Townley Grammar School

Townley Grammar School is a selective girls' academy in the south-east London Borough of Bexley. Originally established in 1937 as Bexley Technical High School for Girls, it is known for advanced teaching of performing and visual arts as well as maths and computing.

Rated Outstanding by Ofsted, the school offers an enriched cultural education through partnerships with the Tate Modern, Trinity College of Music, Laban and the Royal Ballet.

• Address: Townley Road, Bexleyheath, DA6 7AB
• Local authority: London Borough of Bexley
• School type: girls' grammar
• Headteacher: Nevita Pandya
• Number of pupils: 1,613
• National rank (Sunday Times Parent Power): 91
• A level results: 76.2% A*–B
• GCSE results: 74% 9/8/7

Townley Grammar School shares an entrance test with the three other schools in the London Borough of Bexley (Beths Grammar, Bexley Grammar and Chislehurst & Sidcup Grammar). This means that your child only needs to take one exam – known as the Bexley Selection Test – to apply for these schools.

1. Register for the 11 plus

Before registering, speak to your child’s teacher to see if the 11 plus and grammar school is right for them.

While your child is in Year 5, register them to take the Bexley Selection Test on the council website. Registration opens in early May each year and closes at the end of June.

If you are considering schools outside Bexley, such as grammar schools in Kent, remember to register for their 11 plus exams too.

2. Apply for school places

You will receive your child's 11 plus results by 17th October 2023. You can use the results to decide which schools to include on your local authority application form.

Before listing Townley Grammar School as a preference on your form, check its admissions policy and make sure your child is eligible. As well as your child's exam score, how close you live to a school is an important factor in whether your child is likely to be offered a place.

The application form must be submitted to your home local council by 31st October 2023.

During this time, if you are applying to the school under the criteria of your child receiving free school meals, you'll also need to submit a Supplementary Information Form (SIF) which can be found on the school's website.

There is no specified pass mark for Townley Grammar School. After your child takes the exam, their scores are age-standardised and combined to give them a total score across both papers. These total scores are ranked in order and the 180 highest-scoring children are eligible to be considered for a place. As a result, the qualifying score varies from year to year and is only decided after the tests have been marked.

Achieving a particular score doesn't guarantee a place at the school, as it is likely to be oversubscribed with qualified candidates. We always recommend researching the admission policies for your target schools, looking at their oversubscription criteria and their catchment area.

The planned admission number (PAN) for the school is 224. When there are more eligible applicants than there are places available, places are allocated in this order:

1. Looked-After or previously Looked-After Children.

2. Girls who get free school meals and achieve the qualifying score, in order of distance from the school.

3. Girls who have achieved the highest 180 scores in the Selection Test.

4. Girls with a sibling at a school within the Odyssey Trust for Education (Townley Grammar or King Henry School).

5. Girls with a parent employed at an Odyssey Trust for Education school for more than two years. .

6. Girls who live closest to the school, regardless of their test score. Distance is measured as a straight line distance between the child's home address to the student entrance of the school. Selection Test scores are used as a tie-breaker when the distance is identical.

There is no catchment area for Townley Grammar School. The highest-scoring 180 children are offered a place at the school regardless of how far they live from it. The places offered on distance (criteria 6 above) vary each year depending on the number of available places and where the applicants live.