Westwood High

Faith, low fees, and the strongest GCSE results in Oldham: Westwood High packs an unusual amount into a small site off Kelsall Street in Chadderton. This is an independent Islamic school that takes children from the early years through to the sixth form, run by the registered charity The Green Dome Academy and led by headteacher Khadija Khan. It spreads across four buildings on one site, a kindergarten, a preparatory phase, the high school, and a small sixth form, with roughly 340 pupils across the whole age range. The latest Ofsted report rated it Good in October 2023, a step down from the Outstanding it held in 2019. Its 2024 GCSE cohort placed first in Oldham, which is the headline most local Muslim families will come for. Annual fees sit far below the independent norm, which keeps a faith education within reach for ordinary households.

The defining fact about Westwood High is its scale. With around 340 children spanning ages 2 to 19, this is a school where staff know pupils by name and families are known to staff, and relationships between adults and children run strong and supportive right back to the early years. That continuity is the point of an all-through model: a child can arrive in the kindergarten and move all the way to the sixth form having known one community throughout. Few schools, independent or state, offer that uninterrupted arc on a single site.

Islam is woven through daily life rather than bolted on. A respectful culture permeates the school, with pupils who are kind, considerate, and quick to organise charitable projects of their own. Quranic studies, Arabic, and Islamic studies sit alongside the National Curriculum, so a child here studies wudu and Hajj in the same week as English and mathematics. Crucially, pupils are taught to respect difference and leave well prepared for life in modern Britain, a sign that the faith framing builds outward-looking citizens rather than a closed world. The school sits within The Green Dome Academy, a charity whose wider work supports the educational, cultural, and spiritual needs of the local Muslim community, and that mission is visible in the way service and charity thread through school life.

The intake adds its own character. Every pupil speaks English as an additional language, and the school draws from a settled, largely Muslim community in Oldham rather than a wide commuter catchment. The atmosphere is purposeful and warm, with pupils who arrive eager to learn and rise to high expectations. One detail tells the story of how the school actually works day to day. Registered with the Department for Education as a girls school, Westwood High in practice operates co-educationally for its youngest children, admitting boys from Nursery through to Year 6 before the secondary phase becomes single-sex for girls. The result is a kindergarten and preparatory phase that feel like a family setting, feeding into a more focused, single-sex environment as pupils grow.

For the GCSE phase, Westwood High is the clear local leader. The school ranks 583rd in England and 1st in Oldham, figures drawn from the proprietary FindMySchool rankings built from official data. That England position places it above the England average, within the top 25% of schools in England, which is a strong result for a school of this size and a striking one for the price. Topping its home borough is no small feat in a town with several well-regarded secondaries.

The strength runs deeper than a single headline. The 2024 cohort numbered just under 40 pupils at the end of Year 11, a small group by any measure, and they delivered results that lifted the school above the England average and to the top of the borough. The breadth is the encouraging part: this is not a school squeezing a narrow slate of easy subjects, but one holding firm across English, mathematics, science, languages, and the humanities. For a context where every pupil learns in an additional language, that breadth carries extra weight, and it points to a curriculum aimed at the kind of rounded academic profile universities and employers respect.

There is real distance travelled here. With every pupil learning in a second language and a small staff doing the heavy lifting across the whole curriculum, the borough's top GCSE position points to a school that gets more out of its cohort than its size or fees might predict. That is the kind of value-added story that does not show up in a glossy prospectus but matters enormously to parents weighing where their child will flourish.

A note of caution belongs here. The cohort is small, fewer than 40 pupils, so year-to-year figures will move more sharply than at a large secondary, where a single strong or weak group barely shifts the average. The 2024 result is genuinely strong; parents should simply read each year on its own terms rather than assuming one cohort guarantees the next.

The primary phase does not publish the Key Stage 2 results that drive standard primary rankings, so there is no comparable England position to quote for the younger pupils. What the school's record does confirm is that reading is prioritised from the start: children in Reception learn phonics systematically and read books matched to the sounds they know, and pupils across the school read widely and often. There is a flag here, covered in full below, that some staff lacked the depth of phonics knowledge to deliver the programme exactly as intended, which is the kind of detail parents of early readers will want to ask about.

