Varndean School

GCSE results 2024/25

On Attainment 8 this school is in the upper half of state-funded secondaries in England.

Compared with the fifth of schools whose intake is middle, which is where this one sits, it is in the top quarter.

Progress 8 2023/24

Progress 8 measures how far pupils moved between the end of primary and their GCSEs, which makes it far fairer than raw attainment. It is shown for 2023/24 because it could not be calculated for 2024/25: that year group would have sat their key stage 2 tests in summer 2020, when the tests were cancelled, so there is no starting point to measure from. Every school in England is affected, not just this one.

Getting a place 2026/27 entry

Slightly oversubscribed. Of the 350 families who named this school as their first choice, 73% were offered a place.

Places offered

279

for entry into Year 7

Named it first choice

350

First choices per place

1.25

England average 1.00

First choices offered a place

73%

England 88.5%

Demand has been broadly steady over three years.

These are offers made on national offer day for 2026/27 entry, from the local authority's co-ordinated admissions round. They exclude later movement — waiting lists, appeals and in-year admissions — so a school shown as oversubscribed may still have places by September.

Oversubscription measures popularity, not quality, and the two are not the same thing: a school can be heavily oversubscribed because of its intake, its faith designation or simply because the nearest alternative is further away. We do not publish catchment maps, because catchments are not published: each admissions authority applies its own criteria afresh every year, and the distance that got a child in last year is not a boundary. Read the school's own admissions arrangements for the rules that will actually apply.

Pupils

Pupils on roll

1487

Places

1500

How full

Nearly full — 1487 of 1500 places taken

Girls / boys

739 / 748

Overall absence

9%

secondary schools average 8.6%

Persistently absent

22%

secondary schools average 23.9% — pupils missing 10% or more of sessions

Free school meals, last 6 years

21%

England 25.7%

English as an additional language

9%

England 18.7%

With an EHC plan

6%

England 3.5%

On SEN support

25%

England 15%

School funding 2025-26 financial year

Not found for this URN in the 2025-26 release.

Evidence found

Not found for this URN in the 2025-26 release; this is not represented as £0.

Source coverage

DfE mainstream-school allocations for running costs for pupils aged 5-16, importer snapshot 23 August 2026.

What this means

The official mainstream allocation release does not provide a publishable row for this establishment.

What this does not mean

The school received no public funding or has no budget; other establishment types and funding streams use different publications.

Allocation is not expenditure. DfE says this release combines the schools block with several other revenue grants and excludes capital spending. Funding is shown for context and is never used in School Facts ordering, peer groups or quality claims. Source, licence and coverage.

Roads and getting there

Traffic volume is the context the collision count needs: a school beside a major road will record more collisions than one on a quiet street without being any less well run.

Every collision reported to the police within 500m of the school over the five years to 2024, from the Department for Transport's road casualty statistics. A high count usually says the school sits on or near a busy road, not that the school is unsafe — counts rise with traffic and with how built up an area is, and a rural school on a fast road may have fewer collisions but a worse one. Distances are straight-line from the school's recorded position.

What pupils do next

After GCSEs

In education, work or training

96%

England 91.4%

Stayed in education

94%

England 85.4%

Started an apprenticeship

1%

England 3.5%

Stayed at this school's sixth form

3%

No sustained destination

3%

England 5.8%

Pupils in the cohort

293

A destination counts only if it lasted at least six months, which is why these figures lag the exam results by a year. Small cohorts move these percentages a long way — check the cohort size before reading much into a gap.

The area around the school

Indices of Deprivation 2019, for the small area the school stands in. 1 means the most deprived tenth of England, 10 the least. The second measure counts only children living in low-income families, which is the one that describes the intake a school is likely to draw on.

What homes cost nearby

Median sale price

£487,500

postcode sector BN1 6 · 593 sales

Typical range

£300,000 to £788,750

middle half of sales

Detached

£1,055,000

Semi-detached

£990,000

Terraced

£693,500

Flat

£300,000

Homes around this school are among the dearest tenth of England.

Every residential sale registered in this postcode sector since January 2024, from HM Land Registry. A sector covers roughly 2,500 addresses. England's median over the same period was £293,000.

Who lives there

Adults with a degree

59%

England 33.8%

Adults with no qualifications

8%

England 18.3%

In professional or managerial work

22%

England 13.4%

Households deprived in 2+ ways

13%

England 17.8%

Residents in very good health

54%

England 48.4%

Housing

Owned by the occupier

87%

England 62.7%

Social housing

6%

England 17%

Privately rented

7%

England 19.2%

Detached homes

42%

England 38.2%

Four or more bedrooms

36%

England 22.5%

No car

12%

England 21.9%

Census 2021, for Brighton and Hove 004C and the wider neighbourhood around it. These figures describe the area, not the pupils — children may travel in from much further away, and for selective, faith and independent schools they usually do.

School details

Type

Community school

Phase

Secondary

Ages

Ages 11–16

Gender

Mixed

Admissions

Non-selective

Religious character

None

Sixth form

No

Nursery

No

Boarding

Day school

Headteacher

Headteacher: Shelley Baker

Register status

Open

Local authority

Brighton and Hove

Ward

Preston Park

Constituency

Brighton Pavilion

URN

114579

The unique reference number used in all official school data.

Official DfE record

Open the register entry

The source record for this establishment and URN.

The URN identifies this registered establishment. If a school converts or is replaced, DfE may issue a new URN; this page does not stitch different establishments together by a similar name.

Admissions history

The official school-level admissions releases contain up to 13 national-offer-day observations, from 2014/15 to 2026/27. The chart shows first choices per place; the table keeps the underlying counts.

These are annual observations, not forecasts. They exclude waiting lists, appeals and in-year admissions. Each series follows this exact URN only, so academy conversions and missing releases remain visible as gaps rather than being joined by name.

Nearest secondary schools

Schools like this

The 12 state schools in England whose intake most closely matches this one — same phase and sector, and as near as the data allows on size, disadvantage, SEN, English as an additional language and the deprivation of the surrounding area. These are the schools it can fairly be judged against.

Attainment 8 score. This school is ahead of the schools that teach a comparable intake.

Matching uses only characteristics a school does not choose. It is not a ranking, and a close match on intake does not make two schools interchangeable — sixth form, faith character, admissions rules and simple geography all matter and are not in the calculation.