BRAYTON College is to change its name and introduce a school blazer for students.

The rebranding of the school comes at a time when it is struggling to maintain its roll call as students choose other establishments in the area.

It has also only recently replaced its former headmaster, John Kesterton, who has taken up a new post within North Yorkshire County Council’s education authority.

In a letter to parents, acting head teacher Mike Roper announced the name of Brayton College would change to Brayton High School in September and a uniform of a blazer, shirt and tie would be introduced at the same time. He told parents: “Of course we realise that changing the name and uniform does not directly improve the quality of education, but it does generate a sense of change and new direction.

“The new uniform will also generate a sense of pride in our students for their school.”

Mr Kemp also said that exam results were getting increasingly better and last year the school achieved “the best-ever results for any school in the Selby area”.

However, the college, a specialist technology establishment, was only given an average Ofsted report last year, which rated it as “satisfactory”.

Speaking last month, school governor and county councillor Dave Peart, who lives in Brayton, said he understood there had been about 80 applications to join the college in September, although he conceded that Brayton College was not the first-choice establishment in all cases.

A spokeswoman for Brayton College said they were expecting an intake of 81 in September. The capacity for a year group is 240.

Stuart McFarlane, chairman of governors, said the rebranding of the school was to reflect its achievements.

He said: “Brayton has seen significant success recently and there is renewed pride in the school. We felt a smarter image would be a better expression of this success and a change in name would reflect more accurately that this is a school of high academic achievement.”