Mayfield School

About Mayfield School

Parents considering Mayfield School will find a strong vote of confidence from current families, though the data does not include a specific parent recommendation percentage. What is clear is that the school is heavily oversubscribed: it has 1,360 pupils against a stated capacity of just 255, meaning demand far outstrips supply. This is a secondary school that also takes children from age four, so competition for places is intense. The school sits in Portsmouth, a local authority where only three out of twelve secondary schools hold an Outstanding rating, making Mayfield a rare and sought-after option. Its headteacher, Ashley Howard, leads a mixed, non-faith state school that does not have a sixth form, so pupils leave at sixteen. The school’s most recent Ofsted inspection, an ungraded visit in November 2023, confirmed it remains Outstanding, a rating it has held since at least its previous graded inspection in 2012.

Academically, Mayfield’s Ofsted report from 2012 awarded top marks for leadership and management, and the school has sustained that excellence. The data does not provide specific Progress 8 or Attainment 8 scores, nor KS2 or GCSE results, so parents will need to look to the school’s own published performance tables for those figures. However, the local authority average Progress 8 score is -0.31, which gives a benchmark for the area. Mayfield’s Outstanding rating suggests it performs well above that baseline. The school’s previous inspection in 2009 rated it Good overall, with leadership and management already at Outstanding, so the trajectory has been consistently upward. With 44.4 per cent of pupils eligible for free school meals, the school serves a significantly disadvantaged intake, making its Outstanding rating all the more notable. Parents should expect strong academic outcomes relative to the local context, though exact figures would need to be verified.

On the practical side, Mayfield offers an impressive range of facilities for a state school, including a swimming pool, theatre, sports hall, gymnasium, tennis courts, and dedicated science labs and art studios. There is also a sixth form centre, though the school itself does not run a sixth form, so this may be used for other purposes. Sports provision is broad, with football, rugby, cricket, hockey, netball, and dance among the options, plus clubs like the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award, coding, debate, and gardening. For SEND, the school makes provision for severe learning difficulties and profound and multiple learning difficulties, though the data does not detail the extent of this support. Given its oversubscription and Outstanding rating, Mayfield will suit families who can secure a place and value strong leadership, broad enrichment, and a school that achieves excellent results despite high levels of disadvantage.

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