Grammar Schools in Reading

Reading has two single-sex grammar schools, each independently selective rather than sharing one Reading-wide test. Kendrick School (girls, GL Assessment papers in English, maths, verbal and non-verbal reasoning) ranks candidates by aggregate age-standardised score, but geography acts as a hard gate on top of the ranking: only candidates within Kendrick's own "designated area" (parts of Reading and neighbouring districts, split into Priority Area 1 and 2) can ever be offered a place, however high their score. Reading School (boys) is a notable outlier in this whole project: it has already moved to FSCE Ltd (Future Stories Community Enterprise) as its test provider — the same organisation Trafford's consortium is only just switching to from 2028 — rather than the GL Assessment format used almost everywhere else researched. Reading School's test assesses multiple curriculum-linked elements (English, maths, foundation subjects and creativity), and a boy must reach the required standard in every element, not just overall, to be "eligible" at all; the actual eligible score itself is decided fresh each year and is explicitly stated by the school not to be comparable across years.