Notre Dame School

Since 1937, a Georgian house set in 26 acres of Surrey parkland has been home to Notre Dame School, an independent Catholic day school for girls in Cobham. The senior school and sixth form together enrol around 410 students aged 11 to 18, kept deliberately small so that individuals are known rather than processed. Anna King has led as Senior Headmistress since 2013, and the school traces its ethos to Saint Jeanne de Lestonnac and the Company of Mary Our Lady, a Catholic teaching foundation more than four centuries old. Academically it sits well above the England average at both GCSE and A-level, but its signature is the arts: a 370-seat professional theatre and a performing arts programme with links to national training companies give this school a creative reach that outpaces its size.

Notre Dame is small by design, and that shapes everything. With roughly 410 students across seven year groups, teachers know girls as individuals, and the strong pastoral culture grows out of that scale rather than a policy document. The Company of Mary heritage matters here. Founded on the educational vision of Saint Jeanne de Lestonnac, the school frames its values as compassion, respect, tolerance and integrity, and its own language of care, mutual respect and belonging runs through daily life rather than sitting on a wall plaque.

The Catholic identity is genuine and woven in, not bolted on. A school chapel anchors the site, Mass and prayer punctuate the calendar, and Gospel values shape the pastoral programme and the culture of service. Yet the atmosphere is warm rather than austere. Leaders place equal weight on students' wellbeing, their happiness and their success, and that balance is the defining note: ambition held in tension with kindness.

There is a distinctly creative pulse to the place, and it is not accidental. A 370-seat professional theatre on site, three choirs, two orchestras and a performing arts programme tied to national training companies mean that music, drama and dance are part of the ordinary rhythm of the week, not occasional extras. Girls who arrive shy often leave able to hold a stage, and staff talk about confidence and boldness as outcomes they actively cultivate rather than hope for.

For families, the trade-off of a small school is real and worth naming. Girls gain visibility, close relationships with staff, and easy access to leadership and performance opportunities. What a 410-student school cannot offer is the sheer breadth of subject sets and social scale of a large co-educational independent. Notre Dame trades that breadth for intimacy, and does so knowingly.

The results are strong and consistent. At GCSE, Notre Dame ranks 402nd of 3,895 in England for GCSE results, placing it in the top 10.3% (ranked against all schools in England with published GCSE results, state and independent). On the FindMySchool overall measure, which blends results with an inspection score, it stands 386th of 3,887, and 3rd of the schools ranked in Cobham. These are proprietary FindMySchool rankings built from official data.

That standing rests on consistently strong grades across a full academic core of English, mathematics, the sciences, modern languages and the humanities, with 87 students completing Key Stage 4 in the most recent year. Girls here are not steered toward soft options; the school enters its cohort across the traditional academic subjects and gets results from them. Progress is strong over time, and it holds for girls with additional needs as much as for the most able, a pattern the sixth-form results go on to reinforce.

Sixth-form outcomes are stronger still. At A-level, the school ranks 238th of 2,562 in England for A-level results, the top 9.3%, and 2nd among ranked schools in Cobham; on the FindMySchool overall measure it sits 243rd of 2,561. Nearly half of all entries, 46.1%, were graded A* or A, comfortably ahead of the England average of 23.6%, and 86.8% reached A* to B against an England figure of 47.2%. Almost one in five entries, 18.4%, earned the top A* grade. For a school this small, that is a notably high ceiling, and it signals a sixth form that stretches its most able while carrying the middle of the cohort well.

Teaching is well planned and progress is strong across the school. The curriculum is broad and balanced, teachers plan lessons carefully and check understanding regularly, and examination results are consistently good over time for all girls, including the many with additional needs. The picture is of steady, methodical teaching that gets results rather than showy innovation.

Two honest caveats sit alongside that strength, and the school names both among its own development priorities. Feedback to girls is not yet consistent: some marking leaves students unclear on exactly how to improve, and at times girls are not pushed far enough beyond their comfort zone. Early entry to foundation-tier examinations can, in some cases, cap the grades available to a student. These are refinements at the margins of a school already performing well above the England average, and Notre Dame has been asked to sharpen the climate of academic aspiration so that every lesson reaches for the ceiling. Parents of very able girls should ask directly how setting and tiering decisions are made in each subject.

The teaching estate supports serious academic work. Science is taught across a suite of dedicated laboratories rather than converted classrooms, and a Learning Resource Centre and library give girls a proper base for independent study and research. The curriculum is broad through the middle years and specialises sharply at sixth form, where the range of subjects on offer is unusually wide for a school of this size.

