State secondary schools in Newcastle upon Tyne
13 schools · North East · 2024/25 Department for Education figures
Newcastle upon Tyne has 13 state secondaries, 11 of them with sixth forms. 79% of families got their first choice last year, worse than most of England. Results run from 21.9% to 68.9% passing English and maths, a spread of 47 points, with a middle school at 51.5%, above England's 45.4%.
Of those Ofsted has graded, 1 rated Outstanding, 5 Good, 1 Requires improvement. 6 schools carry no overall grade at all — either inspected since Ofsted stopped issuing one in September 2024, or never inspected.
Newcastle upon Tyne against England
State-funded schools, 2024/25
Getting a place
2026/27 secondary admissions round, across Newcastle upon Tyne
79%
Got their first choiceof those who applied
England 84%
91.4%
Got one of their threefirst, second or third
0%
Got no offer at allfrom any preference
54%
Appeals upheld71 of 131 heard
These are figures for Newcastle upon Tyne 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 Newcastle upon Tyne's 12 schools, the share passing English and maths runs from 22% to 69%. That is a spread of 47 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.
Newcastle upon Tyne 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 Gosforth Academy Newcastle-upon-Tyne · 30 entries 97%
- 2 St Mary's Catholic School Newcastle-upon-Tyne · 225 entries 86%
- 3 Sacred Heart Catholic High School Newcastle-upon-Tyne · 224 entries 76%
- 4 St Cuthbert's High School Newcastle-upon-Tyne · 189 entries 74%
- 5 Studio West Newcastle-upon-Tyne · 33 entries 24%
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Every school in Newcastle upon Tyne
Schools in neighbouring authorities are not in this list, because admissions run per authority. See bordering areas.
4 of 13 have no spare places. Sort the list, or narrow it first.
- Benfield School Newcastle-upon-Tyne · Inspected, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 24%
- Attainment 8
- 33.5
- Absence
- 36%
- Callerton Academy Newcastle-upon-Tyne · Good.
- Eng & maths
- —
- Attainment 8
- —
- Absence
- 29%
- Excelsior Academy Newcastle-upon-Tyne · Requires improvement.
- Eng & maths
- 24%
- Attainment 8
- 33.4
- Absence
- 27%
- Gosforth Academy Newcastle-upon-Tyne · Good. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 63%
- Attainment 8
- 54.4
- Absence
- 18%
- Jesmond Park Academy Newcastle-upon-Tyne · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 55%
- Attainment 8
- 51.4
- Absence
- 17%
- Kenton School Newcastle-upon-Tyne · Inspected, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 40%
- Attainment 8
- 38.7
- Absence
- 31%
- North East Futures UTC Newcastle Upon Tyne · Inspected, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 34%
- Attainment 8
- 35.4
- Absence
- 40%
- Sacred Heart Catholic High School Newcastle-upon-Tyne · Inspected, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 54%
- Attainment 8
- 52.1
- Absence
- 22%
- St Cuthbert's High School Newcastle-upon-Tyne · Good. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 52%
- Attainment 8
- 49
- Absence
- 21%
- St Mary's Catholic School Newcastle-upon-Tyne · Outstanding. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 69%
- Attainment 8
- 58.9
- Absence
- 18%
- Studio West Newcastle-upon-Tyne · Inspected, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 28%
- Attainment 8
- 30.9
- Absence
- 37%
- Walbottle Academy Newcastle-upon-Tyne · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 58%
- Attainment 8
- 46.6
- Absence
- 29%
- Walker Riverside Academy Newcastle-upon-Tyne · Inspected, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 22%
- Attainment 8
- 35.5
- Absence
- 28%
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 Newcastle upon Tyne
10 of Newcastle upon Tyne'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.
- Gosforth Academy Newcastle-upon-Tyne C+ 24%
- St Mary's Catholic School Newcastle-upon-Tyne C 20%
- North East Futures UTC Newcastle Upon Tyne C 17%
- St Cuthbert's High School Newcastle-upon-Tyne C+ 16%
- Jesmond Park Academy Newcastle-upon-Tyne C- 14%
- Sacred Heart Catholic High School Newcastle-upon-Tyne C+ 12%
- Kenton School Newcastle-upon-Tyne D 7%
- Walbottle Academy Newcastle-upon-Tyne C- 7%
- Excelsior Academy Newcastle-upon-Tyne D- 0%
- Studio West Newcastle-upon-Tyne C —
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 Newcastle upon Tyne
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.