Barrowby Church of England Primary School

Primary school · Lincolnshire

Church Street, Grantham, NG32 1BX

About the school

Type of school
Voluntary controlled school, run by the council
Ages
4 to 11
Boys or girls
Boys and girls
Religious character
Church of England, Diocese of Lincoln
Nursery classes
No
Website
http://www.barrowby.lincs.sch.uk/
Telephone
01476 566121
School number (URN)
120513

From Get Information about Schools, retrieved 2 September 2026. Schools update their own entries, so these can be out of date.

How big the school is

In 2024 this school had 238 places and 239 children on roll.

It held 1 more child than its recorded capacity.

In 2018, 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023 the school had 246 children on roll on average, against 239 in 2024.

Places are the whole school added up, every year group together. That is not the number of places a school offers to new children in one year.

Source: Department for Education school capacity collection.

Children in each year group

As counted on one day in January 2026, the most recent school census. These are children, not places.

Children in each year group at Barrowby Church of England Primary School

Reception 34, Y1 34, Y2 34, Y3 34, Y4 34, Y5 36, Y6 3534Reception34Y134Y234Y334Y436Y535Y6
Source: Department for Education school census, January 2026.
Year groupChildren
Reception 34
Year 1 34
Year 2 34
Year 3 34
Year 4 34
Year 5 36
Year 6 35

This is not a list of spare places. Places per year group are not published, and the count is from January. Children join and leave all year, so a year group that looked two under in January can be full by March.

If you are moving into the area and need a place during the school year, ask Lincolnshire, which handles admissions for this school. They hold the up-to-date position, which this page does not.

Who decides who gets a place

Lincolnshire sets the admission rules for this school, as it does for all its community and voluntary controlled schools.

Look for Lincolnshire's admission arrangements. An admission authority has to agree its rules every year and publish them.

Taken from the kind of school this is, as recorded by the Department for Education. We do not hold this school's rules themselves: a summary of an admission rule is not the rule, and only the admission authority's own published arrangements are binding.

How to apply

Applications for a place starting in September 2027 close on 15 January 2027, the date the School Admissions Code sets for every council in England.

Councils send every offer for primary school places on the same day, 16 April 2027 or the next working day.

You apply through the council where you live, even for a school in another area. You do not apply to the school. Find your council's primary school application on GOV.UK.

If you live in Lincolnshire, the council's own page explains how to apply there. Lincolnshire school admissions.

To ask about visiting the school, or anything else about it, contact the school. Website: http://www.barrowby.lincs.sch.uk/. Telephone: 01476 566121.

Links and dates can change. Your council's own website has the final word. The dates are set nationally by the School Admissions Code 2021. GOV.UK link checked 23 September 2026. Lincolnshire's page checked 23 September 2026. Contact details from Get Information about Schools.

How many families applied

Preferences expressed and offers made at Reception, as published by the Department for Education. These describe demand, not whether a particular child would be offered a place.

In the 2026 intake, 35 families named Barrowby Church of England Primary School as their first preference, and the school made 34 offers.

That is 1.03 first preferences per place offered, higher than 77% of schools admitting at Reception in England that year.

More first preferences per place than 77% of comparable schools
Position among schools in England admitting at Reception, 2026 intake.

Little change in first preferences per place. Across the 5 most recent years held, first preferences per place averaged 1.32 in 2022–2023 and 1.21 in 2025–2026.

First preferences for this school changed little, from 45 a year in 2022–2023 to 41 in 2025–2026. Across all 269 schools in Lincolnshire admitting at Reception, first preferences changed little over the same years, from 6,803 to 6,498.

Counts of families, not places.

Across Lincolnshire as a whole, 96.3% of families applying for a primary place for September 2026 were offered their first choice, and 99.7% were offered one of the three schools they named. That is a figure for the council, not for this school. How the 2026 round went in Lincolnshire.

Compared with its own past

Fewer families than its recent average put this school first.

In 2026, 35 families put this school first. In 2021 to 2025 the average was 41 a year.

In 2026, 83 families named this school somewhere on their list. In 2021 to 2025 the average was 91 a year.

In 2026, 97 in every 100 families who put this school first were offered a place here (34 of 35). In 2021 to 2025 it was 82 in every 100.

