The Stephen Perse Foundation

The Stephen Perse Foundation began with the Perse School for Girls in 1881 and became fully co-educational in 2017. Today the family is presented publicly as Stephen Perse Cambridge, with early-years, junior, senior and Sixth Form provision across Cambridge, Madingley and Saffron Walden. The senior community is one part of a deliberately multi-site organisation.

Academic challenge sits beside kindness, respect and responsible global citizenship. Senior and Sixth Form pupils receive individual support alongside subject study and co-curricular life, while the different sites retain their own stages and identities. The senior years are part of a wider educational family rather than an all-through campus.

Year 7 and Year 9 are the main Senior School entry points, with assessment covering English, mathematics and verbal or non-verbal reasoning. Sixth Form entry includes CAT4 and subject-grade requirements. The current programme is entirely A-level based; the final International Baccalaureate cohort completed its programme in summer 2023, and A Levels are now supplemented by an EPQ or Stephen Perse Cambridge project and enrichment.

More than twenty-five GCE A-level courses span sciences, mathematics, humanities, languages and creative subjects, with students typically taking three or four. Full-time boarding is available to UK and international A-level students aged 16 or over, in a small Sixth Form-only setting with separate secure living areas for boys and girls and an emphasis on managed independence. Bursaries form part of the effort to widen access.