Trafford grammar school place - pupil premium

[Sai35]

Hi all, apologies if this has been asked before, could anyone shed some light on how pupil premium criteria plays a part in trafford grammar schools admission? I understand pupils on pupil premium sit the exam and the pass mark is lower (?324) but is this only for candidates within the catchment area or are those students who are on pupil premium outside of catchment area also considered?

It's a bit more complicated than that. For example, altrincham grammar for boys allocate up to 20 places under criteria 2, for boys who are pupil premium and who live in the priority area and go to a trafford area state School, who score 324 or above. They then offer up to 10 places to pupil premium pupils who attend a Trafford state funded primary School with a score of 324 or above.

Pupil premium children who scored 324 and above, but who don't fall into either of those two categories fall in category five, behind all the other children who passed with the score of 334 or above.

Each school in the consortium has a different admissions policy, go to each school website and read in detail.

If you are not in catchment/close in distance for any, I would caution solely trying for a pupil premium place as their is a lot of competitive from Greater Manchester and beyond.

I would disagree with this, the PP places are often not even filled and for some of the schools override distance/ catchment/ passmark completely.

Apart from Sale Grammar (for which I am not actually sure the first PP criteria confers any advantage at all and should probably be removed).

I’m intrigued to know how you know PP places are often not filled? They 100% are at Urmston and I’d describe that school as less competitive than Altrincham/Sale schools.

They seem to have stopped doing the leaflet that they used to produce every year detailing the categories places were allocated into.

I concede this is probably out of date as my youngest is in year 9 but when I was in the thick of it the PP guidelines were tweaked as they weren't getting filled.

I am glad to hear that all the PP places are reliably being allocated.

My main point was that I would apply confidently from Manchester/ Stockport/ Warrington etc (assuming travel doable) if your child is PP and has passed the exam/s as they have a very good chance of a place.

All very interesting @SwayingInTimeI would still worry about the chance of getting in, but I guess it’s about managing expectations with your child. I’m glad we’re very close so there wasn’t that uncertainty.