State secondary schools in Shropshire
20 schools · West Midlands · 2024/25 Department for Education figures
Shropshire has 20 state secondaries, 5 of them with sixth forms. 91% of families got their first choice last year, better than most of England. Results run from 20.3% to 55.7% passing English and maths, a spread of 35 points, with a middle school at 37.9%, below England's 45.4%.
Of those Ofsted has graded, 13 Good, 4 Requires improvement. 3 schools carry no overall grade at all — either inspected since Ofsted stopped issuing one in September 2024, or never inspected.
Shropshire against England
State-funded schools, 2024/25
Getting a place
2026/27 secondary admissions round, across Shropshire
91%
Got their first choiceof those who applied
England 84%
98.3%
Got one of their threefirst, second or third
0%
Got no offer at allfrom any preference
32%
Appeals upheld19 of 60 heard
These are figures for Shropshire 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 Shropshire's 20 schools, the share passing English and maths runs from 20% to 56%. That is a spread of 35 percentage points, narrower than most councils.
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.
Shropshire 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 Sir John Talbot's School Whitchurch · 33 entries 67%
- 2 The Priory School Shrewsbury · 35 entries 66%
- 3 Oldbury Wells School Bridgnorth · 34 entries 65%
- 4 William Brookes School Much Wenlock · 24 entries 63%
- 5 Mary Webb School and Science College Shrewsbury · 67 entries 61%
- 6 The Lacon Childe School Kidderminster · 30 entries 60%
- 7 The Thomas Adams School Shrewsbury · 32 entries 59%
- 8 Idsall School Shifnal · 26 entries 58%
- 9 Church Stretton School Church Stretton · 23 entries 57%
- 10 Belvidere School Shrewsbury · 23 entries 57%
- 11 Lakelands Academy Ellesmere · 20 entries 50%
- 12 The Community College, Bishop's Castle Bishops Castle · 35 entries 49%
- 13 Meole Brace School Shrewsbury · 55 entries 45%
- 14 The Marches School Oswestry · 41 entries 44%
- 15 Ludlow Church of England School Ludlow · 30 entries 40%
- 16 Bridgnorth Endowed School Bridgnorth · 25 entries 32%
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Every school in Shropshire
Schools in neighbouring authorities are not in this list, because admissions run per authority. See bordering areas.
5 of 20 have no spare places. Sort the list, or narrow it first.
- Belvidere School Shrewsbury · Inspected, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 34%
- Attainment 8
- 39.8
- Absence
- 25%
- Bridgnorth Endowed School Bridgnorth · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 39%
- Attainment 8
- 44.4
- Absence
- 20%
- Church Stretton School Church Stretton · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 45%
- Attainment 8
- 46
- Absence
- 25%
- Idsall School Shifnal · Inspected, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 32%
- Attainment 8
- 41
- Absence
- 23%
- Lakelands Academy Ellesmere · Inspected under the current report card, which gives no overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 34%
- Attainment 8
- 43.1
- Absence
- 19%
- Ludlow Church of England School Ludlow · Inspected, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 30%
- Attainment 8
- 41.9
- Absence
- 26%
- Mary Webb School and Science College Shrewsbury · Good. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 38%
- Attainment 8
- 43.5
- Absence
- 27%
- Meole Brace School Shrewsbury · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 38%
- Attainment 8
- 44.6
- Absence
- 19%
- Oldbury Wells School Bridgnorth · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 44%
- Attainment 8
- 44.9
- Absence
- 23%
- Shrewsbury Academy Shrewsbury · Requires improvement.
- Eng & maths
- 20%
- Attainment 8
- 33.2
- Absence
- 25%
- Sir John Talbot's School Whitchurch · Good. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 48%
- Attainment 8
- 46.8
- Absence
- 24%
- St Martins School (3-16 Learning Community) Oswestry · Good. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 26%
- Attainment 8
- 36.4
- Absence
- 25%
- The Community College, Bishop's Castle Bishops Castle · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 35%
- Attainment 8
- 43.4
- Absence
- 25%
- The Corbet School Shrewsbury · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 45%
- Attainment 8
- 47.2
- Absence
- 23%
- The Grove School Market Drayton · Requires improvement.
- Eng & maths
- 28%
- Attainment 8
- 39.5
- Absence
- 22%
- The Lacon Childe School Kidderminster · Requires improvement.
- Eng & maths
- 40%
- Attainment 8
- 45.8
- Absence
- 25%
- The Marches School Oswestry · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 39%
- Attainment 8
- 43.1
- Absence
- 24%
- The Priory School Shrewsbury · Good. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 56%
- Attainment 8
- 52.7
- Absence
- 15%
- The Thomas Adams School Shrewsbury · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 36%
- Attainment 8
- 43.4
- Absence
- 19%
- William Brookes School Much Wenlock · Requires improvement.
- Eng & maths
- 38%
- Attainment 8
- 41.4
- Absence
- 27%
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 Shropshire
5 of Shropshire's 5 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.
- The Thomas Adams School Shrewsbury D+ 14%
- The Marches School Oswestry C+ 9%
- Sir John Talbot's School Whitchurch C- 3%
- Idsall School Shifnal C 0%
- The Grove School Market Drayton C 0%
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 Shropshire
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.