City of London School for Girls 16+ Entry: 20 Places for 2027

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5. City of London School for Girls 16+ Entry

City of London School for Girls (CLSG), on the Barbican, admits around 20 external students a year into its Sixth Form through 16+ entry, for the 2026-27 admissions cycle (entry September 2027). Candidates sit a single school-specific assessment day — a multiple-choice critical thinking test plus up to two 45-minute subject papers — followed by short subject interviews, rather than any consortium test shared with other schools. This is a genuinely separate route from CLSG's 11+ entry, with different GCSE thresholds, a much smaller intake, and its own limited bursary allocation. This guide sets out the verified 2026-27 dates, assessment format, grade requirements, fees and bursary details for families considering CLSG at Sixth Form rather than Year 7.

How Many Places Does CLSG Offer at 16+ Entry for 2027?

CLSG's own Sixth Form structure page states that the school "welcome[s] approximately twenty new students to the sixth form" each year via the external 16+ route. That figure does not appear anywhere on CLSG's formal 16+ admissions page or in its published admissions policy — both describe the assessment process in detail but are silent on numbers — which is exactly why most tutoring guides covering CLSG 16+ entry give no places figure at all. Twenty places is a small cohort by any measure, and because CLSG typically starts students on four A-level subjects (dropping to three where needed after Year 12 assessments), the school is also weighing subject balance across its intake, not just raw academic strength.

For context, CLSG's total senior school is far larger than its 16+ intake alone: the school's 11+ entry guide covers the roughly 95 places filled at Year 7 from around 600 applications, so the sixth form's twenty external places are a genuinely small top-up to a school that otherwise fills almost all of its places five years earlier.

What Does the CLSG 16+ Assessment Involve?

Unlike CLSG's 11+ process, which runs through the two-part Quest test shared across the 14-school London 11+ Consortium, 16+ entry is assessed entirely in-house on a single day. Every candidate first sits a multiple-choice critical thinking paper; CLSG states explicitly on its admissions page that "no preparation is required" for this section, since it is designed to test reasoning rather than taught content. Depending on the A-level subjects a candidate proposes to study, she then sits up to two further 45-minute papers: an argument-based essay drawing on set titles for humanities, English and language subjects, or a mathematics paper for STEM subjects. CLSG's admissions policy confirms candidates "may sit a maths paper and/or essay paper depending on their A level choices," so the exact paper combination is tailored to each applicant's subject choices rather than fixed for everyone.

Candidates who are shortlisted after the written papers are invited back for interviews roughly six weeks later. These are short — around 10 minutes each — and are held separately for each proposed A-level subject rather than as a single generalist interview, meaning a candidate applying for three subjects may have three short subject-specific conversations with the relevant teachers. CLSG also offers Art, Drama, Sport and Music scholarships at 16+, assessed alongside (but separately from) the main academic process, for candidates with a strong portfolio, audition or trial performance in those areas.

What Are the Key 2026-27 Admission Dates?

The 16+ cycle for September 2027 entry runs across roughly five months, from the September open event to the December acceptance deadline, with bursary decisions following separately in the new year:

• Tuesday 15 September 2026: CLSG's 16+ open event, for families researching the school and process.
• Friday 2 October 2026: Registration deadline for September 2027 entry — CLSG's own wording is that registration "will close" on this date, with no stated late-entry route.
• Wednesday 14 October 2026: All candidates sit the written assessment (critical thinking, plus up to two subject papers) at CLSG.
• Tuesday 24 November 2026: Shortlisted candidates attend 10-minute interviews in their proposed subjects.
• Tuesday 1 December 2026: CLSG emails offers of places.
• Wednesday 9 December 2026: Deadline for accepting an offered place, accompanied by a non-refundable deposit (waived for bursary-assisted places).
• Around 12 February 2027: Bursary offers are confirmed, running separately from and later than the main December offer round.

Because the whole process compresses into a single autumn assessment day and one short interview slot per subject, there is no resit or second sitting within the same cycle if a candidate is unwell or underperforms on 14 October — a materially different risk profile from a multi-stage admissions process, and one reason families researching CLSG 16+ entry tend to start preparation well before the October assessment date rather than in the weeks immediately before it.

What GCSE Grades Do You Need for CLSG Sixth Form Entry?

