The Newark Academy
Academy · ages 11–18 · with a sixth form
Below average on 1 of the four headline measures — 25th of 44 for average grade in Nottinghamshire.
Newark · Nottinghamshire · one of 44 state secondaries
Summary
The Newark Academy sits 25th of 44 state secondaries in Nottinghamshire for average GCSE grade. 68.3% of its pupils passed both English and maths, in line with the 67.7% managed across Nottinghamshire. 47.3% reached the stronger grade 5 in both. Subject by subject it is furthest clear of Nottinghamshire in Spanish, sat by 9% of the year, and French, sat by 6% of the year,, and furthest behind in geography and music, sat by 7% of the year. Ofsted: Good in July 2019, confirmed in February 2025.
It is an academy of 1,164 pupils, taking ages 11 to 18 and running its own sixth form. 28.2% of its pupils are eligible for free school meals, and 11.2% are on SEN support with a further 2.4% holding an education, health and care plan. 21.5% were entered for the full EBacc, fewer than the 39.4% entered across Nottinghamshire, which is a choice about how broad a curriculum to push, and 14.1% took the separate sciences rather than combined. 19.5% of pupils missed a tenth of school or more, better than the 21.9% across Nottinghamshire, and 78.9% of its leavers went on to further education.
Subject comparisons are measured at grade 4 or above against Nottinghamshire, 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·Nottinghamshire
Inspection
Good
Last inspected February 2025
The grade itself is 7 years old.
- February 2025 Ungraded inspection Improved significantly
- July 2019 Full inspection Good
An ungraded inspection checks whether the existing grade still holds rather than replacing it.
That grade was given under the framework Ofsted used before September 2019.
Attendance
20% of pupils missed a tenth of school or more, against 22% across Nottinghamshire and 21% nationally. The comparators are the median secondary school, not an average.
GCSE · Key stage 4·2024/25
Attainment
68%
Passed English & maths grade 4+, an old grade C
in line with average
Nottinghamshire 68% · England 65%
47%
Strong pass in both grade 5+, a strong pass
in line with average
Nottinghamshire 47% · England 45%
45.4
Average grade across 8 Attainment 8, out of 90
in line with average
Nottinghamshire 46.8 · England 46.1
22%
Entered for the EBacc the academic core of subjects
well below average
Nottinghamshire 39% · England 41%
After Year 11
79% stayed in education, 7% 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.
English Language is the subject most of this year group sat. English Language tutors on Tutorperch.
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Sixth form · Key stage 5·2024/25
Sixth form
2024/25 · 35 A level students
C+
Best three A levelsthe grade a typical offer asks for
11%
AAB or betterat least two in facilitating subjects
in line with average
Nottinghamshire 13% · England 12.8%
94%
Stayed the coursefinished what they started
in line with average
Nottinghamshire 93.8% · England 95.7%
Applied general qualifications: average result Merit+, 16 students, 71.4% stayed the course. These are BTECs and similar, graded pass to distinction* rather than A* to E, so the two cannot be compared directly.
A level results by subject
2024/25 · share reaching B or above
After sixth form
Of the 3 students who finished, 68.2% went on to higher education, 2.3% to an apprenticeship, and 22.7% into work. 93.2% were in a sustained destination of some kind six months later.
Destinations are for 2022/23 leavers, the most recent DfE has published. The results above are 2024/25.
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.
- Grades not published
- Where a subject was sat by only a few students, the Department for Education publishes how many entered and withholds the grades, so that individual students cannot be identified from the figures. The subject is shown, because the school does teach it, but there is nothing to compare. Most A level groups are small enough for this to apply somewhere on a page.
- 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.
School details
London Road
Balderton
Newark
Nottinghamshire
NG24 3AL
- Head
- Miss Inma Pena
- Trust
- Nova Education Trust
- Pupils
- 1,164 of 1,380 places
- Spare places
- 18%
- Free school meals
- 28%
- SEND
- 11% on SEN support, 2% with an EHC plan
- Separate sciences
- 14% of the year
- Progress 8
- Not published · last +0.4 in 2023/24
Other schools in Nottinghamshire
43 schools. Distances are straight-line from this school.
- Magnus Church of England Academy 1.3 km
- The Suthers School 2.4 km
- Toot Hill School 16.9 km
- Tuxford Academy 20 km
- Colonel Frank Seely Academy 20.2 km
- South Nottinghamshire Academy 21.1 km
- Carlton le Willows Academy 21.2 km
- The Dukeries Academy 21.7 km
- Christ The King Voluntary Academy 22.9 km
- The Joseph Whitaker School 23.1 km
- Carlton Academy 23.3 km
- Arnold Hill Spencer Academy 23.3 km
- Redhill Academy 23.8 km
- The Garibaldi School 25.6 km
- Samworth Church Academy 27.4 km
- Rushcliffe Spencer Academy 28 km
- The West Bridgford School 28.6 km
- The Brunts Academy 28.6 km
- The National CofE Academy 28.7 km
- The Becket School 28.9 km
- The South Wolds Academy & Sixth Form 29 km
- Meden School 29.2 km
- The Manor Academy 29.4 km
- The Holgate Academy 29.7 km
- Queen Elizabeth's Academy 29.9 km
- All Saints' Catholic Voluntary Academy 30.3 km
- Retford Oaks Academy 30.9 km
- Outwood Academy Kirkby 31 km
- The Elizabethan Academy 31.8 km
- The Kimberley School 32 km
- Sutton Community Academy 32.4 km
- Ashfield Comprehensive School 32.8 km
- Quarrydale Academy 33.1 km
- Outwood Academy Portland 33.9 km
- Alderman White School 33.9 km
- Bramcote College 34 km
- Chilwell School 34.2 km
- Selston High School 34.8 km
- Hall Park Academy 35.5 km
- George Spencer Academy 35.8 km
- East Leake Academy 36.1 km
- Outwood Academy Valley 36.3 km
- Serlby Park Academy 43.8 km