Getting into Poole Grammar School
The Dorset/BCP Grammar Consortium 11+, set by GL Assessment: what it involves and what to do next, for entry in September 2027.
Every fact on this page is checked against the school’s published admissions information, and nothing is guessed. · View sources · Report an error
Registration for the September 2026 test closed on 12:00 midday, Friday 4 September 2026. 3 weeks to test day.
What to do and when
Sitting the year after (2028 entry)? These are 2027-entry dates, and yours are not published yet: there is nothing you need to do this far out. Sign up for reminders and tick the 2028-entry box, and we’ll email only when your cycle’s dates are out and it is actually time to act.
5 dates as a calendar file, for Apple Calendar, Google Calendar or Outlook. Share the link with anyone who needs them.
Life’s busy, so we’ll email you a nudge before each Poole Grammar deadline above. Nothing else: no newsletter, no marketing, and the reminders stop for good after National Offer Day (1 Mar 2027) unless you sign up again for another school.
The test
Poole Grammar sits the Dorset/BCP Grammar Consortium, set by GL Assessment.
GL Assessment sets the 11+ for most grammar schools in England, including this one. Papers are multiple-choice, and scores are age-standardised: children born at different points in the school year are marked against slightly different scales, so a summer-born child isn’t disadvantaged. Because GL is the most widely used format, familiarisation materials and practice papers in the same style are easy to come by.
Because GL is multiple-choice and age-standardised, the two things that move a score are accuracy under time pressure and covering every question type rather than the comfortable ones. PlusProgress practice is adaptive across English, Maths, Verbal and Non-Verbal Reasoning, so it keeps finding the types your child is weakest on instead of rewarding what they already do well, and mock papers follow the format this school sets. Progress is reported as a standardised age score, the same scale the school will use.
Boys are sorted into Group A (met the required standard) or Group B on the aggregate of the three papers. The pass mark is set after the papers are marked, and parents are sent it along with his scores. He may sit at Poole Grammar or at Bournemouth School, whichever suits.
How places are decided
180 places for September 2027. Reaching the required standard puts a child in the running; this order decides the rest.
Catchment: There is a priority area, not a barrier. Boys in the historic Borough of Poole, or in BH12 to BH18 and BH21 3, are ranked ahead of boys from further out with the same standard. Everyone else remains eligible, one band lower.
Boys with an EHCP naming Poole Grammar School who have achieved the academic standard required are admitted before preferences are considered.
All applicants must first be ‘eligible’, meaning they achieved the academic standard required in the school’s admission tests.
6 ranked criteria decide the order.
▸The full criteria, in the school’s own words
- 1.eligible boys who are ‘Looked After’ or previously ‘Looked After’, whether in England or another country;
- 2.eligible boys who live within the historic Borough of Poole or Poole postcodes BH12, BH13, BH14, BH15, BH16, BH17, BH18 and BH21 3-- and who currently receive Pupil Premium;
- 3.eligible boys who live outside that area and who currently receive Pupil Premium;
- 4.eligible boys who are sons of current members of staff employed at the school for two or more years at the time of application;
- 5.eligible boys who live within the historic Borough of Poole or those Poole postcodes and who do not receive Pupil Premium;
- 6.eligible boys who live outside that area and who do not receive Pupil Premium. The policy sets no quota or place count for any criterion.
Within each criterion places go to the highest scorers up to the published admission number; a tie for the 180th place is settled in favour of the boy whose home address is nearest the school, measured by BCP Council’s Geographical Information System along the shortest safe and practicable walking route, with random allocation by drawn lots if distances are still equal.
What an EHCP is: an Education, Health and Care Plan, a legal document from your council for a child with special educational needs. Where a plan names a school, that school has to offer a place, so those places are taken out of the number above before anyone else is ranked. It is not a route most families can apply through.
Taken from the school’s own determined admission arrangements. The full document is linked under sources.
How pupils here do at GCSE
This is based on how pupils at this school go on to perform in their GCSEs, five years after the 11+. Attainment 8 is their average result across eight subjects. Read it as a description of outcomes rather than of teaching: a selective school admits children who were already scoring well at ten, so a high position here reflects who the school takes in as much as what it does with them.
Scores from Compare school and college performance data in England, Department for Education, 2024/25, under the Open Government Licence v3.0. The Department publishes the scores and does not publish a ranking: the position above is ours, calculated over state-funded schools with a published score. See the full table.
One sitting, 4 schools
The same test also covers these schools:
Three weeks out is exactly when a timed mock helps.