Most leavers go on to university. Of the 2023-24 cohort of 24 sixth formers, 67% progressed to higher education, with a further 8% moving into other further education and small numbers taking apprenticeships or employment. Recent destinations recorded by the school include Exeter, Nottingham and Manchester, alongside medics and, in the most recent cycle on record, a student who won and took up a place at Cambridge. Given the size of the sixth form, Oxbridge and medicine entries come in ones and twos rather than in bulk, which is the expected pattern for a cohort of this scale.

Careers guidance is a genuine strength rather than a box-ticking exercise: a comprehensive careers programme supports informed decision-making, and the close staff-to-student ratio means advice is tailored rather than generic. The value of a small sixth form here is access. Subject groups are compact, contact with teachers is close, and the Extended Project Qualification gives ambitious students a route into independent research that universities value. Families weighing destinations should read the annual leavers list in context: a strong proportion to competitive universities from a year group of a couple of dozen is a genuine achievement, even when the absolute Oxbridge numbers are naturally modest.

The sixth form is small, at roughly 60 students, but the academic menu is not. Notre Dame offers 27 subjects at A-level, a breadth that lets girls build genuinely individual combinations. Alongside the mainstream sciences, mathematics and further mathematics, English literature, history, geography, economics and the modern languages, the list runs to Latin, Classical Civilisation, History of Art, Philosophy Religion and Ethics, Psychology, Sociology, Computer Science, Business, Food Science and Nutrition, and a full spread of creative options including Music, Drama and Theatre Arts, Dance and three strands of Art and Design in fine art, photography and textiles. Few schools this size sustain classics and history of art next to computer science and food science.

The Extended Project Qualification runs alongside A-levels, giving students a structured route into a piece of independent research on a topic of their own choosing, which is exactly the kind of self-directed work that strengthens a university application and prepares girls for degree-level study. Because groups are small, teaching is close to tutorial in feel, and sixth formers get a level of individual attention that larger sixth forms cannot match. The obvious flip side, worth checking early, is that a niche subject only runs if enough girls choose it in a given year.

Notre Dame is academically selective, and entry is by assessment rather than by proof of religious practice, which means the intake reaches well beyond practising Catholic families. The main senior entry point is Year 7 at age 11, with further intakes at Year 9 (13+) and into the Sixth Form at 16+. Girls already in the school's prep progress on the basis of continuous assessment rather than a separate examination.

The Year 7 assessment is thorough but humane. It combines a 60-minute online entrance test covering maths and verbal and non-verbal reasoning, a 30-minute creative writing task, an informal 10-minute interview and a short leisure activity, so that girls are seen as people and not just as test scores. The assessment day for September 2027 entry is set for 20 November 2026; families should confirm current dates directly with the school, as timings move year to year. A registration fee of £150 applies.

Sixth-form entry depends on GCSE performance, with subject-specific grade requirements for A-level courses; prospective students should check the thresholds for their intended subjects, particularly for the sciences, mathematics and further mathematics. The school does not publish a last-distance-offered figure, which is unsurprising for a selective independent that draws from a wide catchment across Surrey and south-west London rather than a fixed geographical boundary. Because places turn on the assessment, the practical question for most families is academic fit rather than postcode.

Pastoral care is the school's strongest suit, and the inspection evidence is unambiguous. At its 2024 ISI inspection, every regulatory standard was met, including the standards for students' physical and mental health and emotional wellbeing and for safeguarding. Safeguarding principles are embedded across the school, with all staff trained and alert to their responsibilities, and leaders take swift and effective action to support girls' wellbeing.

A well-considered PSHE programme, including relationships and sex education, builds tolerance, mutual respect, self-knowledge and self-confidence, and clear behaviour and anti-bullying procedures are applied consistently. Learning support is a genuine strength given the numbers involved: the school has identified 192 girls with special educational needs or disabilities, the large majority with mild specific learning difficulties such as dyslexia. The Learning Support team provides increased subject differentiation, personalised strategies, small-group support and drop-in subject help, alongside provision for students learning English as an additional language. That a school achieving in the top 10% in England also supports this many girls with additional needs, and posts consistently good results for them, is one of its quieter achievements.

The performing arts are where Notre Dame genuinely stands apart. At the centre sits the 370-seat professional Montaigne Theatre, a proper performance venue that hosts everything from nursery nativities to Year 13 productions. Around it runs the Montaigne Performing Arts Programme, built for girls serious about theatre, with partnerships reaching the National Youth Music Theatre, Italia Conti and Mountview Theatre School and routes into screen-acting and filmmaking qualifications. The separate Notre Dame Musical Theatre weekend school adds triple-threat training in singing, acting and dance, with termly performances and festival appearances. The alumnae make the point concrete: Olivier Award-winning actress Patsy Ferran and Ruth Wilson both passed through here, and the pathway from school stage to professional stage is a real one.

