Greenacre School, Chatham Review 2026: Boys’ 11–18 secondary with shared sixth form pathways

A boys’ secondary serving Walderslade and the wider Medway area, Greenacre School sits within the Walderslade and Greenacre Schools Partnership (WGSP) and the Beyond Schools Trust. The partnership model matters here, because it shapes how students experience post-16, and it also underpins the school’s stated focus on personal development, employability skills, and structured routines across Years 7 to 13.

Leadership is clearly foregrounded in public-facing materials. The headteacher is Mrs Louise Campbell, and the school’s own welcome messaging emphasises a positive, aspirational culture and community expectations.

For families, the key practical questions are straightforward. How well does the school translate its partnership approach into calm classrooms and consistent behaviour, how well does it support students whose starting points vary, and how clearly does it map post-16 options for those aiming for university, training, or apprenticeships. The remainder of this review focuses on those decision points.

The school’s public materials lean heavily into a shared identity across WGSP, with recurring language about aspiration, respect, and resilience, plus a structured personal development programme that runs alongside the taught curriculum. For parents, that framing is useful because it signals intent, but it also sets an accountability bar. If culture is the product being offered, day-to-day consistency matters as much as strategy documents.

There is also a distinctive operational choice for a Medway context. The partnership describes an approach that combines single-sex teaching in Key Stage 3 with broader shared access across two sites, including sports and performing arts facilities, and social mixing across the partnership. The implication is that students can benefit from the focus that some families associate with single-sex classrooms, while still experiencing a broader peer environment through the wider partnership model. This is a credible “best of both” promise when it is implemented carefully, but it can feel disjointed for students who prefer one consistent site and routine. Families should look closely at how movement, timetabling, and supervision operate across the week.

Trust context is also part of the story. Greenacre School is listed as part of Beyond Schools Trust on Ofsted’s service pages, and WGSP’s governance page explains that trust-level responsibility is delegated locally through a local governing body structure. For parents, the practical implication is that improvement strategy, staffing approaches, and certain policies may be standardised across the trust, even as school-level implementation varies.

Leadership visibility is strong online. Mrs Louise Campbell is named as headteacher on the WGSP homepage, and government records list her as the headteacher or principal. In recruitment materials connected to the partnership, she states she was appointed headteacher at Walderslade in 2022 and is now driving change across WGSP. For families, that suggests the current leadership narrative is about stabilising culture and raising expectations through a partnership-wide model, rather than operating as a fully standalone boys’ school.

One further contextual point is important for interpretation. Ofsted’s page for the current URN shows no published report yet. That means families do not currently have a recent inspection narrative for the new establishment record, so it becomes more important to triangulate the school’s day-to-day reality through open events, behaviour systems, subject leadership visibility, and how clearly staff can explain what has changed in the last two years.

On GCSE outcomes, the most recent published performance snapshot in the FindMySchool dataset indicates a challenging picture. Ranked 3,708th in England and 5th in Chatham for GCSE outcomes (FindMySchool ranking based on official data), Greenacre sits below England average overall, and that aligns with the England percentile position shown.

The underlying metrics in that dataset reinforce the point. Attainment 8 is recorded as 32.8, and the Progress 8 figure is -1.04, a score that indicates students make substantially less progress than similar students nationally. The EBacc average point score is 2.76, lower than the England average shown (4.08). These measures suggest that the central issue is not just borderline grades, but consistent challenge around progress and secure learning across a broad set of subjects.

It is worth treating this as an actionable signal rather than a label. For parents, the implication is that you should ask direct questions about how teaching is improving in core subjects, how students who fall behind are identified and supported early, and how the school ensures that classroom behaviour supports learning time rather than eroding it.

At A-level, the FindMySchool dataset does not provide a usable grade distribution for this sixth form record, and the school itself points families toward Department for Education performance tables for the partnership’s sixth form routes. In practice, this means families should focus on the substance of post-16 provision, including subject availability, study support, and the clarity of progression routes, rather than relying on a simple headline grades narrative.

