Hope Academy
Academy · ages 11–16 · Church of England/Roman Catholic · no sixth form
In line with St. Helens across the board — 3rd of 9 for average grade in St. Helens.
Newton-le-Willows · St. Helens · one of 9 state secondaries
Summary
Hope Academy sits 3rd of 9 state secondaries in St. Helens for average GCSE grade. 56.6% of its pupils passed both English and maths, in line with the 56.7% managed across St. Helens. 32.5% reached the stronger grade 5 in both. Subject by subject it is furthest clear of St. Helens in religious studies and computer science, sat by 6% of the year,, and furthest behind in art, sat by 24% of the year. Ofsted: Inspected in November 2024, after Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade.
It is an academy of 1,235 pupils, taking ages 11 to 16. 30% of its pupils are eligible for free school meals, a high share by national standards, and 16.1% are on SEN support with a further 1.5% holding an education, health and care plan. 32.5% were entered for the full EBacc, about the same as St. Helens, and 10.9% took the separate sciences rather than combined. 22.4% of pupils missed a tenth of school or more, about the same as St. Helens, and 80.3% of its leavers went on to further education.
Subject comparisons are measured at grade 4 or above against St. Helens, and count as ahead or behind only where the gap is wider than the year-to-year swing that entry group would produce.
The school·St. Helens
Inspection
Graded by area
Inspected November 2024
- Behaviour and attitudes
- Good
- Leadership and management
- Good
- Personal development
- Good
- Quality of education
- Requires improvement
- November 2024 Full inspection
Ofsted stopped issuing a single overall grade in September 2024.
Attendance
22% of pupils missed a tenth of school or more, against 23% across St. Helens and 21% nationally. The comparators are the median secondary school, not an average.
GCSE · Key stage 4·2024/25
Attainment
57%
Passed English & maths grade 4+, an old grade C
in line with average
St. Helens 57% · England 65%
43.8
Average grade across 8 Attainment 8, out of 90
in line with average
St. Helens 41.8 · England 46.1
33%
Entered for the EBacc the academic core of subjects
in line with average
St. Helens 34% · England 41%
After Year 11
80% stayed in education, 5% started an apprenticeship (2022/23 leavers)
GCSE results by subject
2024/25 · share reaching grade 4 or above · a standard pass, the old grade C
Every bar is on the same 0–100% scale, so subjects can be read against each other as well as against the county and England. A dash means the figure does not exist rather than being zero. The county and England lines cover state-funded schools only, the same schools you can browse here, because independent schools sit outside the Department for Education's subject release and outside this site.
Compare these subjects against another school, side by side.
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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.
- The EBacc
- A combination of subjects rather than a qualification in its own right: English, Maths, the Sciences, a Language, and History or Geography. The figure shows the share of pupils entered for all the EBacc subject areas, so it gives an indication of how widely a school enters pupils for this particular combination of subjects.
- Progress 8
- A measure of how much progress pupils make between the end of primary school and the end of GCSE, rather than simply what grades they achieve. It takes pupils' prior attainment into account, making it useful for comparing schools with different intakes. Progress 8 is not published for 2024/25 because the pupils concerned did not have Key Stage 2 tests that can be used as the normal starting point.
- Percentage points
- The gap between two percentages. A subject going from 30% to 36% has risen six percentage points, though it has risen by a fifth. We write "pp" to keep the two apart.
- Why some subjects say nothing
- A year group is small. Where a gap is no bigger than the swing a different intake would produce, we say the subjects are level rather than dressing chance as a finding. Two kinds of subject carry no share at all: a vocational award has no 9-to-1 grade to report, and some qualifications are not published on the 9-to-1 scale for a given year group, most often community languages sat outside the school's own timetable.
- 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.
- 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.
School details
Ashton Road
Newton-le-Willows
Merseyside
WA12 0AQ
- Principal
- Mrs Marie Adams
- Trust
- The Liverpool Joint Catholic and Church of England Academies Trust
- Pupils
- 1,235 of 1,650 places
- Spare places
- 22%
- Free school meals
- 30%
- SEND
- 16% on SEN support, 2% with an EHC plan
- Separate sciences
- 11% of the year
- Progress 8
- Not published · last -0.23 in 2023/24
Other schools in St. Helens
8 schools. Distances are straight-line from this school.
- Outwood Academy Haydock 3.5 km
- St Cuthbert's Catholic High School 5.4 km
- St Augustine of Canterbury Catholic Academy 5.4 km
- The Sutton Academy 8 km
- Cowley International College 8.3 km
- De La Salle School 9.6 km
- Rainhill High School 10.2 km
- Rainford High School 11.7 km