The School Record

Published admissions and inspection figures for schools in England, from the DfE, Ofsted and local authorities.

Wayland Academy

URN 137949 · Secondary · Academy converter · Norfolk

Merton Road, Thetford, IP25 6BA

How many families applied

Preferences expressed and offers made at Year 7, as published by the Department for Education. These describe demand. They do not indicate whether any particular child would be offered a place.

In the 2025 intake, 123 families named Wayland Academy as their first preference, and the school made 113 offers.

That is 1.09 first preferences per place offered, which places it above 71% of schools admitting at Year 7 in England that year.

More first preferences per place than 71% of comparable schools position among schools in England admitting at Year 7, 2025 intake

Little change. Across the 5 most recent years held, first preferences per place averaged 0.95 in 2021–2022 and 1.04 in 2024–2025.

Applications and offers at Year 7, 12 intake years
Intake 1st preferences All preferences Offers made 1st prefs per place
2025 123 150 113 1.09
2024 107 125 109 0.98
2023 109 123 112 0.97
2022 107 124 114 0.94
2021 113 124 118 0.96
2020 110 123 118 0.93
2019 98 117 110 0.89
2018 87 103 93 0.94
2017 99 114 101 0.98
2016 100 114 103 0.97
2015 123 139 123 1.00
2014 94 102 97 0.97

“Offers made” counts the offers the school made. It is not the number of places the school had, so please do not read it as one.

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), 11 July 2023

Overall effectiveness: Good

Quality of education: Good

Behaviour and attitudes: Good

Personal development: Good

Leadership and management: Good

Early years: 9

Sixth form / post-16: 9

Ofsted's report for this school

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 4 (GCSE)
YearAttainment 8Progress 8 Grade 4+ English & mathsEBacc grade 4+
2024/25 52.00 - 79.2% 37.7%
2023/24 45.30 0.61
likely between 0.33 and 0.89
63.2% 29.2%
2022/23 44.70 0.28
likely between 0.00 and 0.56
65.7% 31.4%

Progress 8 compares pupils here with pupils nationally who had similar results at the end of primary school; 0 is average. It is an estimate, and DfE publishes a range it is likely to fall within. Where that range spans zero, the school cannot be said to be above or below average.

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.

Census yearTeachers (FTE) Still there a year later Moved to another state school Left state schools Left in total
2024/25 31.9 30.9 0.0 1.0 3.1%
2023/24 28.7 25.7 2.0 1.0 10.5%
2022/23 28.9 20.7 1.6 6.6 28.4%
2021/22 28.9 26.7 0.2 2.0 7.6%
2020/21 30.9 24.7 2.0 4.2 20.1%
2019/20 31.5 28.5 3.0 0.0 9.5%

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

Norfolk publishes an admission zone for this school (Wayland Academy).

Covers: 622 live postcodes across 229.876 km².

Where it is

The shaded shape is the area the council published for Wayland Academy. Living inside it is not the same as being offered a place. Councils use these areas in different ways. Some use them to help decide who gets a place when a school is full. Some use them to decide who gets free school transport. Many use them for both. Check with the council which it is here. The edge is drawn to about 20 metres, so do not use it to judge a single house.

The 6 nearest secondary schools we hold figures for, by straight-line distance from Wayland Academy.

Nearby and related

Where these figures come from

This page was made on 9 September 2026. "Retrieved" means the day we downloaded the data. It is not the day the data was written, so the figures can be about an earlier year. How we compare schools.