The early years provision was judged Good at the last inspection, and the kindergarten is where the school's family character is most pronounced. With boys and girls together up to Year 6, the youngest children grow up in a setting that combines the National Curriculum's early learning goals with the rhythms of Islamic life, and the strong staff-pupil relationships that run through the whole school begin here. Parents of two- and three-year-olds should ask directly about session times, the funded entitlement, and how the kindergarten feeds into Reception, since this detail is not currently published online.

The sixth form is very small, with only a handful of students in any given year. No A-level grade breakdown is published, so there is no post-16 results ranking to report, and any single year's outcomes would rest on a tiny number of students, making percentages close to meaningless. What the record shows instead is a sixth form with a sharp focus on next steps: students receive careers advice and guidance, access work experience, and are supported to make well-informed choices about university, apprenticeships, or employment. Families considering the sixth form should treat it as a small, personal provision rather than a large college, and discuss the specific A-level subjects on offer, and how recent students have progressed, directly with the school.

Teaching at Westwood High is built on high aspirations and known relationships. Teachers set demanding expectations and pupils rise to meet them, achieving well across the school. Assessment is used purposefully: staff check what pupils know and use that to shape what they teach next, which is the mark of a curriculum that is taught rather than merely covered. In a small school, that feedback loop is tight, because the adult planning the next lesson is usually the one who marked the last piece of work.

Reading runs through the early years and beyond. Phonics is taught from Reception, and across the school pupils relish regular opportunities to listen to books read aloud, building the habit of reading for pleasure as well as for tests. Pupils with special educational needs, a small number here, are identified quickly and accurately, with staff adapting how they deliver the curriculum so those children can keep up rather than fall behind. The curriculum is also threaded with well-considered opportunities to help pupils understand the wider world, which matters for an intake that is tightly rooted in one community.

The picture is not uniformly settled, and Westwood High is honest territory rather than a flawless one. In some subjects the curriculum is less fully developed, with less clarity about what pupils should learn and when, which can leave some pupils struggling to recall earlier knowledge and to tackle more complex problems that depend on those foundations. This is a school improving from an already Good base, and curriculum sequencing in those subjects is the live work that leaders are addressing.

Internal progression is the natural path here. Because the school runs from the early years to the sixth form on one site, a child can move from kindergarten to the preparatory phase, into the high school, and on to Year 12 without ever changing community, friendship group, or set of expectations. That continuity is one of the strongest practical arguments for an all-through school: there is no jarring transfer at 11 to a much larger institution, and staff already know each child's history. Families should confirm with the school whether progression at each stage is automatic or subject to assessment, as the arrangements are not published.

At 16, the small sixth form gives students who stay a close, supported route through A-levels, with the careers guidance and work experience the school is praised for. At 18, leaver numbers are very small, the most recent reported cohort was just three students, so the school does not publish a meaningful breakdown of university destinations, and none should be inferred from such a tiny group. The honest summary is that this is a school whose published track record is strongest at GCSE. Post-16 destinations are best treated as a matter to discuss case by case with staff, who will know where recent leavers have gone.

Westwood High admits directly, not through the local authority, across its entry points: the kindergarten in the early years, the preparatory phase, Year 7, and the sixth form. Boys are admitted from Nursery to Year 6; from the secondary phase the school operates as single-sex for girls. As an independent school it sets its own arrangements, and because the school website is currently unavailable, families should contact the school to confirm current entry ages, any assessment, and waiting lists before making plans.

The faith dimension matters to admissions. This is a genuinely Islamic school, and families choose it for that ethos as much as for its results, so prospective parents should expect an environment in which prayer, Quranic study, and Islamic values shape the school day. There is no published distance or catchment measure to quote, since the school recruits directly rather than through coordinated local authority offers, so proximity is not the deciding factor that it would be at a state school. In practice the intake is local, drawn from Oldham's Muslim community, and demand is driven by ethos and reputation rather than postcode.

For the early years, entry is into the kindergarten from age two or three. The funded early years entitlement may be available to eligible families; for nursery fee details and to check eligibility, contact the school and see our guide to nursery funding. You can use the FindMySchool map to see how Westwood High sits relative to other Oldham schools and to save it to a shortlist alongside the alternatives you are weighing up.

Pastoral care is a clear strength, and it flows directly from the school's size and faith ethos. Pupils behave well, are kind and considerate, and understand the importance of helping others, organising charitable projects of their own. Relationships between staff and pupils are strong and supportive, established from the early years and sustained as children move up the school, so by the time a pupil reaches the high school the adults around them have often known them for years.

