Angela Darnell, said: "We are a comprehensive school and we are not selective, but we have gained our best ever GCSE results this year. It's a very high standard of achievement but then we have these two students with 12 A*s.

"And Joel was in the top five out of 3,000 for general studies and 8,000 students for music."

l Two pupils at Yarm School have achieved top grades.

Richard Gratwick, 15, of Faceby and Neil Singh, 16, of Hartlepool, both gained 10 A* grades.

Richard managed to go one step further by being among the top five marks in the country in both his music and his English Literature exams.

Head David Dunn said: "Once again the results are brilliant news.

What really pleases me about it is that all pupils have done really well and can be proud of their performance. In particular I am pleased for all the pupils who got straight A*s."

The school equalled its best ever pass rate of 97 per cent this year.

The average number of passes in grades A-C was 9.7 per pupil, breaking Yarm School's records.

l An independent school on Teesside is celebrating a great achievement with two of its pupils registering top five grades in the UK.

John Stubley and Simon Clarke, pupils at Red House School in Norton, have achieved outstanding results in English literature.

Their grades put both of them in the top five out of 352,006 candidates who took the exam across the country.

John, who has achieved ten A* grades, also made the top five in biology out of 18,986 candidates nationwide.

Simon gained nine A*s and one A, and as well as his exceptionally good English literature result he reached top five status in geography out of 53,704 students and in history out of 1,813.

Chris Allen, headteacher at the school, said: "This is yet another fantastic year for Red House School with pupils fulfilling their potential across all subjects.

"John and Simon's results are no less than extraordinary."