State secondary schools in West Northamptonshire
22 schools · East Midlands · 2024/25 Department for Education figures
West Northamptonshire has 22 state secondaries, 20 of them with sixth forms. 75.8% of families got their first choice last year, worse than most of England. Results run from 14.5% to 71.6% passing English and maths, a spread of 57 points, with a middle school at 42.2%, below England's 45.4%.
Of those Ofsted has graded, 2 rated Outstanding, 11 Good, 2 Requires improvement. 7 schools carry no overall grade at all — either inspected since Ofsted stopped issuing one in September 2024, or never inspected.
West Northamptonshire against England
State-funded schools, 2024/25
Getting a place
2026/27 secondary admissions round, across West Northamptonshire
75.8%
Got their first choiceof those who applied
England 84%
94.6%
Got one of their threefirst, second or third
0%
Got no offer at allfrom any preference
10%
Appeals upheld34 of 330 heard
These are figures for West Northamptonshire 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 West Northamptonshire's 21 schools, the share passing English and maths runs from 15% to 72%. That is a spread of 57 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.
West Northamptonshire 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 Elizabeth Woodville School Roade · 25 entries 96%
- 2 Weston Favell Academy Northampton · 23 entries 91%
- 3 The Parker E-ACT Academy Daventry · 30 entries 87%
- 4 Sponne School Towcester · 26 entries 85%
- 5 Malcolm Arnold Academy Northampton · 82 entries 79%
- 6 Northampton Academy Northampton · 54 entries 78%
- 7 The Duston School Northampton · 78 entries 73%
- 8 Northampton School for Girls Northampton · 125 entries 72%
- 9 Northampton School for Boys Northampton · 61 entries 70%
- 10 Caroline Chisholm School Northampton · 44 entries 70%
- 11 Abbeyfield School Northampton · 182 entries 60%
- 12 Chenderit School Banbury · 31 entries 58%
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 West Northamptonshire
Schools in neighbouring authorities are not in this list, because admissions run per authority. See bordering areas.
6 of 22 have no spare places. Sort the list, or narrow it first.
- Abbeyfield School Northampton · Inspected under the current report card, which gives no overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 42%
- Attainment 8
- 44
- Absence
- 22%
- Campion School Northampton · Inspected under the current report card, which gives no overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 52%
- Attainment 8
- 46.2
- Absence
- 22%
- Caroline Chisholm School Northampton · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 57%
- Attainment 8
- 50.4
- Absence
- 16%
- Chenderit School Banbury · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 53%
- Attainment 8
- 50
- Absence
- 19%
- DSLV E-ACT Academy Daventry · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 25%
- Attainment 8
- 37.2
- Absence
- 21%
- Elizabeth Woodville School Roade · Inspected, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 41%
- Attainment 8
- 44.9
- Absence
- 24%
- Guilsborough Academy Northampton · Requires improvement.
- Eng & maths
- 42%
- Attainment 8
- 46.6
- Absence
- 23%
- Kingsthorpe College Northampton · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 30%
- Attainment 8
- 39.6
- Absence
- 24%
- Malcolm Arnold Academy Northampton · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 38%
- Attainment 8
- 41.4
- Absence
- 22%
- Moulton School and Science College Northampton · Good. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 44%
- Attainment 8
- 46.1
- Absence
- 28%
- Northampton Academy Northampton · Outstanding. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 56%
- Attainment 8
- 52.1
- Absence
- 18%
- Northampton International Academy Northampton · Inspected, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 28%
- Attainment 8
- 36.4
- Absence
- 24%
- Northampton School Northampton · No inspection outcome published.
- Eng & maths
- —
- Attainment 8
- —
- Absence
- 8%
- Northampton School for Boys Northampton · Inspected, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 72%
- Attainment 8
- 58.2
- Absence
- 9%
- Northampton School for Girls Northampton · Inspected under the current report card, which gives no overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 53%
- Attainment 8
- 54.9
- Absence
- 13%
- Silverstone UTC Towcester · Requires improvement.
- Eng & maths
- 15%
- Attainment 8
- 31.1
- Absence
- 30%
- Sponne School Towcester · Inspected, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 55%
- Attainment 8
- 52
- Absence
- 15%
- St Thomas Becket Catholic School Northampton · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 32%
- Attainment 8
- 38.7
- Absence
- 27%
- The Duston School Northampton · Inspected under the current report card, which gives no overall grade. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 48%
- Attainment 8
- 50
- Absence
- 19%
- The Parker E-ACT Academy Daventry · Inspected, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade.
- Eng & maths
- 34%
- Attainment 8
- 38.9
- Absence
- 28%
- Weston Favell Academy Northampton · Good.
- Eng & maths
- 31%
- Attainment 8
- 41.8
- Absence
- 25%
- Wootton Park School Northampton · Outstanding. · no spare places
- Eng & maths
- 50%
- Attainment 8
- 53.6
- Absence
- 13%
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 West Northamptonshire
19 of West Northamptonshire's 20 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.
- Northampton School for Boys Northampton B- 27%
- St Thomas Becket Catholic School Northampton B+ 27%
- Campion School Northampton C 26%
- Northampton Academy Northampton C+ 25%
- The Duston School Northampton B- 23%
- Sponne School Towcester C+ 17%
- Caroline Chisholm School Northampton B- 12%
- Northampton School for Girls Northampton C+ 11%
- Wootton Park School Northampton C+ 11%
- Moulton School and Science College Northampton C 10%
- Malcolm Arnold Academy Northampton C 9%
- Guilsborough Academy Northampton C 9%
- Kingsthorpe College Northampton C 7%
- Chenderit School Banbury C 6%
- Weston Favell Academy Northampton D+ 6%
- Abbeyfield School Northampton C 0%
- DSLV E-ACT Academy Daventry C 0%
- Silverstone UTC Towcester C 0%
- The Parker E-ACT Academy Daventry D+ 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 West Northamptonshire
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.