Ukrainian teenager from Coventry who spoke no English celebrates GCSEs

A Ukrainian teenager who only started learning English two years ago is planning to celebrate his GCSE results with pizza and a new computer game.

Roman, 16, arrived in Coventry with his mother Svitlana after Russian forces gave them one day to leave the town of Sumy in north-eastern Ukraine.

He took exams in five subjects at West Coventry Academy, including maths, English and construction, and hopes to become a car mechanic.

“I will definitely treat my son the way he wants,” Svitlana said, after opening her results envelope live on BBC CWR, having, she explained, started “from the bottom” by learning English.

When the family left Ukraine, she fled to Poland, obtaining a visa to settle in the UK.

“The envelope doesn’t matter to me,” Svitlana said of the results. “I’m already proud of him, it was a great job.”

His highest grade was a three in maths, the equivalent of a D under the old GCSE grading system.

Roman said: “When I came here, I didn’t know how to speak English, I just knew how to say ‘hello’ and ‘goodbye’.

“Now I can speak English with my friends, with my aunt, with my brother.”

The car-obsessed teenager said he achieved better GCSE results than expected and was looking forward to enrolling at Coventry College to study motor mechanics.

“I did my best, my best – everything is going better than I could have wished,” he explained.

He described Coventry as “a great city” and predicted he would be “a great mechanic”.

Svitlana, in tears, said she would immediately call her parents, who had chosen to stay in Sumy, to keep them informed.

“They are still in danger,” she said. “We call them every day but we are very worried about them.”