My DS passed the Kent today with 377. We live in Bexley and wanted to know whether we would have a chance of getting in at Wilmington Grammar School for Boys or Dartford.

Is there a Top 180 score like Bexley that allows to secure a place at a Kent school based upon your score?

I know the horse has bolted and all that, but didn't you read the admissions criteria for both schools, on their websites, before you put your child in for the Kent Test? Kent County Council would have sent you a letter asking you to as well, when they sent you the information for the test.

The out of catchment score for DGS last year was 387, but obviously that might be different this year. Wilmington Grammar goes by distance, which changes each year, so depending on where you live in Bexley you might have a chance. They also have governor places which is the top 10% of applicants. Not sure what that score required would be but guessing over 400. It's worth contacting them to find out.

Good luck. It's always worth a punt for Wilmington Schools if you are in Bexley.

Not really.

They have a distance of 1.5m AND catchment parishes.

You will find that the last cutoff was around 5m but the local kids (2m distance) from Bexley were excluded as they are not in the listed parishes.

Hi BexleyResident1. Congratulations.

Last yr my dd was 2 points off Bexley, and passed kent comfortably. We live approx. 2.5 miles from Wilmington and were offered Wilmington girls on offer day, and she is very happy there. she uses the 601 bus to get to school, and after a bit of adjustment to make sure she was at the stop well before the first bus (as later buses can be full by the time it gets to us), she has not been late for school at all. Once the boys from her class got into Wilmington boys too on offer day. I haven't heard of anyone from her school who passed kent being unsuccessful for Wilmingon grammars. She has classmates coming from Thamesmead and Woolwich, so seems to be stretching well into Bexley.

I did ask at the Dartford girls open visits, whether they thought her pass mark was unlikely to get in (I believe that the eventual threshold was a fair bit higher than her mark) but they said they really can't tell year to year what the mark will be. In reality we preferred Wilmington so it wasn't a problem to us.

Looking at threads so far, it seems that the marks gained this year are generally higher, and with larger birth rates, I wouldn't expect the Dartford boys mark is likely to come down from last years that much.

Good luck with choosing, and the rest of the school year.

Sorry I should have said in case you didn't realise - we are Bexley residents also - not in named parishes, so distance alone does stretch into bexley.

Dartford GS cut off was 384 last year (387 the previous year) but barely budged after that - even by the end of September a score of 383 was a few places from the top of the waiting list. So always worth applying if you have free spaces on the form but Wilmington might be a better bet.

We are in the same situation DS scored 377 and we are a Bexley resident.
Going to take a punt at Wilmington I think.

Wilmington Boys governors places ranged from 374 to 401 last year. I've just got an email back from them.

As a Bexley resident with a DC last year who had a Kent pass I can confirm it’s not likely to get offered a place at the boys schools. We appealed and were unsuccessful also we were a shorter distance than some of the in county kent parishesb but still didn’t get an offer. It’s harder for boys to get a Kent offer than it is for girls in my opinion.

WGSB ‘Governors Places’ now given to the top scores in English (I think) so check their admissions criteria.
First year of this so no data.
What was his score in this?