Partially selective and bilateral schools in the UK explained

Partially selective and bilateral schools sit in the middle of the English state system. They're not grammar schools (where every place is selective) and they're not standard comprehensives (where no places are selective). They reserve a proportion of their intake (typically 10-30%) for children who pass a test, and fill the rest through normal admissions.

If you're applying for secondary school and one of these schools is on your shortlist, the test route is the bit many parents don't understand. This guide explains what each type is, how they differ, who runs the tests, and which schools to know about.

A partially selective school reserves a portion of its Year 7 places for children who demonstrate aptitude in a specific area (academic, musical, sporting, technological, language or arts), tested through an aptitude assessment. The rest of the places are filled using standard oversubscription criteria like distance, sibling priority and faith.

There are around 35 partially selective state schools in England (counts vary by source from roughly 31 to 37 depending on definitions), mostly in London and the south east. The way each school is allowed to select depends on when its arrangements were first set up. Schools that introduce new partial selection (or test for aptitude in arts, sport, modern foreign languages or design and technology) are capped at 10% of places under the School Admissions Code and the School Standards and Framework Act 1998. A separate group of schools that already selected on academic ability before 1997/98 are 'grandfathered': They can keep selecting at the level they did before the cap, which is why some still allocate 20-25% of places on academic ability.

A bilateral school runs two streams within one institution: a selective grammar-style stream and a non-selective comprehensive stream. Children sit a test to enter the selective stream, and the rest of the cohort joins the non-selective side under the school's standard admissions criteria.

Bilateral schools are rare and concentrated in a handful of areas, including parts of Berkshire, Devon, Essex, Lincolnshire and Warwickshire. They're a relic of older school structures and most have either become fully comprehensive or fully selective over time.

The simplest way to picture it is on a spectrum of selectivity.

A fully selective grammar school takes 100% of its intake by test. A comprehensive takes 0%. A partially selective school sits in between, typically with 10-30% of places allocated via test. A bilateral school looks more like two schools sharing a building, with one selective stream and one comprehensive stream running side by side.

It depends entirely on the aptitude being tested. Schools selecting on academic ability usually use a GL Assessment or CAT4-style paper covering English, maths and reasoning. Schools selecting for music will hold an audition with technical exercises and a prepared piece. Sports aptitude is usually a practical assessment of fitness, coordination and technical skill in a chosen sport. Languages and arts tend to use a mix of written tasks and interviews.

The key difference from a grammar school 11+ is that you're only competing against the small pool of children applying for the aptitude quota, not the whole cohort. The pass mark is usually set so the quota fills cleanly each year.

The best-known cluster sits in Wandsworth, south London, where several schools reserve a meaningful share of places for academic aptitude.

Burntwood School (girls) offers up to 71 academically selective places out of its Year 7 intake under its current admissions arrangements. Graveney School offers around 70 academically selective places. Chestnut Grove School reserves 30 places for art and design aptitude and 30 for languages.

Outside Wandsworth, Greenshaw High School in Sutton offers around 60 academically selective places. Mill Hill County High School in Barnet reserves around a quarter of its 2026 intake (Published Admission Number 243) for aptitude, split as 24 technology, 24 music and 12 dance places. There are similar schools in Manchester (parts of Stretford), Watford, Reading and other parts of the south east.

A common point of confusion: some London comprehensives have a tiny musical aptitude quota (often 6-10 places) but aren't usually thought of as partially selective. Technically they are. Check the school's admissions arrangements document for the exact figure before assuming.

You apply separately for the aptitude place, in addition to listing the school on your local authority common application form (CAF). The aptitude test is usually held in autumn of Year 6, with results out before the CAF deadline of 31 October.

If your child passes the test, you list the school on your CAF and you're considered first under the aptitude criterion when places are allocated on national offers day (1 March). If your child doesn't pass the test, you can still list the school: you'll just be considered under the standard distance, sibling and faith criteria like everyone else.

Sometimes, but it depends on the school and the aptitude. The total number of test-takers for a partially selective place is typically smaller than the pool sitting an 11+ for a county grammar, which can make the odds of passing the test feel better. The trade-off is that the quota itself is small, so even with a strong score there may be more qualified children than aptitude places.

For music, sport, art or languages, the candidate pool is usually smaller still and the quota fills based on assessed standard rather than a percentage cut-off. If your child has the aptitude in question, these routes are often a strong angle into a school you'd struggle to reach on distance alone.

No. Bilateral schools used to be more common in the post-grammar era of the 1970s and 80s but most have since converted to one model or the other. The handful still operating tend to be in counties that didn't fully abolish selection, and they vary widely in how the two streams are run day to day.

If you're considering a bilateral school, the practical questions are how integrated the two streams are (do they share lessons in some subjects?), how the selective stream is identified to students and parents, and whether the school's intake feels split or unified. These vary by school.

The number of partially selective schools has been broadly stable for the last decade. The 10% cap on new partial and aptitude selection (introduced under the 1998 School Standards and Framework Act) limits any school's ability to push further into selection without becoming a full grammar, which is politically difficult. The handful of schools with pre-1997/98 academic selection rights are allowed to keep them, but the rights aren't being extended to new schools.

In practice, parents most often encounter partial selection in London (Wandsworth, Sutton, Barnet, Bromley) and a few pockets in the home counties and the north west. If you're outside those areas, you may not have a partially selective option locally.