In 2026, 0 of the 34 offers went to children living outside Lincolnshire. In 2021 to 2025 the average was 0 a year.

Each figure is compared only with the same figure at this school. "About the same" means within 10 in every 100 of the average.

First preferences and offers at Reception

Families naming Barrowby Church of England Primary School first, against the offers it made, for every intake year held.

First preferences from 58 in 2014 to 35 in 2026; Offers made from 52 in 2014 to 34 in 202630405060702014201620182020202220242026First preferences35Offers made34
Source: Department for Education, school-level applications and offers. Preferences count families. Offers count places given out on offer day. The vertical axis does not start at zero.
Applications and offers at Reception, 13 intake years
Intake 1st preferences1st choice All preferencesAny choice Offers madeOffers 1st prefs per placePer place
2026 35 83 34 1.03
2025 47 94 34 1.38
2024 38 78 34 1.12
2023 57 108 34 1.68
2022 33 97 34 0.97
2021 30 78 34 0.88
2020 37 83 34 1.09
2019 37 92 34 1.09
2018 45 87 34 1.32
2017 42 88 34 1.24
2016 49 92 34 1.44
2015 63 112 34 1.85
2014 58 92 52 1.12

“Offers made” is the number of offers on offer day, not the number of places the school has.

Source: Department for Education: school-level applications and offers, checked 14 September 2026. All sources.

Where families put this school on their list

In 2026 this school made 34 offers, and every one of them went to a family who had named it first.

A school is not allowed to treat a family differently because of where it sat on their list. The School Admissions Code says an admission authority must not give extra priority to children whose parents rank preferred schools in a particular order.

The order is used at the end, by the council, and not by the school. Where more than one school could take a child, the council offers the one the family put highest.

Leaving the other boxes empty does not change how this school considers an application. If none of the schools a family names can offer a place, the council has to offer one at a school that has room, and that school may be further away.

Source: Department for Education school level applications and offers, and the School Admissions Code 2021, paragraphs 1.9 and 2.11.

Ofsted

Ofsted changed its inspection framework: the current one publishes several graded areas and no single overall grade, while the previous one published an overall effectiveness grade. Each inspection below states which framework produced it.

Ofsted graded inspection (previous framework), 8 October 2024

Overall effectiveness
Not judged
Quality of education
Outstanding
Behaviour and attitudes
Outstanding
Personal development
Outstanding
Leadership and management
Outstanding
Early years
Outstanding

Ofsted's report for this school

Source: Ofsted: state-funded school inspections management information, checked 14 September 2026. All sources.

If you are refused a place

In 2026, families in Lincolnshire lodged 112 appeals about a primary school place.

71 of them were heard by a panel and 18 succeeded, which is about 25 in every 100 heard.

The other 41 did not reach a panel. Most appeals that do not are withdrawn because a place comes up first.

Reception is an infant class, and the law caps an infant class at 30 children. A panel hearing an appeal about an infant class can only agree in three situations: the place was refused by mistake, the admission rules were not applied properly, or the decision was one no reasonable council would have made. It cannot simply decide that the child should have the place.

Of the 33 infant class appeals heard in Lincolnshire in 2026, 8 succeeded.

This is a record of decisions already made. A panel hears one case at a time and decides it on what that family sets out, so these figures do not indicate what would happen in any particular appeal.

These count appeals about every school in Lincolnshire, not this school. Nobody publishes appeal figures school by school.

Source: Department for Education, admission appeals in England, reporting year 2026.

Waiting lists

Being refused a place does not end the application. Every admission authority has to keep a waiting list until at least 31 December of the school year the child would have started, and some keep them for longer.

A waiting list is not a queue. The rules say a child cannot be given priority for having joined it earlier, or for having applied earlier. The list is put back in order against the school's own admission rules every time a child is added, so a place can move further away as well as nearer.

Councils differ on whether a refused child goes onto the list automatically. The council that sent the refusal is the only place that can say which it does.

From the School Admissions Code 2021, paragraph 2.15.

Children with special educational needs

In January 2026, 8 of the 241 children here had an education, health and care plan. That is 3 in every 100. That is close to the middle for schools in England, where the middle figure is 4 in every 100.

