Cardinal Newman Catholic School

About Cardinal Newman Catholic School

Cardinal Newman Catholic School’s Progress 8 score of 0.26 sits well above the Coventry local authority average of 0.07 for secondary schools, placing it firmly in the top half of the 24 schools of its type in the area. That positive value means pupils here typically make about a quarter of a grade more progress per subject than the national average, which is a solid indicator of academic value added. The school ranks 9th out of 21 Coventry schools on this metric, putting it in the 43rd percentile locally, and 931st nationally out of over 3,100 schools. It’s not the highest performer in the city — that’s Eden Girls’ School with a score of 1.52 — but it’s comfortably ahead of the pack, and its nearest outstanding-rated school is President Kennedy School Academy, 1.4 kilometres away.

Digging into the breakdown, the school’s strongest subject area is English, where Progress 8 hits 0.66, while maths is more modest at 0.24 and the EBacc subjects actually sit slightly below zero at -0.1. Attainment 8 sits at 49.9, and 73.9% of pupils achieved a grade 4 or above in English and maths, compared with 56.2% at the stronger grade 5 threshold. The EBacc entry rate is relatively low at 24.5%, and only 17.3% of pupils achieved the EBacc at grade 4 or above. In the sixth form, the school’s value-added score is 0.12, with an average points per entry of 35.14 (roughly a B- grade), and the best three A-levels average out at 37.5 points, also a B-. The sixth form was rated Good in its most recent Ofsted inspection, and the school overall has held a Good rating since its 2016 graded inspection, having improved from Requires Improvement in 2014.

The school is heavily oversubscribed: for 248 places in 2025/26, it received 514 applications, with 248 first-preference applications and 229 first-preference offers. That’s a ratio of 2.07 applicants per place, so getting in is competitive. Facilities include a library, science labs, theatre, sixth form centre, sports hall, tennis courts and a chapel, and the sports on offer range from martial arts and rowing to hockey and netball. There’s a wide selection of clubs — art, drama, choir, film, orchestra, newspaper, eco club, Model UN and debate — which suggests a lively extracurricular scene. The school also provides for a broad range of SEND needs, including dyslexia, moderate learning difficulty, social and emotional mental health, speech and language, hearing and visual impairment, physical disability, and autistic spectrum disorder. With 28.9% of pupils eligible for free school meals, it serves a diverse intake. This is a solid, improving Catholic secondary that delivers above-average progress, particularly in English, and offers a strong sixth form — best suited to families who value academic rigour within a faith-based setting and can navigate a competitive admissions process.

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