Thousands of pupils across Northern Ireland were celebrating their GCSE results today.
Two days ahead of the release of results by exam boards in England and Wales, pupils in the North were sitting back after scoring a 90.8 per cent pass mark across all papers - up 0.6 per cent on last summer.
Around 30,000 pupils sat over 187,000 papers set by the Northern Ireland exam council, the CCEA, and in all but a couple of subjects pass rates were up.
The all important A* - C grades were achieved by 70.5 per cent of pupils, up 0.9 per cent on last year.
However the full picture of achievement in Northern Ireland will not be known until the results in England and Wales are known on Thursday.
The vast majority of pupils in the North sit at least one or two exams set by the English and Welsh boards - some many more.
Traditionally Northern Ireland pupils do better at both GCSE and A level than their counterparts in Britain and that is expected to be repeated again this year.
However the number of pupils who achieved the top A* grade was down a shade this year at 6.7 per cent , compared to 6.8 per cent in 2004.
The number who achieved at least an A increased to 23.3 per cent [from 22.8 per cent].