CLSG's admissions policy sets the conditional offer threshold at a minimum of eight GCSEs or IGCSEs graded 7 or above, with at least a grade 8 required in every subject a candidate proposes to study at A-level. This is a materially higher bar than many independent schools' published 16+ minimums, and reflects how tightly the twenty external places are contested: because offers are conditional on results day performance in August, candidates whose predicted grades sit right at the grade-7 floor face a genuinely uncertain summer even after a strong assessment and interview. In practice, most candidates who receive and hold an offer present a run of grade 8s and 9s across the majority of their GCSEs, particularly in the subjects they intend to continue.

International applicants are assessed against equivalent overseas qualifications using the same benchmark — CLSG's registration process includes a separate international-applicant registration link precisely because overseas exam calendars and grading scales need to be mapped onto the school's grade 7/8 thresholds individually. A predicted-grades form, a reference from the candidate's current school, and (where relevant) supporting bursary documentation all form part of the wider application alongside the assessment itself.

Is There a Bursary for CLSG 16+ Entry?

Yes, though the funded route at 16+ is narrower than CLSG's whole-school bursary programme, which supports roughly a quarter of all pupils. At Sixth Form specifically, CLSG offers three to four means-tested bursary places each year, capable of covering up to 100% of the £10,611-a-term Sixth Form fee for eligible UK families. The school's stated guideline is a net household income (after tax and National Insurance) of up to around £70,000 a year, with savings, shares and property equity also taken into account — though CLSG is explicit that meeting the income guideline does not guarantee an award, since the number of places is fixed regardless of how many families qualify on paper.

A full bursary award covers considerably more than tuition: recipients also receive free school lunches, an issued laptop, funded school trips, co-curricular activity costs, public examination fees, and £500-£1,200 a year towards public transport for Years 12 and 13, with no acceptance deposit required at all. One detail families often miss is timing — bursary decisions are confirmed separately from, and roughly ten weeks after, the main 1 December offer round, landing around 12 February 2027, so a bursary-dependent family cannot assume their financial position is settled at the same time as the academic offer. Overseas applicants are not eligible for CLSG bursary support under any circumstances, regardless of financial need.

How Does CLSG 16+ Compare with CLSG 11+ Entry?

These are two genuinely separate admissions routes into the same school, with different tests, different odds, and different funding rules. Families who assume the 11+ process (or its consortium test) simply repeats at 16 are working from the wrong information.

Because 11+ entry is judged purely on assessment day performance with no GCSE record to draw on, and 16+ entry leans heavily on eight-plus GCSEs at grade 7 or above alongside a single assessment day, families are effectively being tested on different things at each stage. Our specialist tutors treat CLSG 16+ preparation as a distinct discipline from 11+ Quest preparation — for families who sat, or are currently preparing for, the 11+ route, our CLSG Quest Assessment guide covers that process specifically, including the two-part test structure and the London 11+ Consortium arrangement that does not apply at all to 16+ applicants.

How Should Families Prepare for the CLSG 16+ Assessment?

Because the entire 16+ cycle compresses into a single October assessment day and one interview slot per subject, effective preparation needs to start well before the 2 October registration deadline, ideally in the spring or summer term of Year 11. Our specialist tutors typically focus preparation across three strands.

The first strand is the critical thinking paper: although CLSG states no preparation is technically required, timed practice with multiple-choice reasoning and logical deduction questions materially improves pacing and confidence on the day, since the format itself — rather than subject content — is what typically catches candidates out. The second strand is the subject-specific paper, which differs sharply by pathway: humanities and language candidates need practice building a tightly argued essay from an unfamiliar title within 45 minutes, while STEM candidates need a mathematics paper pitched to stretch a strong GCSE-level student rather than simply test GCSE recall. The third strand is subject interview technique — because CLSG interviews separately for each proposed A-level rather than running one general conversation, candidates benefit from rehearsing subject-specific discussion (a piece of wider reading in English, a mathematical proof or problem, a historical debate) rather than generic "tell me about yourself" preparation.

For students also building UCAS applications in parallel with 16+ entry, or weighing Oxbridge as a longer-term goal once at CLSG, our university personal statement support and A-Level tuition can run alongside 16+ entry preparation, since the same subject grounding that gets a candidate through CLSG's subject-specific paper and interview also underpins the A-Level or EPQ work she goes on to do once she joins the Sixth Form.

Frequently Asked Questions