Queen Mary's High School 11+ Guide 2026: Admissions, Exam & Prep

Queen Mary's High School (QMHS) is a fully selective state grammar school for girls aged 11 to 18 on Upper Forster Street in Walsall, West Midlands, with a co-educational sixth form. For September 2027 entry, girls currently in Year 5 must register for the entrance test by 4pm on Friday 26 June 2026, sit a GL Assessment paper set for the West Midlands Grammar Schools Partnership on Saturday 12 September 2026, and be ranked highly enough within the school's oversubscription criteria to secure one of 150 Year 7 places. Crucially, QMHS does not set its own independent paper: it sits within the Shropshire/Wolverhampton/Walsall arm of the partnership, sharing its exact test with Wolverhampton Girls' High School, Queen Mary's Grammar School (the neighbouring boys' school), Newport Girls' High School and Haberdashers' Adams. This guide covers QMHS's history and character, the consortium test format and how it interacts with other West Midlands grammar schools, 2026 key dates, oversubscription criteria, its recent Ofsted outcome, and how to build an effective preparation plan.

Key Facts: Queen Mary's High School

About Queen Mary's High School: History and Character

Queen Mary's High School has served girls in Walsall for over 125 years, giving it deep local roots as one of the borough's longest-established grammar schools. The school today operates as an academy converter under The Mercian Trust, a multi-academy trust running twelve schools across the Midlands region, and sits alongside its neighbouring (but administratively separate) boys' school, Queen Mary's Grammar School, with which it shares its Walsall heritage and, as covered below, its entrance test arrangements.

QMHS describes itself as "a place where students flourish academically and socially in a vibrant, diverse and inclusive community," with a stated ethos built around five core values: responsibility, honesty, integrity, respect and tolerance. The school is girls-only from Year 7 to Year 11, with a co-educational sixth form serving around 944 pupils across the whole school. Its curriculum is notably broad for a grammar school of its size, including Mandarin alongside more conventional European languages, and universal music instrument tuition for all pupils in Year 7 — a distinctive feature that goes beyond the core academic offer most grammar schools are known for.

Parent satisfaction at QMHS has been reported at around 95% in independent school-guide surveys, and the school places particular emphasis on leadership opportunities in the sixth form and a "family atmosphere" that it says keeps alumnae connected to the school long after they leave. As a fully selective school with no non-selective admission route, every Year 7 entrant must have sat and been ranked highly enough in the West Midlands Grammar Schools Partnership entrance test described below.

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Does QMHS Share Its 11+ Test With Wolverhampton Girls' High School?

Yes — and this is one of the most important facts for families to understand before applying. Unlike school-set tests where a single grammar school writes and administers its own paper, Queen Mary's High School sits within the West Midlands Grammar Schools Partnership, a wider network of 19 selective schools spanning three geographic groupings: a Shropshire/Wolverhampton/Walsall consortium, the Birmingham grammar schools, and a separate Warwickshire consortium. QMHS belongs to the Shropshire/Wolverhampton/Walsall group, together with Wolverhampton Girls' High School, Queen Mary's Grammar School (the boys' school in Walsall), Newport Girls' High School and Haberdashers' Adams. Schools within this group sit the same GL Assessment paper on the same test day, and families can request "data sharing" on the registration form so that a single test sitting is considered by more than one partnership school in this group.

This is a different arrangement from, for example, the King Edward VI schools in Birmingham, which fall under the same overall partnership umbrella but sit their own group's version of the test on a different day as part of the Birmingham consortium grouping, and are not automatically interchangeable with a Walsall-area registration. Families considering both a Walsall-area school and a Birmingham grammar school should check each group's registration process separately rather than assuming one sitting covers both. For a broader look at how consortium-style testing works across England, see our guide to consortium schools and shared papers, and for background on the exam format generally, see what the 11+ exam involves.