Personal development is handled with care. Pupils learn to understand their emotions and mental health and are taught how to keep themselves safe online, both essential in a phone-saturated childhood. Residential visits and extra-curricular activities are used deliberately to build confidence and independence, taking pupils beyond a tightly knit local community and into new settings. Inspectors judged safeguarding effective at the last inspection, and the school met the independent school standards in full, the baseline assurance every fee-paying family should check.

Staff wellbeing is part of the picture too, and it is more than a footnote. Staff hold highly positive views of working at Westwood High and value how leaders communicate with them and consider their workload. A settled, content staff body tends to translate into stability for pupils, fewer changes of teacher, and the long relationships that anchor the pastoral strength described above.

Enrichment at Westwood High leans on experiences rather than a long published list of named clubs. The strongest evidence is the use of residential visits and trips, which build pupils' confidence, independence, and a feel for the world outside their immediate community. For an intake where every child learns in an additional language and many come from a tight local network, those journeys do real developmental work, stretching pupils socially as well as academically.

Charity and service are a defining thread, and they set the tone of the place. Pupils here organise their own charitable projects, an expression of the Islamic value of service rather than a top-down initiative, and a sign that the school's ethos produces action rather than just assembly themes. This is enrichment with a moral spine to it, and it dovetails with the wider mission of The Green Dome Academy charity that runs the school.

The faith curriculum is itself part of life beyond ordinary lessons. Quranic studies and Arabic give pupils a second linguistic and spiritual track alongside the National Curriculum, and the rhythm of prayer and Islamic study shapes the week from the early years upward. Parents who want a fuller account of clubs, sports, and the arts should ask the school directly, since the website is presently offline and the published detail on these is limited; what is documented is a school that prizes experiences, service, and faith over a glossy activities brochure.

Westwood High operates from a single site on Kelsall Street in Chadderton, Oldham, with four buildings serving the kindergarten, preparatory phase, high school, and sixth form. Keeping every phase on one site is a practical advantage for families with several children of different ages, who can manage a single drop-off rather than a scattered morning run. Exact school hours and any wraparound or before- and after-school care are not currently published, so families should confirm these with the school, along with kindergarten opening times for the youngest children.

Travel is local in character. The school sits within Oldham and draws from the surrounding community rather than a wide commuter catchment, and as a direct-admission independent it has no coordinated transport scheme to quote. Parents weighing the journey can use the FindMySchool map to compare door-to-door distance against other Oldham options before deciding.

The website is currently offline. At the time of writing the school's site returns an error, so current fees, term dates, open events, and curriculum detail cannot be verified online. Contact the school directly for anything time-sensitive before making decisions, and treat any third-party figures with caution.

A small sixth form with no published results. The post-16 phase has only a handful of students and does not publish A-level outcomes or university destinations. Treat it as a small, personal provision and ask specifically which A-level subjects run, what the entry requirements are, and how recent leavers have fared.

Curriculum and phonics are work in progress. The last inspection found that some staff lacked the phonics depth to deliver the early reading programme as intended, and that a few subjects are less well sequenced, contributing to the drop from Outstanding to Good. The school is improving from a Good base, but parents of early-years and primary children should ask how this is being addressed.

The Islamic character is genuine and pervasive. Faith runs through the timetable, the values, and the daily routine. This is the school's great strength for Muslim families, but families uncomfortable with regular prayer, Quranic study, and explicit Islamic teaching should look elsewhere.

Westwood High is a small, faith-centred independent that delivers more than its modest fees suggest. Its GCSE cohort ranks first in Oldham and within the top 25% of schools in England, its inspection record is solidly Good across every judgement, and its pastoral culture, warm, respectful, and rooted in service, is a clear strength. The caveats are real and worth weighing: the website is down, the sixth form is tiny and unproven on paper, and curriculum sequencing in places is still being tightened after the slip from Outstanding.

It is best suited to Muslim families in and around Oldham who want an affordable, single-site Islamic education from the early years to GCSE, with strong relationships, a genuine faith ethos, and genuinely strong exam results at 16. Families seeking a large sixth form with a published university record, or those wanting a secular environment, should look elsewhere. The main thing to resolve before applying is simply getting current information directly from the school while its website is offline.