King Edward VI School Stratford-upon-Avon 11+ and 16+ Admissions: Test, Scores and Catchment

Entry into King Edward VI School, Stratford-upon-Avon depends on the year group applied for: boys join Year 7 by sitting the 11+ Entrance Test and meeting the school's oversubscription criteria, while the co-educational Sixth Form takes external applicants of either sex on GCSE results. The 11+ is a shared Entrance Test, run jointly by Warwickshire Admissions and The Grammar Schools in Birmingham, sat once in September and used to rank candidates against two priority circles drawn around the town.

There is no interview or group activity at either stage. Year 7 places turn on the test score and home address; Sixth Form places turn on GCSE points. Occasional vacancies also arise in Years 7 to 11, administered by Warwickshire Admissions on a first-come, first-served basis.

Entry points and places

King Edward VI School takes boys into Year 7 through the 11+ Entrance Test and opens its co-educational Sixth Form to external applicants of either sex on GCSE results, alongside occasional in-year places across Years 7 to 11. The Published Admission Number for Year 7 is 87, set by the Governing Body as the Academy Trust's Admission Authority and administered on the school's behalf by Warwickshire Admissions. The Sixth Form carries a Published Admission Number of 105 for external joiners, giving a planned Year 12 cohort of around 195 once the school's own Year 11 pupils are included.

• Year 7 (11+): 87 places, selective entry, boys only
• Year 12 (Sixth Form): about 105 places for external applicants, co-educational
• Years 7 to 11: occasional in-year vacancies handled by Warwickshire Admissions

How the 11+ assessment works

The 11+ assessment is the Entrance Test shared by the Warwickshire and Birmingham grammar schools, so a boy sits it once for every selective school his family lists. Warwickshire County Council's Admissions Service runs the test alongside The Grammar Schools in Birmingham, and the consortium also covers Ashlawn School's selective places plus the Walsall, Wolverhampton and Shropshire grammar schools. Candidates sit two papers, each around 60 minutes including spoken instructions and practice items, split into timed sections testing English, Verbal Reasoning, Non-Verbal Reasoning and Mathematics. Answers go on a separate scannable answer sheet, and there is no interview, group activity or school reference: the test score and the oversubscription criteria decide the outcome.

• Scores are standardised and weighted as part of the assessment process.
• Families tested in Warwickshire can ask for their raw score to be shared with the Birmingham consortium, and vice versa, producing two separate results letters with different qualifying scores

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Registration and the admissions timeline

Getting into Year 7 follows a fixed sequence set by Warwickshire Admissions, starting with 11+ registration and ending with a formal offer from the family's home local authority. The Automatic Qualifying Score and the lower Required Minimum Academic Standard are not fixed in advance: a Committee of Reference, made up of local headteachers and teachers, sets both once papers are marked, weighing the aptitude of that cohort against the Published Admission Number.

• Register online for the Entrance Test with Warwickshire Admissions, or with The Grammar Schools in Birmingham for Birmingham-based families, during the spring term of Year 5
• Sit the two-paper Entrance Test in a single allocated session in September of Year 6
• Receive the standardised score, together with the previous year's Automatic Qualifying Score and Required Minimum Academic Standard for comparison
• Apply for the school as one of up to six preferences on the home authority's Common Application Form, under the national equal-preference system
• Receive the outcome on National Offer Day through the home authority's coordinated secondary scheme
• Accept the offer within the window set by the home authority, or join the waiting list if the Required Minimum Academic Standard was reached without the Automatic Qualifying Score.

Catchment and oversubscription criteria

KES prioritises Year 7 places using two concentric priority circles measured from the Fountain in Rother Street, Stratford-upon-Avon, combined with the Entrance Test score. The inner priority circle has a 13-mile radius; the outer priority circle extends to the county boundary south of Long Compton. Within each category, ties are broken by straight-line distance from home to school and then, if distances are equal, by a computerised random draw witnessed by an independent member of Legal Services.