A further 22 were on SEN support, which is help arranged by the school without a plan. That is 9 in every 100, against a middle figure of 15 in every 100 across England.

A school named in a child's education, health and care plan has to admit that child. That duty holds even when the school is full, and it sits outside the rules that decide who gets a place when there are more children than places. Which school is named is decided with the council while the plan is being written, not through the normal application.

Source: Department for Education, special educational needs in England, January 2026 census.

Who goes to this school

In January 2026, 27 of the 241 children here were known to be eligible for free school meals. That is 11 in every 100.

Fewer children are eligible here than at half of primary schools in England, where the middle figure is 20 in every 100.

English was not the first language for 2 in every 100 children here. Across primary schools the middle figure is 10 in every 100.

This describes the children who go to this school. It is not a measure of the school. Most children go to a school near home, so it is mostly a fact about the streets around it.

This matters when reading results. Across the 15,153 schools we hold 2024 key stage 2 results for, the fifth with the fewest eligible children averaged 70% reaching the expected standard in reading, writing and maths. The fifth with the most averaged 48%.

Those are averages of many schools all over the country. This school's own results are further down this page exactly as published.

Source: Department for Education school census, January 2026. Free school meal eligibility is counted for every pupil on roll.

Exam results

Published by the Department for Education for the whole year group. Figures for smaller cohorts are withheld by DfE to protect pupil privacy and appear here as a dash, not a zero.

Key stage 2: what these numbers are made of

Reaching the expected standard in reading, writing and maths.

Across the 3 years published, this measure ran from 76% in 2023 to 86% in 2022, a difference of 10 points.

Year 6 had 35 children, so one child is worth about 2.9 percentage points and that difference is about 3 children.

Half of schools in England move by 13 points or more across the same three years, so movement on this scale is ordinary rather than a sign of anything.

A percentage of a group this small says more about which children happened to be in it than about the teaching.

Key stage 2 (end of primary)
Year Expected standard in reading, writing & maths Higher standard Average reading score Average maths score
2024/25 79.0% 12.0% 106.0 106.0
2023/24 76.0% 18.0% 106.0 108.0
2022/23 86.0% 9.0% 106.0 107.0

Teachers staying and leaving

These come from the School Workforce Census, which follows each teacher into the next year. The numbers count full-time jobs, so a teacher who works half the week counts as half. They are not a count of people.

The share of teachers who left, each year

Counted as full-time jobs rather than people, and counting a move to another state school as leaving this one.

2019 17.1%, 2020 24.3%, 2021 12.3%, 2022 9.2%, 2023 10.3%, 2024 4.2%17.1%201924.3%202012.3%20219.2%202210.3%20234.2%2024
Source: Department for Education, School Workforce Census. The year shown is the census year; leaving is measured by where the teacher was a year later. A small school's figure moves a long way on one or two people.
Census yearTeachers (FTE) Still there a year later Moved to another state school Left state schools Left in total
2024/25 9.6 9.2 0.0 0.4 4.2%
2023/24 9.7 8.7 1.0 0.0 10.3%
2022/23 10.9 9.9 0.0 1.0 9.2%
2021/22 8.1 7.1 0.0 1.0 12.3%
2020/21 10.7 8.1 0.0 2.6 24.3%
2019/20 11.7 9.7 0.0 2.0 17.1%

This is turnover among teachers. It says nothing about the headteacher or the senior leadership team: DfE publishes leadership retention separately and we do not hold it by school.

Catchment area

Nobody publishes a catchment area map for this school that we can read. That does not mean an address is outside its area. It means we hold no map, so we cannot tell you either way.

Where it is, and schools nearby

The 6 nearest primary schools we hold figures for, by straight-line distance from Barrowby Church of England Primary School.

Nearby and related

Where these figures come from

Using this information

This is information only, not advice. It may have mistakes in it, or be out of date. Check with the school and the council before you decide anything. We collect these figures from official publications and check them, but mistakes can get through. If you find one, tell us.

Figures current as of 14 September 2026.

This page was updated on 5 November 2026. "Retrieved" is the date of our copy of each source, not the year its figures describe. How we compare schools.