Music matches the ambition of the drama. The department runs three choirs and two orchestras alongside a concert band, string ensemble and jazz group, and specialist peripatetic staff prepare girls for ABRSM, Trinity and Music Theatre examinations. Facilities are built for it: a recording studio, a computer-based composition studio, a recital room and sound-proofed teaching and practice rooms mean composition and performance are taught in dedicated spaces rather than borrowed classrooms.

Sport benefits from the 26-acre site, where all the facilities sit on one campus. A 25m heated indoor pool, a 17m by 40m sports hall, a floodlit all-weather hockey pitch, four floodlit netball and tennis courts plus an indoor netball court, a senior gymnasium and dedicated cross-country, 200m and sprint tracks support a full fixture list in netball, hockey, cricket, football, tennis, athletics, swimming and rounders. The school fields multiple teams per sport, with netball running from A team through to E, so competitive sport is not reserved for a talented few.

The Notre Dame Musical Theatre weekend school extends the reach further still, opening its triple-threat training to girls from Year 3 to Year 13, current students and external participants alike, with weekly sessions in professional facilities and festival appearances through the year. It is a rare thing for a school theatre to double as a genuine training pathway.

Beyond the three arts and sport pillars, more than 100 clubs and activities fill the co-curricular timetable each week, from academic societies to creative and outdoor pursuits. The Catholic emphasis on service is not decorative: regular volunteering and charitable fundraising teach girls that contributing to wider society is part of the education, not an add-on. Chaplaincy and the life of the chapel give that ethos a spiritual centre.

Senior and sixth-form tuition is charged at £9,250 per term for Years 7 to 13 in the 2026-27 schedule, which works out at roughly £27,750 across the year, with lunches a compulsory termly extra of £425 in Year 7 and further optional charges such as LAMDA speech and drama lessons, individual music tuition and school coach travel billed separately. As with all independent schools, fees now carry VAT, so families should confirm the current inclusive figure with the school.

Financial support is a real part of the offer, not an afterthought. The school states plainly that no prospective parent should feel unable to afford a place, and means-tested bursaries are available to widen access. Merit scholarships are awarded at 11+, 13+ and 16+ across academic work, art and design, drama, music and sport, with a STEM scholarship added at 13+; each award is worth 10% of tuition fees per year, and a girl may hold more than one. A 20% sibling discount applies to the youngest child where three or more children attend at the same time. Bursaries are income-assessed help; scholarships are merit awards, and the two can be combined.

Notre Dame occupies a single 26-acre parkland campus centred on Burwood House, its Georgian main building, on Convent Lane in Cobham. The school does not publish exact daily hours online, so families should confirm the timetable and any before- or after-school arrangements directly. Transport is a practical strength for a school drawing from a wide area: a dedicated coach network run through the school's Vectare partner covers routes across south-west London and Surrey, including Fulham, Putney, Wimbledon, Richmond and Kingston, and Woking, Weybridge, Esher, Guildford, Leatherhead and Epsom, with several express services. Families weighing the commute can map their address against these routes and compare travel options using the FindMySchool tools before committing to a visit.

The Catholic character is real and pervasive. Chapel, Mass, prayer and Gospel values are part of the ordinary week, and the pastoral and PSHE programmes are shaped by the faith foundation. Girls of any faith and none are welcomed on academic merit, but families uncomfortable with regular worship and an explicit religious ethos should look elsewhere.

It is a small school, and that cuts both ways. With around 410 students and a sixth form of roughly 60, girls are known and stretched individually, but subject setting, the range of A-level combinations and the social scale are narrower than at a large independent. Check that your daughter's intended subjects run in the years she needs them.

Feedback and stretch are the school's own improvement targets. Inspectors found marking inconsistent in places and noted that some girls are not pushed beyond their comfort zone, and that early foundation-tier entry can limit top grades in some subjects. Parents of very able girls should ask how tiering and challenge are handled subject by subject.

Fees now carry VAT. At £9,250 per term before extras, the cost has risen with the addition of VAT. Bursaries and 10% scholarships genuinely offset this for some families, but confirm the current inclusive figure and the full list of compulsory extras before committing.

Notre Dame is a strong, small Catholic girls' school that does two things unusually well: it delivers results in the top 10% in England while running a performing arts operation, anchored by a 370-seat theatre and national training partnerships, that would flatter a school many times its size. Add genuinely embedded pastoral care, a serious learning-support offer, and a single 26-acre campus with real sports facilities, and the case is clear. It is best suited to academically able girls, and particularly those with a passion for drama, musical theatre or music, who will thrive in a close community that knows them by name and where faith and wellbeing are taken seriously. The main caveats are honest ones: the school is small, so subject breadth is limited; the Catholic ethos is central rather than incidental; and the school itself is still sharpening feedback and academic challenge. For the right family, those are easy trade-offs for what Notre Dame offers.