• Category 1: looked-after and previously looked-after children at or close to the Automatic Qualifying Score
• Category 2: up to 13 places for boys in the outer priority circle, including the inner circle, who attract the Pupil Premium through free school meals and reach the qualifying standard
• Category 3: up to 70 places for boys in the inner priority circle who reach the Automatic Qualifying Score
• Category 4: boys anywhere in the outer priority circle, including the inner circle, who reach the Automatic Qualifying Score
• Category 5: boys living outside the outer priority circle who reach the Automatic Qualifying Score
• Category 6: boys scoring below the Automatic Qualifying Score but above the Required Minimum Academic Standard, held on the waiting list

Sixth-form entry

Sixth-form entry turns on GCSE results; the priority circles do not apply beyond Year 11. External applicants need a minimum of 54 points from their best eight GCSE grades on the 9-1 scale, and confirmed places are only allocated once results are published in August. The school's own Year 11 pupils who meet the same standard progress automatically. External candidates apply online between the Sixth Form Open Evening and a deadline in early January, with late applications still considered up to the point GCSE results are published. Where the Sixth Form is oversubscribed, places are allocated to looked-after children, Pupil Premium pupils and remaining external applicants, subject to maximum class sizes in individual subjects.

In-year admissions and appeals

Occasional vacancies in Years 7 to 11 are administered externally by Warwickshire Admissions. Change-of-school applications are processed in the order they are received, with a random generator used to settle same-day applications. Children under 12 who have not previously sat the 11+ are tested using that same Entrance Test; once the Year 7 waiting list has closed, children aged 12 or over instead sit the school's own English and Maths tests. Every family refused a place, whether at the point of entry or in-year, has the right of appeal to an independent panel through their home local authority.

Where pupils join from

The school does not name partner or feeder primary schools: admission depends on the priority circles and the Entrance Test score, not which primary school a boy attended. Boys qualify from anywhere within the inner and outer priority circles drawn around Stratford-upon-Avon, an area stretching toward Redditch, Evesham, Shipston-on-Stour and the edge of the Birmingham and Coventry conurbation. Boys living outside the outer circle can still be offered a place if they reach the qualifying score and there are not enough children of the required standard living within the circles.

How to prepare

Preparing for the 11+ means building accuracy across all four tested areas, since the Entrance Test is sat once, under time pressure, with no interview to compensate for a weak section. With two papers of around 60 minutes each covering English, Verbal Reasoning, Non-Verbal Reasoning and Mathematics, timed practice matters as much as subject knowledge: children need to work quickly on the scannable answer sheet without losing accuracy. Warwickshire Admissions publishes a familiarisation booklet showing the test format and example questions, worth working through calmly well before registration closes, since the test cannot be resat and a late or incomplete registration is treated as a late application.

Related guides

• Warwickshire grammar schools guide
• Best grammar schools in the UK by GCSE results
• Grammar schools in England: the full directory
• Alcester Grammar School admissions guide
• Lawrence Sheriff School admissions guide
• Stratford-upon-Avon Grammar School for Girls admissions guide

Preparing for the King Edward VI School Stratford-upon-Avon 11+ with Taylor Tuition

Families preparing for the King Edward VI School Stratford-upon-Avon 11+ usually come to us a year or so before the assessment, though shorter runs work where the foundations are already sound. Having prepared pupils for entry to leading independent and grammar schools, with placements including Westminster, St Paul's, Wycombe Abbey and Eton, our tutors build each programme around the format the school actually uses, whether a written paper, an online pre-test, an interview or a combination of them.

More than half of our tutors hold Qualified Teacher Status and around three in five hold a master's degree or doctorate, and the pool includes former heads of department, exam-board examiners and teachers from independent and boarding schools, so the preparation is led by people who know how selective schools assess. Every tutor who works with children holds an enhanced DBS check.

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Read more about our 11+ entrance exam tutors, or send an enquiry and we will come back with tutor recommendations.