Across Nottinghamshire, more than 10 thousand young children and their families are preparing for the first step in their educational journey.
The end of the current school year is now just weeks away, with the summer holidays set to begin later this month in most parts of England. Children will then head back for the beginning of the 2025/26 school year around the start of September, including thousands who will be entering the Reception class at a brand new primary school.
With this in mind, we’ve taken a closer look at the top-performing primary schools across the Nottingham City and Nottinghamshire County council areas, based on our own unique metric. The key figure it’s based on is the proportion of each school’s pupils who completed Year 6 in the most recently-completed 2023/24 academic year, who met the government’s expected standards in three essential school skills areas: reading, writing and maths.
But there are a lot of different things that can make a school an excellent place to learn, so we also made sure that each one included had a positive rating in its latest Ofsted inspections. These inspections are in the middle of some big changes, but we’ve restricted the list to schools with either a ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’ overall grade under the previous system, or positive ratings across all categories under the current one. This means their quality of education, student behaviour and attitudes, school leadership and management, and safeguarding practices have all met or exceeded government standards.
Here were the 19 local schools that came out on top:
1. John Blow Primary School
At the top of the list is John Blow, a local authority-maintained primary school in Collingham, in the Newark area. It has a roll size of about 170 pupils, and was most recently rated ‘good’ overall by Ofsted. In the 2023/24 school year, it was one of just a handful of schools nationwide where 100% of its pupils met the government’s expected standards in reading, writing and maths. | Google
2. Harworth CofE Academy
Next up is this Anglican primary academy in Harworth - near the border with South Yorkshire. It has about 203 pupils, and was most recently rated ‘good’ overall by Ofsted. In the 2023/24 school year, 93% of its pupils met the government’s expected standards in reading, writing and maths - compared to averages of 62% locally and 61% nationally. | Google
3. Bunny CofE Primary School
This is a local authority-maintained Anglican primary school in Bunny, in the Rushcliffe borough. It has about 108 pupils, and was most recently rated ‘good’ overall by Ofsted. In the 2023/24 school year, 91% of its pupils met the government’s expected standards in reading, writing and maths - compared to averages of 62% locally and 61% nationally. | Google
4. Forest Glade Primary School
Forest Glade is a primary academy in Sutton-in-Ashfield. It has a roll size of about 239, and was most recently rated ‘good’ overall by Ofsted. In the 2023/24 school year, 90% of its pupils met the government’s expected standard in reading, writing and maths - compared to averages of 62% locally and 61% nationally. | Google