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Secondary education

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Original poster

St Albans boys

79 replies

jdr1234 · 06/01/2026 20:01

Ds sat the St Albans exam today, there didn’t look like there was more than 100 kids - I know there was yesterday as well but surely must be more than 200 kids sitting…anyone know? I assume there was only one session today as was 8.30-1.30.

OP posts:
SAmum26 · 29/01/2026 02:41

BarqsHasBite · 24/01/2026 18:50

My guess is they will make at least 2x or maybe 2.5x the number of offers compared with places. Most kids apply for 2/3/4 or more schools and go to only one of course. Quite a few from North London sit SAS and for many it’s a backup for the London schools which are more easily commutable. St Albans and Harpenden also have some excellent state schools with very small catchments, plus a number of people apply to Parmiter’s so again SAS may be a backup for those.

In addition they’ll have no idea how many girls will accept offers, so will likely over-offer to the girls to an even greater extent. I suspect all but the really poor scoring girls will have been taken through to callbacks so that may have upped the numbers.

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Thank you. Yes makes sense. And another resulting factor is more kids get more offers as schools over offer. Therefore St Albans may lose some of its applicants for whom they would have been a first choice school for to Habs for example as those kids this year may get in there….

BarqsHasBite · 29/01/2026 08:57

What I did this time last year is email SAS admissions and say “I appreciate it’s even more challenging than ever to work out how many offers to make. I know it won’t make any difference to your decision but just to let you know that SAS is absolutely our first choice and we will be accepting if we are lucky enough to receive an offer.”

While it is unlikely to make a difference you never know, it could just tip the balance if you’re borderline. They need to make the right number of offers to get bums on seats, and this involves them having to speculate about which candidates will accept.

violetisdoodoo · 29/01/2026 09:01

Not to be picky but It's St Albans School.
Not boys unless you mean verulam school.

St Albans School is fully co ed from year 7 from next September.

BarqsHasBite · 13/02/2026 18:02

I hope the news was good for you all today!

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