Stretford, Greater Manchester · Trafford
Stretford Grammar School
The only Trafford grammar that never converted to academy status — which is also why its DfE reference number looks decades older than its neighbours'.
Stretford Grammar traces to a 1923 girls' school and a 1928 boys' school that merged in 1986 onto the girls' school's rebuilt site — genuinely ambiguous enough history that we're not picking one founding year. It's one of five schools sharing the Trafford Consortium's GL Assessment test (with Altrincham Boys, Altrincham Girls, Sale, and Urmston — Loreto and Saint Ambrose College, Trafford's two Catholic grammar schools, sit separate tests of their own). Its qualifying score, 334 (324 for Pupil Premium), is identical to every other consortium school checked so far — a remarkably consistent pattern across four schools now. Administratively, it's the odd one out: unlike its neighbours, it never converted to academy status, which is why it kept a much older-looking DfE reference number while the others were reissued new ones on conversion.
Key facts
- Gender
- co-ed
- Age range
- 11-18
- Region
- North West
- Local authority
- Trafford
- DfE URN
- 106368
- Website
- https://www.stretfordgrammar.com
Admissions
- Admissions authority
- The school sets its own test and criteria
- Entrance test board
- GL Assessment, shared with four other Trafford Consortium schools (Altrincham Boys, Altrincham Girls, Sale, Urmston) on the same day. Loreto and Saint Ambrose College, Trafford's two Catholic grammar schools, are not part of this consortium and sit their own separate tests.
- Test format
- Two papers of about an hour each, assessing verbal reasoning, non-verbal reasoning and mathematics, age-standardised.
- Qualifying / pass mark
- A standardised score of 334 or above is required for eligibility (Pupil Premium/Service Premium candidates scoring 324-333 get an automatic review, recorded as 334R if upgraded) — identical to the published thresholds independently confirmed at Altrincham Grammar School for Boys, Urmston Grammar, and Sale Grammar. Reaching 334 makes a candidate eligible for consideration only; an actual place still depends on the oversubscription criteria below.
- Superselective?
- No
Its published 334/324 threshold is identical to every other Trafford Consortium school checked so far (Altrincham Boys, Sale, Urmston), so the raw score doesn't distinguish it from its peers. Its oversubscription criteria also place catchment-area residence, siblings, and Pupil-Premium-in-catchment status ahead of pure distance-rank, rather than admitting strictly by score across an open area. No source found describes Stretford, or any Trafford Consortium school, as superselective. A reputational claim that Stretford and Urmston are the 'least selective' of the group couldn't be traced to a specific citable source and isn't repeated as fact here.
Catchment & priority criteria
A priority area covering postcodes M32, M33, M41, M15, M16, M17, and M21 (spanning parts of both Trafford and Manchester).partly verified
The current admissions policy document carries a visible 'DRAFT' watermark despite being headed 'Ratified by Governors' — the content is corroborated by the school's separate non-draft admissions page and by sibling school Sale Grammar's published policy, so it's very likely accurate, but the source document's own draft marking is worth disclosing.
- Looked-after and previously looked-after children
- Children who were in state care outside England and ceased to be in care through adoption
- In-catchment Pupil Premium/Service Premium-eligible applicants
- Applicants with a sibling at the school in Years 7-11 at the time of admission
- Successful candidates living within the catchment postcodes
- Out-of-catchment Pupil Premium/Service Premium-eligible applicants
- All other candidates, by straight-line distance to the school
Results
| Year | Attainment 8 | GCSE 5+ Eng & Maths | Progress 8 | A*–A | A*–B |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 74.4 | sources conflict — 95.60% per one aggregator, 100.0% per another, both citing DfE tables; not resolved | Not calculated by DfE — no KS2 baseline data for this cohort nationally | 43.0% | 71.5% |
| A-level average grade B, average point score ~41.0 per entry. | |||||
| 2024 | 73.8 | 98.7% | +0.80 | — | — |
| This cohort predates the COVID-era Progress 8 gap. A-level average grade B, value-added score -0.01 ('broadly average'). | |||||
Ofsted
- Rating
- Good — an ungraded 2024 monitoring visit confirmed the school's existing rating from a 2015 full inspection; inspectors noted the evidence suggested the grade 'might be outstanding if a graded inspection were carried out now', but no such inspection has taken place since 2015, so Good remains the last formally graded rating.
- Date
- 20-21 March 2024
- Report
- Read the full report
Sources
- 1. DfE Get Information About Schools — URN, status (Foundation school), gender, capacity, LA — https://get-information-schools.service.gov.uk/Establishments/Establishment/Details/106368
- 2. Admissions Policy for September 2027 entry — https://www.stretfordgrammar.com/attachments/documents.asp?id=1
- 3. School's own admissions page — test provider, format, current-cycle dates — https://www.stretfordgrammar.com/page/?title=Admissions&pid=151
- 4. Trafford Council — confirms which schools share the joint entrance test and which sit separately — https://www.trafford.gov.uk/schools-and-learning/starting-school-and-admissions/starting-secondary-school/entrance-test-grammar-schools
- 5. Ofsted report, inspected 20-21 March 2024 — https://files.ofsted.gov.uk/v1/file/50246375
- 6. Comparator: Sale Grammar School's own September 2027 entry page — corroborates identical 334 qualifying score — https://www.salegrammar.co.uk/6731/september-2027-entry
Last updated 2026-08-30. Spotted something wrong? Tell us.