How many offers do London selective private secondaries over offer by at the 11+?

[todayortomorrow]

I'm trying to estimate how many offers the SW London secondary schools make relative to places. I can't find any facts but saw someone on here a few years ago say the Dulwich head said they made 100 offers for 70 places. We're looking at Alleyns, Emanuel & Kingston Grammar. They all have 5-8x applications to places but as we all know the kids are applying to multiple schools (say 4 on average?) and many kids get multiple offers.

ChatGpt reckons (based on v little) over-offers from 30-100% for these types of school which makes the odds less scary. Any thoughts/experiences/facts?

Wouldn't want to be the admissions team working out how to factor in VAT to acceptance rates this year!

It depends on the school. But the popular selective senior school at DC’s school currently makes no extra offers and just opened up a waiting list for year 7-9 entry. If they don’t hit their threshold they just go down the list.

They tend not to over offer but have waiting list, it depends on siblings that year. Heard some schools in previous years needing extra seats or new form due to over offer numbers. VAT is a consideration since some have very generous scholarships and bursaries compared to others eg. One Music scholarship with £200 off per term and free lessons vs a few music scholars with 20% off term fees, free lessons on 2 instruments, free music trips and lots of performances options.

Most over offer but won’t tell you by how much. You only need to look at some of the leavers info for local preps to see that they need to. I just looked at one in SW London for example. Last year it had 9 offers from Emanuel and 2 accepted and 13 offers from Ibstock with 3 acceptances. That is one non selective prep. Even the ‘more academic’ schools will be over offering as well.

This is a great point. I've just looked at Hornsby & Broomwood prep schools - on average they have 3 offers per kid to these types of school. With 2/3rds of those offers being rejected, the schools must be over-offering by a decent amount!

Yes they all over offer. The exact ratio of offers to places will depend on lots of factors.

The most sought after schools will expect to get a high % of acceptances so will not over offer by much. Especially if they are offering to lots of siblings or have other reasons for thinking acceptance is very likely (eg assurance from trusted preps that they are top choice). If they’ve miscalculated and had to create extra places in the past (like Alleyns two years ago), they will be more cautious as they can’t fit in another bulge year.

By contrast, the schools which know they are a “back up” school for many applicants will over offer by more, as they know the top slice will likely turn them down. They’ll often end up going to their waiting list as well.

VAT might be a factor as well though parents are well aware of it by now.

I don’t think there is any standard %, it will vary from year to year and school to school.

This kind of information is quite closely guarded, all the private schools like to give the impression of being in demand, and being in the private sector aren't subject to transparency requirements including FOI.

I suspect that pretty much all would make more than 2 offers per place. The very most popular might be a little below that figure but the least popular would likely offer at a very hefty multiple.

I recall KGS saying they offer double the number of places

Spoke to someone in the sector who said most schools over offer by 20-100%. School will decide year by year using historic data, number of applications, and their general “popularity”. The more competitive schools tend to only over offer by about 10%.

as a pp said, most kids sit 2-4 exams and receive multiple offers and some also apply for grammar school.

Totally depends on the school.

Look at the rate of destination school offers > acceptances for the prep schools, most publish this on their websites. So for offers to St Pauls Girls it's about 90% acceptances, hardly anyone would turn down an offer for there. Go down the list to SHHS and depending on the prep it's more like 50% acceptance of offers. Then go down the list to (for example) Queens College which is a wonderful school but is considered a backup school for many girls, and acceptances are often only 10% or less.