The school’s curriculum narrative is detailed and is framed explicitly around sequencing, retrieval, modelling, high-level questioning, and structured challenge. This is the right kind of language, because it describes classroom behaviours rather than abstract ambition, and it also gives parents concrete hooks to probe during visits. For example, if retrieval is a pillar, you should see consistent low-stakes checking of prior knowledge and clear correction routines. If modelling is a pillar, you should see worked examples and teacher thinking made explicit.

At Key Stage 3, the partnership publishes a two-week timetable structure with sixty-minute periods and an explicit distribution of curriculum time across English, mathematics, science, and foundation subjects, plus personal development. A long-period model can be effective when behaviour routines are consistent and tasks are well structured; it can also magnify disruption if expectations are not enforced tightly. That makes behaviour systems and teaching routines inseparable from curriculum quality.

At Key Stage 4, the published options list is broad and includes a mixture of academic and applied subjects, including areas such as engineering, health and social care, creative iMedia, photography, psychology, sociology, and travel and tourism, alongside more traditional arts and humanities. The implication for students is flexibility. A well-run options process should translate this breadth into coherent pathways, not a scattered timetable of unrelated choices. Parents should ask how the school prevents students from closing doors too early, particularly in English and mathematics resourcing, and how it supports those who need to keep multiple routes open post-16.

Post-16, the partnership sets a clear baseline entry requirement for sixth form. Students must achieve five GCSE passes at grade 4 or above, including English and or maths, with some subjects requiring higher grades. This is a standard threshold, but the important question is how consistently it is applied, and how well the sixth form supports students who arrive with a mix of grades and need structure to develop independent study habits.

Greenacre is a secondary with post-16, so the key transition points are Year 11 and Year 13.

For Year 11, the school’s public narrative places careers and employability alongside academic study. The partnership states it works with CXK for careers guidance through group sessions and one-to-one support, with exposure to employers and pathways including apprenticeships and higher education routes. For families, the implication is that the school is positioning itself as a practical route-builder, not just an exam centre. You should ask what this looks like by year group, for example, when work experience occurs, how provider access is organised, and how careers guidance is integrated into subject choices.

For post-16, WGSP frames sixth form as offering both A-level and applied general courses and highlights UCAS and apprenticeship workshops, application support, and careers advice. The school does not publish a quantified Russell Group or Oxbridge pathway in the materials reviewed, and the dataset does not provide usable destination percentages for this record. The sensible approach for parents is therefore qualitative due diligence. Ask which courses recruit strongly, how many teaching groups typically run per subject, what supervised study expectations are, and how students are coached through applications, including personal statements, interviews, and apprenticeship selection processes.

A practical positive is that the school explicitly addresses GCSE resits in English and maths in Year 12 for those who have not yet achieved grade 4. This matters, because it is often the difference between students staying in education successfully and drifting into repeated course changes.

Greenacre is a state school with no tuition fees. Admission for Year 7 is coordinated through Medway’s local authority process rather than direct fee-based entry.

For September 2026 entry across Medway, the local authority publishes clear dates. Secondary applications opened on 01 September 2025 and closed on 31 October 2025, with offers issued on 02 March 2026 and a deadline of 27 March 2026 for accepting or refusing offers, plus associated waiting list and appeal requests. These dates matter because late applications are typically handled after on-time allocations.

The school and council listings also show open events running as part of the Year 7 transition process. For the September 2026 intake cycle, open morning tours were scheduled across early October 2025 with a larger open evening on 02 October 2025, and both were advertised as not requiring pre-booking. Given the current date, those events have already passed for the September 2026 cycle, but the pattern is useful. Families considering later intakes can reasonably expect open events to cluster in early autumn, with specifics confirmed on the school’s own channels.

A final admissions detail is that Medway’s directory listing shows a published intake number per year group of 160 and confirms that no supplementary information form is required and no fair banding test is required. The implication is that this is not a selective entry model. For parents, the more relevant question is how quickly year groups fill and how movement is handled across the year through in-year applications.

Pastoral effectiveness at any secondary school rests on three operational realities. Behaviour expectations must be clear and consistently enforced, attendance must be actively managed, and students must know where to go when something goes wrong.

In the most recent published inspection for the predecessor academy at the same address, Ofsted judged the school Inadequate in March 2023, with Behaviour and attitudes and Leadership and management graded Inadequate. That matters for parents because it frames the improvement journey as substantial rather than incremental, and it reinforces why families should probe what has changed under the current partnership model and trust governance.

