The State recorded an overall pass percentage of 92.1% in Plus 2 exams, an increase of 0.7 percentage points over last year and the highest in the last five years.
Girls secured a pass percentage of 94.5, once again outshining the boys who recorded a pass percentage of 89.3. Tharika Banu, the only transgender candidate to take up the exam this year, also passed.
Spike in centums
Of the 9.33 lakh students who appeared for the exam, 31.45% scored 700 marks and below. While the top marks were not known, data released by the School Education department indicated that 1,171 students had scored more than 1,180 out of 1,200 marks.
Virudhunagar and Ramanathapuram districts bagged the top honours with regard to the overall pass percentage, displacing Erode and Perambalur districts, which were among the toppers last year.
While there were no centums in Tamil and English, there was a sharp spike in the number of centums scored in economics, computer science and commerce. Students who took up mathematics, accountancy and business maths also scored a large number of centums.
Unlike in previous years, when rank holders were the focus of attention in schools, this year, the celebrations seemed to involve the bulk of students. The School Education department had announced that it was scrapping the practice of announcing the names of top rankers. For the first time, students got to know the results through SMS as well.
Of the 6,732 schools in the State, 1,813 had a 100% pass rate.