Furness Primary School

About Furness Primary School

Furness Primary School in Brent is a mixed state primary for ages 3 to 11, currently home to 343 pupils against a capacity of 545. That leaves significant room for growth, but the school is already heavily oversubscribed: for the 2025/26 intake, it received 95 applications for just 39 places, with 35 of those coming as first preferences. That works out at 2.44 applications per place, a clear signal of local demand. The pupil body is notably diverse in economic terms, with 32.5% of children eligible for free school meals — well above the national average of around 23%, and a figure that places the school in a high-needs bracket within Brent. The school does not have a religious character, and it offers nursery provision, which will appeal to families looking for continuity from early years through to Year 6.

Academically, Furness Primary sits in the bottom half of Brent’s 52 primaries, ranked 42nd with a KS2 score of 51 based on the proportion of pupils reaching the expected standard in reading, writing and maths combined. That figure was 51%, compared with the Brent local authority average of 65%. Digging into the individual subjects, 80% of pupils met the expected standard in reading and 69% in maths, but writing lagged at 62%. At the higher standard, just 2% achieved the combined benchmark, though 29% hit higher in reading and 24% in maths. Progress scores are not available in the data, so it is hard to say whether pupils are improving at a typical rate. In its most recent Ofsted inspection in 2021, the school was rated Good overall, with an Outstanding mark for behaviour and attitudes — a strong point that may reassure parents concerned about the academic ranking.

The school’s facilities are generous for a primary: a library, sports hall, playing fields, music rooms, art studios, an ICT suite, and a sensory room. There is also a chapel on site, which is unusual for a school with no religious character. Sports include football, netball, cricket, rounders, dance and cross country, while clubs cover coding, art and chess. The SEND provision is broad, covering dyslexia, moderate learning difficulties, speech and language needs, hearing and multi-sensory impairment, physical disability, and autistic spectrum disorder. For families weighing up options, the nearest Outstanding-rated school is St Joseph’s Roman Catholic Primary, 1.4 km away, but Furness’s strong behaviour record and wide range of facilities may make it a practical choice for families who value pastoral stability over headline exam scores.

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