Plymouth, Devon · Plymouth

Devonport High School for Boys

Its own admissions policy sets the qualifying mark to be exactly whatever the 180th-ranked candidate scores — designed to fill the school, not to filter far beyond it.

DHSB has taught boys since 1896 and is the only one of Plymouth's three grammar schools that is fully independent — unlike Devonport High School for Girls and Plymouth High School for Girls, which share a trust and a pooled test registration, DHSB is its own single-academy trust and sets its own test alongside external providers. Two papers (English and Maths) come from Quest Assessments; a third, testing composition and writing, is set and marked by the school itself. Its qualifying mark isn't a fixed bar — it's defined as exactly the score of the 180th-ranked candidate each year, built to fill the school rather than to select far beyond it.

Key facts

Gender: boys
Age range: 11-18
Region: South West
Local authority: Plymouth
Established: 1896
DfE URN: 136496
Website: https://www.dhsb.org

Admissions

Admissions authority: The school sets its own test and criteria
Entrance test board: Quest Assessments sets two external papers (English, Maths); DHSB itself sets and marks a third paper testing English composition and writing skills. The school's own legally determined policy names only 'an external assessment authority' without saying Quest by name — the provider is confirmed instead via the school's informal 11+ familiarisation page and corroborated by both other Plymouth grammar schools' sites.partly verified
Quest Assessments is named on the school's informal 11+ familiarisation page and corroborated by two sibling Plymouth schools' sites, but DHSB's own legally determined admissions document never names the provider directly.
Test format: Three papers, content capped at National Curriculum Year 5 level: an external multiple-choice English paper, an external multiple-choice Maths paper, and DHSB's own internally-marked composition/writing paper. For the live cycle, the two external papers are sat on two Saturdays in September.sources conflict
One secondary aggregator describes the English component as a take-home paper; the school's own page and other tutoring guides describe both external papers as sat under timed conditions. The school's own page is given more weight, but which Saturday carries which subject specifically for this school wasn't fully confirmed.
Qualifying / pass mark: No fixed numeric pass mark is published in advance. A candidate is 'Category A' (qualified) only if they score at or above the level of the 180th-ranked candidate on the external papers (180 being the PAN) and also meet a qualifying mark in DHSB's own English paper — recalculated fresh from each year's cohort rather than a fixed standard.
Superselective?: Noverify with school
A reasoned inference from the school's own admissions mechanism, not a label from any source. No reliable applicant-to-place ratio was found to test it further.

Catchment & priority criteria

No geographic catchment area — any candidate nationally may register and sit the tests on the same footing as a Plymouth resident. Distance from home to school is used only as the second-to-last of five tie-break criteria for identical marks.

Candidates with a Statement of SEN or EHCP naming the school (admitted before other criteria)
Looked-after and previously looked-after children who reached the qualifying mark
Children who were in state care outside England and ceased to be in care through adoption
174 candidates reaching the qualifying mark, by rank order
Up to 6 places reserved for Pupil Premium-eligible candidates reaching the qualifying mark
All other candidates reaching the qualifying mark, by rank order

Results

Year	Attainment 8	GCSE 5+ Eng & Maths	Progress 8	A*–A	A*–B
2025	69.3 (England average 46.1, Plymouth average 45.7)	94.4% (England average 45.4%, Plymouth average 46.2%)	Not calculated by DfE — no KS2 baseline data for this cohort nationally	31.2%	58.5% (headline figure; the school's own detailed table sums to 59.6% — see note)
179 GCSE candidates; 53.1% of all grades were 9-7. A-level (182 students, 510 entries): 31.2% grades A-A, 98.0% grades A-E. The school's own results document states 58.5% grades A*-B as its headline figure, but its own subject-by-subject table sums to 59.6% — an internal inconsistency in the school's own source, reported rather than resolved.

Ofsted

Rating: Good
Date: 17 October 2023
Report: Read the full report

Sources

1. DfE Get Information About Schools — URN, status, gender, capacity, LA — https://get-information-schools.service.gov.uk/Establishments/Establishment/Details/136496
2. DHSB Year 7 Admission Policy 2027/28 — admissions authority, PAN, categories, oversubscription criteria, tie-breaks — https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VR0SiF5w6mdq6gm7SW3EMpMRSuiCdJDr/view
3. School's own admissions landing page — https://www.dhsb.org/admissions
4. School's own 11+ familiarisation page — names Quest Assessments, format detail — https://www.dhsb.org/11-familiarisation
5. School's own results page — 2025 GCSE headline figures — https://www.dhsb.org/results
6. School's own results and destinations page — 2025 A-level headline figures — https://www.dhsb.org/results-destinations
7. Ofsted report, inspected 17 October 2023 — https://files.ofsted.gov.uk/v1/file/50235155
8. DfE Compare School Performance — 2025 GCSE results — https://www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/school/136496/devonport-high-school-for-boys/secondary

Last updated 2026-08-30. Spotted something wrong? Tell us.