The partnership’s published approach to personal development is extensive, listing structured strands such as student leadership, careers benchmarking, equality and diversity themes, safeguarding, community service, and wellbeing-linked calendar events such as Mental Health Week. The implication is a school attempting to make the broader curriculum explicit rather than implicit. For parents, the right question is how these strands show up in weekly routines, tutor time, assemblies, and student voice processes, rather than as a poster list.

If your child is sensitive to inconsistent behaviour management, this is the area to prioritise in your due diligence. Ask to see the behaviour policy in practice during an open morning, ask how corridors and social times are staffed, and ask how the school communicates behaviour incidents and follow-up actions to families.

The extracurricular programme is unusually specific in published form, with a named timetable across the week and clubs that go beyond the standard generic list.

Examples include Dungeons & Dragons, BandLab, Pop Orchestra, Practice Room Hire, IDEA Badges, Cultural Art, Photography, and subject-linked support such as Maths Homework, plus a range of sports including basketball, football, rugby, badminton, and gender-specific options such as netball and handball for girls within the partnership activities listing. This matters because it indicates an attempt to offer “identity” clubs alongside sport, plus structured enrichment that can suit students who are not motivated by competitive teams.

There are also civic and character-linked activities embedded in the broader personal development strands, including Medway Youth Council and UK Youth Parliament references, plus Rotary Youth Speaks and Rotary Young Chef. The implication is that students who enjoy public speaking, structured competitions, or leadership roles may find a clear route to participation, particularly if staff actively recruit quieter students rather than relying on confident volunteers.

Facilities are hinted at through the published club locations, including sports halls, music spaces, a main hall, library spaces, and field use. For families, the practical question is participation. Ask how many students typically attend these clubs, whether transport home is an issue at 4pm, and whether there is targeted encouragement for students who would benefit most.

The school day is published with morning line-up and registration starting at 8:30 and the day finishing at 15:00. For working families, the key follow-up question is what supervised provision exists beyond 15:00 for students who stay on site for clubs or study, and how the school manages late-day safeguarding and sign-out routines.

Catering information is unusually transparent, with a published main meal and dessert price of £2.75 and a stated daily spend cap that can be adjusted by parental request. Parents should still budget for the broader secondary cost profile, including uniform, trips, and optional activities.

On transport, the site sits within Walderslade with road access not far from the M2 (junction 3 is commonly used for the area), and public transport routes into Walderslade typically connect via Chatham. One local directions source notes Chatham as the nearest train station with onward bus connections into Walderslade. Families should sanity-check real commute times at the time they would actually travel, particularly for winter-term timings.

• Academic outcomes require scrutiny. The published GCSE performance snapshot in the FindMySchool dataset indicates that progress and attainment have been significantly below typical England levels, so families should ask precisely what has changed in teaching routines, subject leadership, and intervention since the partnership’s current operating model was introduced.

• Inspection coverage is not yet updated for the current establishment record. Ofsted shows no published report yet for the current URN, so parents will need to use open events and direct questioning to understand day-to-day behaviour culture and safeguarding systems.

• Partnership operation may suit some students better than others. The model that combines single-sex Key Stage 3 teaching with broader partnership access can be a strength, but students who want one consistent site and routine may find it less comfortable.

• Sixth form decision-making should be evidence-led. Entry requirements are clear, but families should ask about subject viability, class sizes, and post-16 outcomes, particularly where published grade distributions and destination statistics are limited in the available sources.

Greenacre School is best understood as a partnership-based 11–18 option for Medway families who want a clear personal development framework, a published enrichment timetable with some genuinely distinctive clubs, and a structured sixth form route that keeps both academic and applied pathways in view.

The limiting factor is not the offer on paper, it is confidence in consistent classroom learning and behaviour. This is most likely to suit families who are prepared to do thorough due diligence through open events and targeted questions, and who want a local state option with post-16 continuity rather than a transition to a separate college environment.

Parents shortlisting should use FindMySchool’s Local Hub comparison tools to benchmark GCSE performance against nearby alternatives, and use Map Search to sanity-check travel times and day-to-day logistics before committing to the choice.