The Grange School

The Grange School is an all-through school in Runcorn, part of the Wade Deacon Trust, serving a disadvantaged community with high proportions of pupils eligible for free school meals and pupils with SEND, including a resourced provision for autistic spectrum disorder. Safeguarding standards are met, and inspectors found the school is generally fulfilling expected standards, with early years judged particularly strong and achievement requiring attention. The school has a warm, inclusive culture where pupils feel happy, safe and well supported, and leaders have made meaningful improvements since the previous inspection.

Strengths

• Early years provision is highly ambitious, vocabulary-rich and nurturing, with a curriculum that prepares children well for key stage 1.
• Leaders have strengthened the early years curriculum and are relentless in checking provision quality.
• Children with SEND and disadvantaged children are identified quickly and supported through astute, impactful adjustments.
• Early writing, number skills and an expertly taught phonics programme help children build a love of reading.
• Behaviour expectations are very high, routines are embedded, and pupils are courteous and polite.
• Pupils know bullying and discrimination are not tolerated, and leaders deal with issues promptly.
• Safe havens and careful emotional-regulation adjustments particularly benefit pupils with SEND.
• The curriculum has improved across subjects and year groups, is well sequenced and allows pupils to deepen knowledge.
• Teachers know their subjects well and make meaningful adjustments for disadvantaged pupils and pupils with SEND.
• Inclusion systems ensure every pupil matters, with effective identification of barriers and strong work with external professionals.
• The specially resourced provision has high expectations and effective adjustments that help pupils access the curriculum.
• Personal development and wellbeing are embedded from Nursery to Year 11, including healthy relationships, online safety, British values and pastoral support.
• Careers support is appropriate and most pupils move on to suitable education, training or employment after Year 11.
• Staff love working at the school, feel leaders are mindful of workload and wellbeing, and value professional training.

Areas for Improvement

• Pupils do not attain as well as they should in national examinations at the end of key stage 4 and generally do not achieve as well as their peers nationally across most subjects.
• Pupils have gaps in their knowledge by the end of Year 11, partly because teachers historically did not routinely provide the right remedies.
• Disadvantaged pupils typically do not achieve as well as they could in national examinations from their starting points.
• Attendance rates remain below the national average, and overall absence and persistent absence are above national averages.
• Teachers' checks on what pupils know are not consistent across all year groups and subjects, leading to missed opportunities to plug gaps.
• Leaders do not consistently share positive practices between the secondary and primary phases, limiting improvement in some areas.
• Governors at times do not check the information they are provided with as robustly as they could.
• It is too soon to see the impact of leaders' recent focus on developing pupils' reading, writing and number skills across the curriculum.
• Key stage 2 mathematics outcomes have been below national averages in recent years.
• Key stage 4 English and maths GCSE results and Progress 8 scores have been below national averages.

Admissions: local authority offers data from the Department for Education. A school is oversubscribed when at least 5% of the families who put it first were not offered a place, and undersubscribed when everyone who put it first got in but 10% or more of its places were unfilled in the Department's school capacity survey (the latest survey is used for entry years it does not cover). Places: Department for Education, School capacity, from local authorities' annual survey as at 1 May. Each year is the one the school year ends in (2025 is 2024–25); the survey was not run in 2020. Places include sixth form places. Forecasts are the local authority's own for the school's planning area, an area it uses to plan places that is not the school's catchment area. The forecast starts from a head count in 2025; the dashed line is the Department's estimate of places in that area, including those the authority has firm plans for. Planned places are cumulative, and only those with firm plans are counted.

In 2024–25 pupils at The Grange School attended 89.2% of sessions (the national figure for secondary schools was 91.6%). 33.4% of pupils were persistently absent, missing at least one session in ten (nationally 23.4%).

Sessions missed

Pupils persistently absent

Source: Department for Education, Pupil absence in schools in England. Each year is the one the school year ends in (2025 is 2024/25). Persistent absence means missing 10% or more of sessions; severe absence means 50% or more. No figures were published for 2019/20.

In 2024–25, 11.9% of pupils at The Grange School were suspended at least once (nationally 7.3%). 7 pupils were permanently excluded.

Pupils suspended at least once

Source: Department for Education, Suspensions and permanent exclusions in England. Each year is the one the school year ends in (2025 is 2024/25). A pupil can be suspended more than once, so suspensions per 100 pupils can be higher than the share of pupils suspended. Very small numbers are hidden by the DfE. Exclusion figures dropped in 2020 and 2021 because of school closures.

In 2025–26 The Grange School had 15.9 pupils for each teacher (the national figure for secondary schools was 16.7). Of its teachers in 2024–25, 13.2% were no longer at the school a year later (nationally 14.1%).

Pupils per teacher

Teachers who left the school within a year

Source: Department for Education, School workforce in England. Each year is the one the school year ends in (2025 is 2024/25). Pupils per teacher counts full-time-equivalent pupils and teachers. Turnover is the share of a year's teachers (full-time equivalent) who were not at the school the following year, whether they moved to another school or left state-funded teaching. Turnover and sickness figures run one year behind the ratios. Sick leave is the share of teachers who took at least one day in the year, so it swings widely at small schools, where a few teachers can make it 0% or 100%. The national figures are for all state schools of the same type.

In 2025–26, 24.6% of pupils at The Grange School were on SEN support (nationally 14.1%) and 5.7% had an education, health and care (EHC) plan (nationally 3.5%).

Pupils by main type of need

Source: Department for Education, Special educational needs in England (the 2025–26 school census). SEN support is extra help in school without an EHC plan. National figures are for all state-funded secondary schools. Counts are as published, with small numbers not hidden.

In 2024–25 The Grange School received £9,836 and spent £9,537 for each of its 1,175 pupils. It ended the year with reserves of £1,967,000 (£1,675 per pupil).

Across all 9 schools of Wade Deacon Trust, income was £9,213 and spending £8,949 per pupil.

Income per pupil

Spending per pupil

Source: Department for Education, Financial Benchmarking and Insights Tool. Each year is the one the financial year ends in (2024 is 2023–24). Academy figures include a share of the trust's central services, shared out by pupil numbers, and are rounded to the nearest £1,000. Premises costs were defined differently from 2024, so compare them across that gap with care.

• Primary Schools
• Secondary Schools

All schools in Runcorn · Halton local authority: places and applications

The Grange School is part of Wade Deacon Trust, which runs 10 schools. The nearest others:

• Widnes Academy Widnes
• Weston Point Primary Academy Runcorn
• Wade Deacon High School Widnes
• Halewood Academy Knowsley
• Yew Tree Primary Academy Knowsley
• Oakdene Primary Academy Prescot
• Whiston Willis Primary Academy Prescot
• Sylvester Primary Academy Liverpool
• Hillside High School Bootle

What is The Grange School's Ofsted rating?

The latest Ofsted rating for The Grange School is Needs attention, from an inspection in September 2026.

When was The Grange School last inspected by Ofsted?

The Grange School was last inspected in September 2026.

How many pupils does The Grange School have?

The Grange School has 1,200 pupils on roll.

What age range does The Grange School cover?

The Grange School for pupils aged 3 to 16.

What are The Grange School's GCSE results?

In 2026 its average Attainment 8 score was 36.0, and 26% of pupils achieved grade 5 or above in both English and maths GCSE.

What are The Grange School's SATs (KS2) results?

In 2025, 53% of Year 6 pupils met the expected standard in reading, writing and maths.

Where is The Grange School?

The Grange School is at Latham Avenue, Runcorn, Cheshire, WA7 5DX.