Will eight grade 9s be needed for Tiffin Boys Sixth Form entry?

[IrishPetal]

Does everyone think you’ll need eight 9s to get into Tiffin Boys 6th form this year?

Loads leaving our local independent schools to try for Tiffin 6th form this year (post VAT) so am worrying the odds are smaller than ever!

I think the marks needed will depend a lot on what subjects you want to study. If going for humanities, languages and arts subjects then slightly lower grades will suffice - there will only be a small number of places on stem courses for new students so very high marks may be needed. Don’t know if this year will be be wildly different to previous as assume pressure from private VAT changes been there for a year or two already,

Do you meant they’re giving notice to the private school in the hope of a place, as that seems risky? What will they do if they don’t get in?

You can give provisional notice, so no risk at all

You can’t give provisional notice at all schools. They want to know if they will have spaces so they can offer to other candidates. If they have lots saying they ‘might’ leave it’s not helpful. More likely is that they will have to pay the Autumn term fees if they move.

Would agree that it’s easier to get into Tiffin if doing humanities.

Definitely not true at any of the schools I’m aware of!

A local outstanding state 6th form would be plan B.

This is interesting, thank you. Someone did advise us a while back to choose RE and German for the best chance! Sadly DS wants to do STEM. Alongside one undersubscribed arts subject, so who knows how that would place his chances!

I don’t think the VAT pressure has fully hit until this year - many people will have moved heaven and earth to keep their kids in their private school until the end of year 11.

Does anyone have recent experience or reflections on humanities and languages teaching at A Level at Tiffin Boys? My daughter has applied for Sept 2026 entry wanting to do humanities/ languages and is weighing up Tiffin Boys v staying where she is (obviously offer dependent!) so it would be great to hear any recent experiences

If they can no longer afford private they'd need to apply to whichever state school has places.

My son joined Tiffin last Sept. One of his friends got in to study maths, FM, Physics and Chemistry with 7 x 9. There are a few students with 6 x 9 who are not doing STEM subjects. Given that Tiffin gets 35% 9s at GCSE - so 3.5 per student on

we have kids in two different selective london day schools and neither give that option.

This was the grade 9 stats for 2024. Slightly flawed on that it’s all subjects taken but the numbers are not huge. They can ask….

Appx 1/4 of our private school GCSE cohort are openly applying for grammar spaces for A Levels (London area) and most from set 1, so doing at least 9 GCSEs at grade 8 or above. Dd is set 2 with 11 GCSEs 6+ but we won't be heading to London for A' Levels but applyibg to Grammar elsewhere. Only 5 pupils left straight after the VAT announcement so having about 40 pupils now choosing to leave and apply for Grammars shows to me their parents have eeked out as far as they can to keep them stable for GCSEs. I know some in Y10 doing the same as it hit on the cusp of them starting to chose subjects and kids had just settled into friendships groups. I am confident our school won't be the only private with figures like this.

@6thformoptions How do you know they are grade 8s? They have not got the results yet? The results I’ve posted show 9 or 10 GCSEs all at grade 9 are rare.

Going by predicted grades - that is what set 1 expects. It is a high performing school, which is why people pay for it, which is why I mention it as that will be part of the grammar 6th form competition for the next few years at least.

@6thformoptions But in the context of the results for GCSEs, 8 grade 9s is pretty unusual. So top set or not, not many get that in 8, 9 or 10 subjects and the op seemed to think 8 grade 9s would be required. From the stats, this seems too high.

The majority of external students to do stem at tiffin get straight 9s. Grades are slightly lower for languages and other subjects they need to ‘fill’. The majority of external entrants are girls as they generally out perform external boys.

DS wants to do economic, politics and either maths, a language or history.

How many 9s would he need for that?

So around 1300 dc get all 9s in the whole country - how many apply to Tiffin? I guess all the 9s must be in London and a large number within commuting range to this school. Although isn’t Tiffin boys separate from the girls?

Surely it depends on the offer? DS was offered 64 points from top 8 exams I.e. average 8’s. DS had one 7 but 5 nines which offset the 7.

Thing is everyone above is talking about the previous system where Tiffin gave out conditional offers earlier in the year.

This is the first year of the more brutal new system whereby you input your highest 8 grades achieved on results day. So it’s literally who gets the most 9s. For STEM at least. I know with less popular subjects you can get in with slightly lower grades

Our school has allowed this.

Our private school is very similar.

My DD, who wants to do STEM subjects was not offered a place at the competitive grammar - her predictions were 7-9 although she will probably achieve 8-9 but certainly not all 9.

Her more academic peers have had offers and less academic peers wanting to study English and humanities have had offers.

ETA - we are north London.

There aren’t any ‘offers’ anymore. It’s done by highest results on results day.