Grammar Schools in Lancashire

What families in Lancashire need to know

• All four schools test on the morning of Saturday 26 September 2026. The choice between them is made at registration, months before any result is known.
• Lancaster's two schools sit that same morning under different providers and different content. Lancaster Royal (boys) uses GL Assessment and includes a verbal reasoning paper; Lancaster Girls' uses FSCE and tests only maths and English, with no verbal reasoning at all. Preparing for one is not preparing for the other.
• Lancaster Royal effectively guarantees its priority area: every boy from the Administrative City of Lancaster who reaches the qualifying standard is offered a place. It also holds boarding places, assessed separately, with a further sitting in January for late boarding entrants.
• No school publishes a pass mark. Each sets the standard after the papers are marked, based on how that year's cohort performed.
• Bacup and Rawtenstall says so in terms: passing the examination is not a guarantee of a place, because oversubscription criteria are applied afterwards.
• Clitheroe Royal runs a three-tier catchment, each tier split by Pupil Premium status, with straight-line distance as the tie-break.