State secondary schools in Derby
16 schools · East Midlands · 2024/25 Department for Education figures
Derby has 16 state secondaries, 11 of them with sixth forms. 81.7% of families got their first choice last year, about the national picture. Results run from 21% to 65.1% passing English and maths, a spread of 44 points, with a middle school at 37%, below England's 45.4%.
Of those Ofsted has graded, 1 rated Outstanding, 13 Good, 2 Requires improvement.
Derby against England
State-funded schools, 2024/25
Getting a place
2026/27 secondary admissions round, across Derby
81.7%
Got their first choiceof those who applied
England 84%
94.5%
Got one of their threefirst, second or third
0.2%
Got no offer at allfrom any preference
14%
Appeals upheld30 of 219 heard
These are figures for Derby as a whole. A popular school can be much harder to get into than the average suggests, and the criteria that decide it are set by each school's own admission authority rather than centrally. How applying works
How much the choice matters here
Across Derby's 16 schools, the share passing English and maths runs from 21% to 65%. That is a spread of 44 percentage points, about typical.
The typical council spans about 48 points. Where schools are close together the school a child gets matters less; where they are far apart it matters a great deal. The widest spreads are all selective areas, where grammar schools sit at one end and everything else at the other.
Derby schools, subject by subject
The share reaching grade 4 or above, among schools entering at least 20 pupils. Which pupils take a subject differs a lot between schools, so read this as what happened rather than as a ranking of teaching.
- 1 Landau Forte College Derby · 109 entries 82%
- 2 Chellaston Academy Derby · 70 entries 70%
- 3 Littleover Community School Derby · 91 entries 67%
- 4 Allestree Woodlands School Derby · 103 entries 66%
- 5 City of Derby Academy Derby · 39 entries 56%
- 6 Derby Moor Spencer Academy Derby · 88 entries 51%
- 7 Derby Cathedral School Derby · 58 entries 48%
- 8 Noel-Baker Academy Derby · 48 entries 44%
- 9 Murray Park Community School Derby · 72 entries 32%
- 10 Alvaston Moor Academy Derby · 57 entries 23%
Parent guides
Thinking about a tutor?
Are tutors worth it?
What tutoring can and cannot fix, and how to tell which you are looking at.
How much does a tutor cost
Typical hourly rates by subject and level, and what changes them.
When to start tutoring
Why the term before an exam is usually later than parents expect.
How to know if it's working
What to look for after a month, beyond the next test score.
Every school in Derby
Derby is a separate local authority inside Derbyshire, so schools in the surrounding county are not in this list. See Derbyshire.
3 of 16 have no spare places. Sort the list, or narrow it first.
- Allestree Woodlands School Derby · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 40%
- Attainment 8
- 46.5
- Absence
- 21%
- Alvaston Moor Academy Derby · Requires improvement.
- Eng & maths
- 23%
- Attainment 8
- 32.4
- Absence
- 36%
- Chellaston Academy Derby · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 50%
- Attainment 8
- 49.2
- Absence
- 16%
- City of Derby Academy Derby · Requires improvement.
- Eng & maths
- 26%
- Attainment 8
- 34.8
- Absence
- 37%
- Da Vinci Academy Derby · Inspected under the current report card, which gives no overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 21%
- Attainment 8
- 34.7
- Absence
- 27%
- Derby Cathedral School Derby · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 35%
- Attainment 8
- 41.5
- Absence
- 20%
- Derby Moor Spencer Academy Derby · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 48%
- Attainment 8
- 47.7
- Absence
- 24%
- Landau Forte College Derby · Outstanding. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 65%
- Attainment 8
- 55.4
- Absence
- 15%
- Lees Brook Academy Derby · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 33%
- Attainment 8
- 41.5
- Absence
- 25%
- Littleover Community School Derby · Good. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 58%
- Attainment 8
- 52.7
- Absence
- 10%
- Murray Park Community School Derby · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 33%
- Attainment 8
- 40.6
- Absence
- 23%
- Noel-Baker Academy Derby · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 30%
- Attainment 8
- 36.3
- Absence
- 31%
- Saint Benedict, A Catholic Voluntary Academy Derby · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 37%
- Attainment 8
- 45.3
- Absence
- 18%
- The Bemrose School Derby · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 25%
- Attainment 8
- 33.8
- Absence
- 23%
- UTC Derby Pride Park Derby · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 38%
- Attainment 8
- 42
- Absence
- 23%
- West Park School Derby · Good. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 52%
- Attainment 8
- 48.7
- Absence
- 26%
Pick up to 4 schools to see them side by side in the comparison tool, subject by subject.
Sixth form · Key stage 5·2024/25
A levels in Derby
9 of Derby's 11 sixth forms publish A level results. Ranked on the share reaching AAB or better in at least two of the subjects universities name, which is the measure the steepest entry requirements are written in.
A level results only. A sixth form running mostly BTECs and other applied courses will show a dash here and can still be the right one — those are graded on their own scale, where a distinction and an A grade carry the same points and mean different things.
Bordering Derby
Near a boundary, schools on both sides are usually in reach. Whether a child can apply is set by each school's admission criteria, not by the border.
What these mean
- Attainment 8
- The average pupil's total score across eight GCSE-equivalent subjects, with English and maths counting double. It is scored out of 90. A score of 50 is roughly equivalent to achieving a grade 5 across eight subjects.
- Grades 4 and 5
- GCSEs are graded from 9 down to 1. Grade 4 is a standard pass and broadly corresponds to the old grade C; grade 5 is what the government calls a strong pass. Grade 7 is broadly equivalent to an old grade A.
- Persistent absence
- The share of pupils who miss at least 10% of their possible sessions during the school year. This includes both authorised and unauthorised absence, so illness and other authorised reasons are included. Persistent absence has remained substantially higher than its pre-pandemic level.
- First preference
- The share of families who were offered the school they ranked first on their application, on national offer day in March. This figure is calculated across the relevant schools or admissions authority, so a high overall figure does not necessarily mean that every individual school is easy to get into.
- Spare places
- The amount of available capacity a school has compared with the number of pupils on roll. This is different from oversubscription: spare places measure whether a school has capacity, whereas oversubscription describes demand for places exceeding the number available. A school with no spare places may be popular, but a small school can also be full without receiving a large number of applications.
- Average A-level grade
- The average grade achieved across students' A-level entries. This is different from measures such as the proportion achieving AAB or better in two or more facilitating subjects, which are sometimes used to indicate higher attainment and university-entry performance.