Iqra Academy

Faith and academic ambition are held in the same hand at Iqra Academy, an independent Islamic secondary school for girls on Enterprise Way in Westwood, Peterborough. It is the first full-time Islamic girls' secondary in the city, established to give local Muslim families an option where their daughters are educated within a clear set of values rather than alongside them. The school takes girls from the age of 11, with around 94 currently on roll against a capacity of 205, so classes are small and teachers know each girl by name. The National Curriculum and GCSE subjects run in parallel with Arabic, Urdu and Islamic studies, and the timetable folds in daily prayer and an evening Madrasah. In its July 2025 Ofsted inspection the school was judged Good, with the strongest possible marks for behaviour, personal development and leadership.

The defining quality here is calm. Girls move through the day with a settled, purposeful confidence, and behaviour is a genuine strength, holding the highest grade in the most recent inspection. Girls carry themselves with a quiet confidence and speak with real clarity, driven by a visible desire to do well both academically and as people, and that drive is woven into the fabric of the place rather than printed on a poster. What emerges from every account of the school is how thoroughly ambition and mutual respect have become the operating culture rather than aspirations on a wall, and it shows in the small things: girls speaking up in lessons, taking responsibility without being asked, and treating the school as theirs to shape.

The school's character is rooted in its origins. It was set up as the first full-time Islamic girls' secondary in Peterborough by local Muslim families and a community education charity, and that founding intent, to provide a serious academic education without asking girls to leave their faith at the school gate, still drives the place. The proprietor and leaders maintain high engagement with the wider community, local schools and parents, and the sense of community ownership runs deeper than at most schools because the families who use it helped create it.

What gives the school its texture is the seamlessness of faith and study. Religious education and Islamiyat are fully timetabled by specialist teachers from Year 7 onward, Arabic is taught as a living language rather than only as scripture, and Friday prayers at 12:30 are open to parents and the wider community. The aim, in the school's own words, is to develop well-educated, well-mannered, pious young Muslim women, and the day is built around that goal: secular lessons, enrichment and an evening Madrasah sit under one roof on one schedule, so a girl's academic and religious education are not competing for her time but plaited together.

Leadership sets the tone. Principal Dr Michael Wright, a former British police detective who holds a doctorate in law, has chaired the leadership team since 2016 and was named Head Teacher of the Year at the Association of Muslim Schools interfaith awards. His background outside education is unusual for a school head, taking in a senior education role at the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic organising committee, and he chairs education bodies for the Muslim community in Peterborough and across the East Midlands. Under his leadership the school has built genuine reach into the local community, working with other Peterborough schools and with families, and staff are valued and developed effectively so that the whole team shares the school's ambition. That confidence filters down to the girls, who develop a clear and articulate sense of their own and other faiths.

For GCSE outcomes, Iqra Academy is ranked 1,285th in England and 3rd within Peterborough, a proprietary FindMySchool ranking built from official results. That places the school in solid territory, in line with the middle 35% of schools in England, which is a creditable position for a small independent working with a comprehensive intake rather than a selected one. The local ranking is the more telling figure for Peterborough families: third in the city is a strong standing for a school of this size, and it is the number worth weighing against the much larger secondaries nearby.

The academic spread is deliberately broad for a small cohort. English, mathematics and the sciences form the core, sitting beside Arabic, Urdu, religious education and a run of foundation subjects that includes history, geography, computer science and IT, art and design, citizenship, and project work taking in food and textiles. Girls make their GCSE choices in Year 9 with guidance from careers staff, and the curriculum carries vocational qualifications alongside the academic GCSEs, so the offer flexes to suit different strengths within a single year group of around a dozen or so leavers. That flexibility matters in a small school: rather than force every girl down one academic track, the school can match qualifications to the individual.

Languages and religious studies have been a particular strength of the offer, reflecting the substantial time given to Arabic, Urdu and Islamiyat across the week. The bilingual and trilingual reality of many families here is treated as an asset rather than an afterthought, with formal qualifications in community languages giving girls something concrete to show for skills they often arrive with. It is a sensible piece of curriculum design: it plays to the cohort's strengths while still holding the line on the core academic subjects.

Skilful teaching and pupils' own commitment secure achievement across most subjects, and the curriculum is broad and ambitious with effective checks on what girls have understood. The one qualification, and it is an honest one, is that in a small number of foundation subjects the teaching does not yet consistently stretch every pupil to deepen her knowledge, which the school has rightly identified as its next area of focus. For most parents, the headline is the combination of a broad academic curriculum and a strong third-in-city local ranking achieved with small, unselected year groups.

