Sittingbourne, Kent · Kent

Highsted Grammar School

Its own admissions PDF gives two different deadlines for the same Pupil Premium form — 31 January in one place, 31 October in another.

Highsted offers girls a choice of routes to qualify — the standard Kent Test, or the school's own in-house 'Highsted procedure', with the policy explicitly stating there's 'no differentiation between the two routes to eligibility.' Its own admissions policy sets no score requirement above the standard threshold, and unlike its natural comparison point, Borden Grammar School (mirror-image boys' school, girls admitted at 16 there, boys admitted at 16 here), Highsted has no general catchment tier at all — its only postcode restriction narrows eligibility for the Pupil Premium priority category specifically, not a general zone.

Key facts

Gender: girls
Age range: 11-18
Region: South East
Local authority: Kent
Established: 1904
DfE URN: 136305
Website: https://www.highsted.kent.sch.uk

Admissions

Admissions authority: The school sets its own test and criteria
Entrance test board: Either the Kent Test (GL Assessment reported as paper-setter, though not confirmed on a KCC primary page) or the school's own in-house 'Highsted procedure' — the policy states explicitly there is no differentiation between the two routes.partly verified
GL Assessment's role in the Kent Test is well-attested via a third-party primary school's parent materials but not stated directly by Kent County Council.
Test format: Kent Test: an English & Maths paper and a Reasoning paper, both multiple-choice/computer-marked, plus an unmarked writing task. Highsted procedure (open only to girls who registered for the Kent Test, sat the Saturday after it): a locally-standardised computer-based test (verbal ability, numerical reasoning, non-verbal reasoning) plus a separately marked English reading/writing paper — the anticipated pass mark is designed to align with roughly the top 25% of the national age cohort.
Qualifying / pass mark: An aggregate of 332 or more, with no individual component below 108, confirmed directly from a Kent County Council Threshold Statement — though the specific document read covers the test cycle one year ahead of the one governing the current live intake, so treat as indicative pending a fresh check on the exact current cycle. The school's own policy never restates this number itself, referring only to 'the required standard through the Kent PESE procedure.'
Superselective?: No

Catchment & priority criteria

No general catchment area. The only geographic element is a postcode restriction (ME9, ME10, ME11, ME12) that narrows which girls can claim the Pupil Premium priority criterion specifically — unlike its natural comparison school, Borden Grammar, which does have a general tiered catchment.

Children with a Statement of SEN or EHCP naming the school
Looked-after and previously looked-after children
Pupil Premium-eligible children resident in ME9/ME10/ME11/ME12 postcodes only
Current family association — a sister, or a brother currently in the sixth form
Nearness of home to school, by straight-line distance; independently-supervised random allocation for the final place

Results

Year	Attainment 8	GCSE 5+ Eng & Maths	Progress 8	A*–A	A*–B
2024	60.6 (Kent LA average 47.0, England state-funded average 45.9)	76.4% (Kent LA 47.9%, England 45.9%)	-0.04 ('Average', confidence interval -0.27 to +0.19) — the prior year (2022/23) was -0.25 ('Below average'), unusual for a grammar school though not necessarily alarming given how Progress 8 behaves for very high-prior-attainment cohorts	—	—
A-level (77 students): average grade B- (35.33 points per entry). School's own results page describes 'over one-third' of grades at A-A and 69% at A-B for this cohort, in imprecise rounded language.
2025	61.1	82.4%	Not calculated — no KS2 baseline data for this cohort nationally	~33% (school-reported, imprecise)	~70% (school-reported, imprecise)
A-level (76 students): DfE's official average grade declined to C+ (33.8 points per entry) from B- (35.33 points) the year before. The school's own results page separately describes roughly a third of grades at A-A and 70% at A-B for this cohort — the school's celebratory framing and DfE's declining average-grade measure describe different things and shouldn't be read as confirming each other.

Ofsted

Rating: Good, in every category: quality of education, behaviour and attitudes, personal development, leadership and management, and sixth-form provision. This was the school's first full graded inspection since converting to academy status in 2010.
Date: 17-18 January 2023
Report: Read the full report

Sources

1. DfE Get Information About Schools — URN, status, gender, LA — https://get-information-schools.service.gov.uk/Establishments/Establishment/Details/136305
2. School's own Admissions Policy, September 2026 — https://www.kent.gov.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0014/201029/Highstead-Grammar-School-admissions-criteria-2026-2027.pdf
3. Ofsted report, inspected 17-18 January 2023 — https://files.ofsted.gov.uk/v1/file/50211687
4. School's own Examination Results page — https://www.highsted.kent.sch.uk/our-learning-curriculum-examinations/examination-results/
5. School's own Sixth Form page — co-ed confirmation — https://www.highsted.kent.sch.uk/our-sixth-form/
6. DfE Compare School Performance — Progress 8, 2023 and 2024 — https://www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/school/136305/highsted-grammar-school/secondary/progress-measures-for-2023-and-2024
7. DfE Compare School Performance — A-level results over time — https://www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/school/136305/highsted-grammar-school/16-to-18/advanced-level-qualifications-results-over-time

Last updated 2026-08-31. Spotted something wrong? Tell us.