One important administrative detail: school preferences for data sharing must be selected at the point of registration and cannot be changed afterwards. Families who want their daughter considered for both QMHS and Wolverhampton Girls' High School, for instance, need to select both schools when registering, well before the 26 June 2026 deadline, rather than assuming this can be arranged later.

What Does the QMHS 11+ Entrance Test Cover?

The QMHS entrance test is set and standardised by GL Assessment on behalf of the West Midlands Grammar Schools Partnership, and is sat as two timed papers on a single Saturday. According to sourced information on the test format, the assessment covers four skill areas:

• English: reading comprehension and use of language, assessed via multiple-choice questions rather than extended writing.
• Verbal Reasoning: word relationships, codes, sequences and logical patterns in language.
• Mathematics: Key Stage 2 curriculum content, including arithmetic fluency, reasoning and multi-step problem solving.
• Non-Verbal Reasoning: pattern recognition, spatial and diagrammatic reasoning skills not directly taught in the primary curriculum.

Scoring is weighted rather than split evenly across the four areas: combined English and Verbal Reasoning make up approximately 50% of the available marks, with Non-Verbal Reasoning and Mathematics each contributing around 25%. Scores are also age-weighted, standardised around a median of 200, so that a child born later in the academic year is not disadvantaged relative to an older classmate sitting the same paper. There is no fixed published pass mark that applies every year: instead, QMHS's governors set a Minimum Qualifying Score (MQS) once they have reviewed the full order of merit for that year's applicants. For September 2026 entry, the MQS was set at 200, with the lowest score securing a place for a non-priority applicant recorded at 215; the equivalent score for September 2027 entry will not be confirmed until governors meet in November 2026, after that year's test has been sat and marked.

What Are the Key 2026 Dates for QMHS Admissions?

For girls seeking September 2027 entry to Year 7 at Queen Mary's High School, the following timetable applies, based on the school's published admissions arrangements:

Registration and the entrance test itself are administered by QMHS as part of the West Midlands Grammar Schools Partnership, but families must separately submit their home local authority's Common Application Form (for most Walsall families, this means applying via Walsall Council) listing QMHS — and any other preferred partnership schools — by the national deadline of 31 October 2026. Failing to submit this separate LA form means a child will not be considered through the coordinated admissions round even if she has sat and passed the QMHS test. For the wider national picture on grammar and independent school test dates, see our 11+ exam dates 2025–2026 guide. Full official details are published on the QMHS Year 7 September 2027 entry page.

What Are QMHS's Oversubscription Criteria?

Queen Mary's High School has no catchment area or priority zone for Year 7 admissions — unlike some grammar schools that give preference to named priority-area primary schools, QMHS considers every candidate who meets the Minimum Qualifying Score on an equal geographical footing. When the school is oversubscribed among qualifying candidates, places are allocated in the following order:

1. "Looked after" children and previously looked-after children who meet the Minimum Qualifying Score.
2. Children eligible for the Pupil Premium who meet the Minimum Qualifying Score, capped at a maximum of 30% of the intake — approximately 45 of the 150 places — with a sub-priority within this group for pupils attending a state-funded primary school in Walsall.
3. All other candidates who meet the Minimum Qualifying Score, ranked strictly by test score.

Because there is no catchment area, a straight-line distance tiebreak is not used to decide Year 7 places; it applies only to external applications for the single advertised Year 12 place, where "closest proximity to the School calculated on the basis of a straight line measurement" acts as the final tiebreaker between otherwise equally-ranked sixth form applicants. For Year 7 entry, once the priority categories above are exhausted, remaining places go strictly by rank order of test score, regardless of where in Walsall or the wider West Midlands a family lives.

What Is QMHS's Ofsted History and Current Position?