Teaching is led by subject specialists with strong command of their material, and they explain concepts clearly and prepare girls exceptionally well for the next stage of their education. Deputy Head Nasiba Zaib, a mathematics specialist who holds a degree in accounting and finance and a PGCE in mathematics, anchors the academic side, and the small class sizes mean teachers can track each girl closely rather than teach to the middle of a large room. With a year group of a handful of girls rather than dozens, gaps in understanding are caught early and addressed individually, which is one of the genuine advantages of a school this size.

Reading is a particular priority. Girls read often and widely, and those who are not yet fluent or confident receive targeted support so that weak reading does not hold back progress elsewhere. The logic is sound: a girl who reads with confidence accesses the rest of the curriculum, so the investment in reading pays forward into every subject she studies.

Provision for pupils with special educational needs and disabilities is a clear strength and is genuinely exceptional. Individual needs are identified accurately, support is tailored to the girl rather than to a category, and the school works collaboratively with parents and carers, which leads to strong progress for those pupils. The combination of small classes, specialist staff and close parent partnership is what makes that possible, and for a family whose daughter needs that kind of attention it is one of the school's most reassuring features. The result is a learning culture where high expectations and individual attention coexist, and where staff are actively developed and motivated by leaders so that the quality of teaching keeps rising.

The school's stated focus is on preparing girls thoroughly for whatever comes after Year 11, and teachers do this exceptionally well, with careers guidance built into the GCSE choices process from Year 9. Girls leave Iqra Academy ready for the next stage, whether that is sixth-form study elsewhere in Peterborough, a college course, or a vocational route, and the breadth of the curriculum, mixing academic GCSEs with vocational qualifications, is designed to keep those doors open rather than narrow a girl's options too early.

A word of clarity on post-16: Iqra Academy is registered to teach up to the age of 19 and a sixth form forms part of its long-term picture, but at the time of the most recent inspection there were no students in the post-16 provision, so it could not be assessed. In practice the school currently educates girls through to the end of Year 11, and families should treat sixth-form study as something to confirm directly with the school for the year of entry rather than assume.

The school does not publish university or college destination figures, which is unsurprising for a school of this scale, so prospective parents should ask about recent leavers' next steps when they visit. What can be said with confidence is that the school's strong personal development and careers guidance are aimed squarely at turning out girls who progress with purpose, and that preparing pupils thoroughly for the next stage is one of the things the school is most consistently praised for.

Entry is by direct application to the school rather than through the local authority, and the main intake is into Year 7, with places also available higher up the school when capacity allows. With around 94 girls on roll against 205 places, Iqra Academy is not oversubscribed, so families have a realistic chance of securing a place across the year groups, a welcome contrast with the competition for places at many Peterborough secondaries. That said, the Year 7 cohort is the natural entry point and the one to target, and applying early gives the best chance of a settled start.

The process is straightforward: parents request an application form and prospectus, and Year 7 applicants sit a school transfer test, which the school typically holds in the spring before September entry. Because exact test and open-event dates move each year, families should contact the school for the current schedule rather than rely on a previous year's date. As an independent school, admission is conditional on an agreement that fees will be paid, and payment can be spread across the year by monthly standing order.

On faith, the school's Islamic character is genuine and central to daily life, but the school has historically welcomed both Muslim and non-Muslim families. What matters is that any family is comfortable with an environment where Arabic, Islamic studies and daily prayer are part of the ordinary timetable. Distance is not an admissions factor here, so where you live does not affect priority, though families further out should weigh the daily travel to the Westwood site and the implications of the extended weekday timetable. You can use the FindMySchool map to gauge travel from your home before committing to an application.

Pastoral care is one of the school's real distinctions. The latest Ofsted report awarded the highest grade for personal development, describing a culture of ambition and mutual respect that creates an environment where pupils flourish. Girls are given meaningful responsibility: they devised their own pupil charter and run community charity work, including fundraising for a local homeless shelter, which turns the school's values into something they practise rather than recite. That habit of service, rooted in the school's faith ethos, is exactly the kind of character-building that larger schools find hard to deliver at scale.

Safeguarding is effective, and behaviour, also graded at the highest level, is built on self-regulation and a high degree of independence rather than heavy policing. Exceptional behaviour is promoted throughout the school, and the small size means no girl is anonymous; a quiet change in a pupil's mood is noticed rather than missed in a crowd. Girls are resilient as well as aspirational, which speaks to a pastoral culture that builds character rather than simply managing conduct.

