Skipton, North Yorkshire · North Yorkshire

Skipton Girls' High School

Sits the same entrance test as Ermysted's Grammar School on the same date, but at separate venues with separate processes — a shared commercial test product, not a joint admissions system.

Founded in 1886, Skipton Girls' High confirms a cross-region finding first spotted while researching Lancashire: its entrance test provider, FSCE (a trading company of Reading School in Berkshire), is shared with Ermysted's Grammar School here in Skipton and with Lancaster Girls' Grammar and Clitheroe Royal Grammar across the Pennines in Lancashire. But 'shared' means only a common commercial test product — each school tests on the same date but at its own venue, with its own registration, its own admission number, and its own annually-recalculated pass mark. A separate, distinct arrangement exists at sixth-form level: Skipton Girls' and Ermysted's pool their subject choice through a long-standing curriculum partnership, offering up to around 30 A-level subjects between them.

Key facts

Gender: girls
Age range: 11-18
Region: Yorkshire and the Humber
Local authority: North Yorkshire
Established: 1886
DfE URN: 136664
Website: https://www.sghs.org.uk

Admissions

Admissions authority: The school sets its own test and criteria
Entrance test board: FSCE (Future Stories Community Enterprise), a not-for-profit trading company of Reading School in Berkshire.
Test format: Two separate written papers, English and Mathematics, based on Key Stage 2 National Curriculum content up to the end of Year 5. Computer-marked and age-standardised. No verbal or non-verbal reasoning, and no separate creative-writing paper. A candidate sits the test once per academic year.
Qualifying / pass mark: Not published as a fixed number for any cycle. The school's own admissions booklet and the shared FSCE materials describe the required standard as a cohort-relative benchmark, determined by the Admissions Committee based on that year's applicant performance, not a repeating fixed threshold.verify with school
No fixed numeric pass mark is published anywhere by the school or FSCE — confirmed non-disclosure, checked across the school's own current admissions policy, admissions booklet, and shared FSCE materials.
Superselective?: Nopartly verified
A secondary tutoring source's claim about score-based final ranking directly conflicts with the school's own policy, which describes distance as the tiebreak instead — the school's own document is treated as authoritative.

Catchment & priority criteria

A defined 'Priority Area' covering the Craven district of North Yorkshire, used for oversubscription priority — not an exclusive catchment, since the school states places are expected to be available for girls living outside the area too.

Pupils with a current EHC Plan naming the school who reached the required standard
Looked-after and previously looked-after girls who reached the required standard
Girls registered as Pupil Premium and/or whose families receive Universal Credit, who reached the required standard
Girls living within the school's Priority Area who reached the required standard
Girls living outside the Priority Area who reached the required standard
Tie-break: straight-line distance from home to school, then random draw for exact ties

Results

Year	Attainment 8	GCSE 5+ Eng & Maths	Progress 8	A*–A	A*–B
2024	66.9 (North Yorkshire LA average 46.8, England average 45.9)	89.3% (North Yorkshire LA 47.7%, England 45.9%)	+0.45 ('Above average', confidence interval +0.18 to +0.71) — this is the most recent year DfE was able to calculate Progress 8 for this school; the following cohort falls into the nationwide COVID-era gap	—	—
A-level (129 students): average grade B- (37.99 points per entry, North Yorkshire LA average B-/35.62, England average C+/34.38).
2025	69.7 (North Yorkshire LA average 46.5, England average 46.1)	89.6% (North Yorkshire LA 47.0%, England 45.4%)	Not calculated — confirmed directly on DfE's own page as the nationwide COVID-era gap for this cohort	verify with school	verify with school
A-level (119 students): average grade B- (37.86 points per entry, North Yorkshire LA average B-/35.74, England average B-/36.1), value-added progress score -0.09 ('Average', confidence interval spans zero), retention 99.2% (England 93.1%). DfE's current service doesn't publish an A-A/A-B percentage breakdown for this school.

Ofsted

Rating: Good overall (this was a full graded inspection under the pre-September 2024 framework — no inspection has occurred since). Behaviour and attitudes was Outstanding; quality of education, personal development, leadership and management, and sixth-form provision were all Good.
Date: 21 September 2022
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/136664
2. School's own Admissions Policy for 2027 Admission — https://nst-skiptonhigh.reactfiles.co.uk/uploads/document/SGHS-Admissions-Policy-2027-Entry.pdf
3. School's own Admissions Booklet for 2027 Entry — https://nst-skiptonhigh.reactfiles.co.uk/uploads/document/SGHS-Admissions-Entry-Booklet-2027.pdf
4. FSCE — Familiarisation Guide for Parents — https://nst-skiptonhigh.reactfiles.co.uk/uploads/document/FSCE-Familiarisation-Guide-Information-for-Parents-LCSE.pdf
5. Ofsted report, inspected 21 September 2022 — https://reports.ofsted.gov.uk/provider/23/136664
6. School's own Our History page — https://www.sghs.org.uk/our-school/our-history-and-the-old-girls-guild
7. School's own About Sixth Form page — https://www.sghs.org.uk/sixth-form/about-sghs-sixth-form
8. DfE Compare School Performance — Progress 8, 2023 and 2024 — https://www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/school/136664/skipton-girls--high-school/secondary/progress-measures-for-2023-and-2024

Last updated 2026-09-01. Spotted something wrong? Tell us.