QMHS's Ofsted history reflects the shift in how Ofsted reports on schools nationally. At its most recent full inspection under the previous single-headline-grade system, in 2021, the school was rated Outstanding, the highest possible overall grade at that time. QMHS was then inspected again in March 2026, this time under Ofsted's newer report card framework, with the resulting report published in June 2026. Under this framework the school received five judgements of "Strong Standard" and two judgements of "Exceptional" — the top available grade, which Ofsted reserves for practice it considers "among the very best nationally." Inspectors reportedly described pupils' achievement at QMHS as "truly remarkable," noting that outcomes at both GCSE and A-level significantly exceed national averages.

Because Ofsted's reporting framework changed nationally between the school's two most recent inspections, direct like-for-like comparison between the 2021 "Outstanding" grade and the 2026 report card judgements is not straightforward — but both inspections point in the same direction: a school performing at, or very close to, the top of what Ofsted considers achievable. Families should always check the school's latest Ofsted report directly, since inspection outcomes can change between visits and the underlying detail in the full report is more informative than the headline grades alone.

What Is the Sixth Form and Wider School Life Like at QMHS?

QMHS's sixth form is co-educational, unlike the girls-only Years 7 to 11, giving the school a broader social mix at the top of the school while its main intake remains fully selective and single-sex. With around 944 pupils across the whole school, QMHS sits comfortably in the mid-to-large range for a West Midlands grammar school, and its curriculum breadth — including Mandarin tuition and universal Year 7 music instrument lessons — goes beyond what many grammar schools of a similar size offer. The school places particular emphasis on leadership opportunities in the sixth form, alongside a wide range of extracurricular clubs and societies typical of a large, well-resourced secondary school.

As part of The Mercian Trust, a twelve-school multi-academy trust operating across the Midlands, QMHS benefits from a wider network of institutional support while retaining its own distinct identity, ethos and over 125 years of local history in Walsall. Its stated values of responsibility, honesty, integrity, respect and tolerance are presented as shaping expected behaviour both in school and, notably, online — a modern addition to a set of traditional grammar school values.

How Should My Daughter Prepare for the QMHS 11+?

Because the QMHS test covers four distinct skill areas with uneven weighting, an effective preparation plan should reflect where the marks actually are rather than treating all four areas equally.

English and Verbal Reasoning together make up roughly half of the available marks, so these deserve proportionately more preparation time. English practice should focus on comprehension technique under multiple-choice conditions — since QMHS's paper is multiple-choice rather than requiring extended written answers — alongside strong general vocabulary built through wide reading. Verbal Reasoning preparation should use GL Assessment-style familiarisation materials covering the full range of question types: codes, analogies, sequences, hidden words, synonyms and antonyms, practised under timed conditions.

Mathematics preparation should be built around the Key Stage 2 curriculum — arithmetic fluency, times tables, fractions, ratio and multi-step word problems — with increasing emphasis on speed and accuracy under timed conditions as the September test date approaches. Non-Verbal Reasoning preparation should cover pattern recognition, sequences, rotations and spatial reasoning question types, since this is a skill area rarely taught directly in the primary curriculum and one where consistent, structured practice makes a genuine difference.

Because QMHS shares its exact paper with several other partnership schools — Wolverhampton Girls' High School, Queen Mary's Grammar School, Newport Girls' High School and Haberdashers' Adams — families should use consortium-style, GL Assessment-format practice materials that reflect this specific four-paper, age-weighted format, rather than papers designed for a different regional test such as a school-set exam with extended written English. A personalised, one-to-one approach is particularly valuable here because it allows a tutor to diagnose which of the four skill areas (and which specific question types within each) need the most attention, building a programme around the weighting of the actual test rather than a generic, one-size-fits-all course. At Leading Tuition, our specialist 11+ tutors cover all four QMHS test components and work with families across Walsall and the wider West Midlands, including online tuition for those outside the immediate area. For a structured overview of how to plan preparation over time, see our 11+ six-month countdown guide, and for a wider comparison of grammar school performance, see our 2026 grammar school league tables.

Frequently Asked Questions: QMHS 11+ 2026