Queen Elizabeth's School, Barnet is a selective boys' grammar for ages 11 to 18, usually known simply as QE. Its identity is unusually historic even by grammar-school standards: the school traces its foundation to a Royal Charter granted by Elizabeth I in 1573, and its present site on Queen's Road still carries that sense of long institutional memory. The school has about 1,314 pupils on roll, including the sixth form.
Academically, QE presents itself through the language of free-thinking scholarship. The curriculum is broad, demanding and unapologetically intellectual, with modern foreign languages, creative arts, personal development, the EPQ and sixth-form study all visible parts of the offer. Drama and music pages show the same seriousness outside the core academic subjects, with music taught through a large peripatetic team and a wide co-curricular programme.
The wider life of the school has depth as well as polish. School life includes debate, chess, Combined Cadet Force, robotics, sport and music, supported by facilities including sports hall, library, music rooms, performing arts spaces and science laboratories. The school also publishes targeted 11+ support for disadvantaged pupils, which sits alongside its wider meritocratic language.
Year 7 admission has 180 places. Candidates sit two multiple-choice GL papers, one in English and one in mathematics, in a single session; scores are age-standardised and combined, and for 2027 entry boys need 225 or higher to be eligible for consideration. That score is a threshold, not an offer guarantee, because places are allocated by rank. Ofsted judged QE Outstanding in May 2022, and GOV.UK shows +1.22 Progress 8, 99.5% grade 5+ in English and maths, and 83.8% AAB or better at A level.