The faith dimension shapes all of this: girls develop a clear sense of morals and values and a deep understanding of their own and other faiths, alongside the fundamental British values and an appreciation of cultural diversity. Wellbeing here is bound up with belonging and character rather than treated as a separate programme bolted on at the edges, and the result is a school where girls are plainly happy to be, speaking warmly about their school and their teachers.

Enrichment is timetabled rather than optional, which tells you how seriously the school takes the hours beyond core lessons. From Monday to Thursday, formal lessons give way to enrichment activities in the late afternoon, followed by an evening Madrasah, so a typical day blends academic study, co-curricular activity and religious learning in one continuous arc. The Madrasah strand is the part many faith-conscious families value most, since it means a girl's Quranic and religious education does not have to be arranged separately after school elsewhere, and it folds the religious side of her week into the same timetable as her GCSE work.

The activities on offer reach further than the obvious. Sport includes a U15 girls' football team, giving competitive fixtures a place in a girls' Islamic setting where they are not always assumed, and signalling that physical activity and ambition on the pitch are taken seriously. More striking is the Combined Cadet Force, an unusual and ambitious feature for a small independent of this kind, offering girls structured leadership, discipline and challenge that few schools their size attempt. Project work in food and textiles brings a practical, creative strand into the curriculum itself, while the Arabic and Urdu programmes give language and culture real prominence rather than tokenism, building skills that carry well beyond school.

Leadership opportunities are the thread that runs through all of it. The pupil charter and the charity fundraising are pupil-led, and these responsibilities let girls make meaningful contributions to school life. For a school this size, the breadth of activity and, more importantly, the genuine pupil ownership of it are notable, and they reinforce the confident, aspirational character the school is known for. The point is not the length of the activities list but the fact that girls run much of it themselves, which is precisely how the school turns its stated values into lived experience.

The school day runs from 08:30, with formal lessons through to mid-afternoon and enrichment activities following until late afternoon from Monday to Thursday, after which an optional evening Madrasah runs into the early evening. Fridays finish earlier, at 12:30, to allow for congregational Friday prayers, which are open to parents and the wider community. The longer weekday provision effectively builds wraparound learning into the structure, which can suit working families, though parents should confirm exactly which sessions are core and which are optional before committing.

The school sits on Enterprise Way in the Westwood area of Peterborough, served by the city's road and bus network, and is within reach of families across Peterborough and the surrounding parts of Cambridgeshire. As entry does not depend on distance, families from further afield can apply, but should factor in the daily commute and the long weekday timetable. You can use the local hub comparison tool to view Iqra Academy side by side with other Peterborough secondaries and weigh the trade-offs before you apply.

The faith character is genuine and pervasive. Arabic, Islamic studies and daily prayer are part of the ordinary school day, and the school's purpose is to educate girls within a Muslim framework. Families who are not comfortable with regular worship and explicit religious teaching woven through the timetable should look elsewhere; for those who want exactly this, it is a defining strength rather than an add-on.

Post-16 provision is not currently running. Although the school is registered to age 19, there were no sixth-form students at the most recent inspection, so the provision could not be assessed. Families hoping for a continuous route to 18 should confirm what is actually available for their year of entry rather than assume a sixth form will be in place.

Consistency across foundation subjects is the work in progress. In a small number of subjects, teaching does not yet stretch every girl to deepen her knowledge as far as she could, and the school has named this as its priority. It is fair for parents to ask how it is being addressed for the specific subjects their daughter wants to take.

It is a small school. With around 94 girls on roll, the cohort sizes are modest, which brings real intimacy and individual attention but a narrower peer group and a smaller range of subject options than a large secondary. Whether that is a strength or a limitation depends on what your daughter needs from her school.

Iqra Academy is a small, values-driven independent that does the things that matter most genuinely well: behaviour, personal development and leadership were all judged outstanding at its 2025 inspection, and the academic offer is broad and ambitious for a school of its size, placing third in Peterborough for GCSE outcomes. The faith dimension is not a veneer; it shapes the timetable, the ethos and the way girls carry themselves. It is best suited to Muslim families in and around Peterborough who want their daughter educated in a calm, ambitious, single-sex Islamic environment where prayer, Arabic and Islamic studies sit alongside a full GCSE curriculum, and who value close pastoral attention over the scale and subject breadth of a large secondary. The main caveats are practical rather than fundamental: confirm what post-16 provision is actually available for your year of entry, weigh whether the small cohort suits your daughter, and be sure the school's pervasive faith character is exactly the education you want.