Wildground Infant School

About Wildground Infant School

Wildground Infant School sits within Hampshire’s New Forest, one of 425 primary schools in the local authority. Among its peers, the school is not ranked in the top tier — the highest-scoring nearby primary is Preston Candover Church of England Primary School, followed by Our Lady and St Joseph Catholic Primary and St Faith’s Church of England Primary. The nearest school rated Outstanding by Ofsted is Orchard Infant School, just 0.9 kilometres away. Wildground itself holds a Good rating from its most recent graded inspection in 2017, and an ungraded inspection in 2023 confirmed it remains Good with an improving trajectory. That 2023 visit noted leadership and management as Outstanding, and early years provision as Outstanding too — a strong signal for families with children in the youngest years. The school serves 205 pupils from age 2 to 7, with capacity for 210, and 33.1 per cent of pupils are eligible for free school meals, above the national average.

Academically, Wildground is an infant school, so it does not publish Key Stage 2 SATs results — its pupils move on to junior school before that assessment point. The most recent Ofsted breakdown gives a clearer picture: the 2017 graded inspection rated overall effectiveness as Good, with leadership and management also Good. By the 2023 ungraded inspection, leadership and management had been upgraded to Outstanding, and early years provision was judged Outstanding too. The school’s Progress 8 or KS2 data is not available, but the local authority average for KS2 attainment is 61 per cent, which provides a benchmark for the area. For a school that focuses on the earliest years, the standout metric is the early years rating — parents of Reception-age children can take particular confidence from that Outstanding judgement. The school’s nursery provision means children can start from age 2, giving families a single-site option through to Year 2.

The school is oversubscribed: for 2025/26 entry, it received 52 applications for 27 places, a ratio of 1.93 applicants per place, and all 27 first-preference families were offered a spot. Facilities include music rooms, art studios, a sensory room, an ICT suite, and an outdoor playground — plus a chapel, which is unusual for a school with no religious character. Sports on offer include netball, tennis, gymnastics, rounders, cross country, athletics, and dance, while clubs cover drama, coding, eco club, and science club. SEND provision is broad, covering moderate learning difficulty, social emotional and mental health needs, speech language and communication needs, physical disability, and a resourced provision. This makes Wildground a practical choice for families in the New Forest who want a strong early-years foundation, particularly those whose children have additional needs, and who are happy with a Good-rated school that is clearly improving in key areas.

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