Entrance Exam Information

Please refer to our Key Dates page for the timetabled dates. 

Children who wish to sit the Entrance Examination must live within one of our Local Priority Areas.  Registration takes place when children are in Year 5 and is open between mid-May and mid-June.  We are unable to consider any registration requests after the closing date for registration.  Please do not send in any supporting material of academic aptitude/ability as we are unable to take these into consideration. Emails with exact timings and further details will be sent out before the end of the summer term.

The Governors’ Entrance Examination consists of three separate papers and are separated into Part I and Part II. These tests have been designed to identify the most able candidates and children of average or below average ability are likely to find them very difficult. The tests are considered to be valid, reliable and fair.

Part 1 – Verbal Reasoning 
A 50 minute multiple choice paper which consists of 80 questions and is provided by GL Assessment.  There are normally four test sessions spread throughout the day.

Part II – English and Mathematics (NB only children ranked in the top 325 of the Verbal Reasoning test will be invited to sit Part II)

English – A one hour comprehension paper which includes an extended writing piece – written internally
Mathematics – A one hour paper – written internally

Familiarisation Papers are available for all to view and additional sample papers are available to purchase. We strongly advise all children to look at these papers to familiarise themselves with the format of our tests.

Access Arrangements

Illness on test date:

Children that are indisposed on the test day (a medical certificate will be required where possible) or have religious reasons for being unable to attend (proof will be required) will be offered one further date to attend. Notification must be within 12 hours of the tests taking place.

A child may only take the Entrance Tests for admission to Year 7 once.

Part I Results

Once the verbal reasoning papers have been marked these raw scores are converted to an “age-standardised score” based on the child’s age in completed months. This takes into account that some children are very young in the year group and is carried out by the test providers. The candidates are then ranked in order of their marks.

Children ranked below position 325 in the Verbal Reasoning Test will be deemed by the Governors not to be eligible for consideration for admission to the school under the academic criterion and will therefore not be invited to sit Part II of the Entrance Examinations.

Children ranked within the top 325  (325 candidates) in the Verbal Reasoning Test will be invited back to sit Part II of the Entrance tests.  The results will be “age- standardised” and combined with the results from the verbal reasoning test to produce a total combined mark which will then be ranked accordingly. For further information please refer to our Admissions Arrangements.

Part II Results and Ranking

We will write to parents of candidates with a breakdown of marks, the ranked position of the candidate and the lowest ranked position we have been able to offer to in the last few years.  These letters do not constitute an offer of a place at the School but are given for information purposes only and may be helpful to parents when making their child’s school application. Parents who wish to apply for a place at Dame Alice Owen’s School must include it as one of their preferences when making their child’s secondary transfer application via their home Local Authority.

Please refer to our comprehensive FAQs list before contacting the school with any queries, as you may find the answer to your question here. This will enable our Admissions Office to deal with priority calls – thank you for your consideration.