What grades do I need to get into St Olaves sixth form as an external student?

I'm in yr10 studying at a state school, however, I want to go to St Olaves for Sixth Form. What do I need to get to get a solid place in the school and any tips?

current year 12 here
they add up your best 9 gcses (excluding subjects like further maths and fsmq) and basically rank everyone and gives offers from highest score downwards. the maximum score you get can with this system is 81 (9 9s)
i think the cut off was around 73/74 for my year? not too sure but i have a friend who got 71 and never got off the waiting list for a place in the sixth form
tips? think long and hard before deciding to come here. it's not a light decision. the people here are crazy smart, and universities look at your grades in the context of your school. so for example, getting grades like A*AA looks a lot better in a state school than it does here, where so many people achieve 3 A*s. also, most people in my year are really smart but they can't predict everyone A*s. so people who may have gotten A* at a regular state school could end up without one purely because of the nature of the school.
but if i haven't put you off yet, i think it's a great sixth form and at this point in time i have no regrets about coming here (even though i have wished i never came at multiple points throughout the year). you meet some horrible people but you also meet some of the sweetest, amazing, smartest people ever who are so passionate about their subject. most of the teachers are great, i love the vibe of the school and i can't imagine going to any other sixth form.
good luck with gcses!! if you have any other questions feel free to pm me and i can try my best to answer them 🙂

Tyyy! Are there too many guys as I go to an all girl's school and though I don't mind going to a more male school, I don't want to be one of the few girls there out of many guys.

yeah i get what you mean, my old school was all girls too
there are obviously more guys than girls in the sixth form but i think there's about 80 girls in my year (out of around 220) so its not too bad.
i definitely miss being in an all girls school though, i've lost count of the number of times people have just pushed past me when going somewhere 😔. some of the younger years have no sense of patience. once when someone did that they knocked my water bottle out of my bag and ended up breaking it

Ahhh. I'm so sorry for your water bottle. Btw, I'm doing further maths, and though they won't consider it as an extra gcse, will they still consider it.

thank you, it lived a good life while it lasted 😔
they will not consider further maths at all. i can say this for sure because i did it too (aqa level 2 fm) and they didn't consider it and from an admissions perspective having it makes no difference as to whether they will give you an offer. however, it's incredibly useful as it gives you a slight headstart to a-level maths. its made my life a bit easier in year 12 because i already knew stuff like differention and binomial expansion.

Great advice thanks about the further maths. 🙂

So you know how I'll apply to the school around october next year, are my mock grades important and do I need to get the same grades or better to get into the sixth form. I'm really confused about how to apply for sixth form so do you mind explaining.

no worries, i appreciate how confusing it is. a lot of sixth forms have similar application processes, but i'll talk about the olave's one specifically below
the sixth form open day should be in november, i'd really recommend going to talk to students and get a feel for the school. and then i think applications open in january and close in november
you should have predicted grades in january to apply with - this could be from mocks or reports or something, depends on the school. i used predicted grades from my winter report, and those grades were based off november mocks.
at this stage, your predicteds don't matter at all as long as you get the minimum - i think thats a minimum of 63 points across your best 9 GCSEs. i think i explained how that works in an earlier post. if you meet that criteria they accept your application - but crucially, this is not equivalent to an offer. you do not have an offer for the sixth form.

the process stops till july after your final gcse exams. they do an induction event that i also recommend going to.
on gcse results day, you need to upload proof of your results to an online application portal. the deadline is literally on the day so make sure you do it on time and don't forget. they then start offering places from that evening onwards by ranking applicants based on their achieved grades. term starts in august (which is horrible) so they have a really short time to make their offers in. just keep checking your emails/turn notifications on or whatever to make sure you know when you get an email from them, because they set tight and strict deadlines for responses.
i hope that makes sense! lmk if not

So say if I get 78 for mocks/ predicted grades so they accept my application so like I have a chance of getting into the school but if I get 8s and 9s for GCSEs so like good grades for actual GCSEs, I'm likely to get a place.

That's scary bro. Yk how they rank students from highest, and its out of 81 so that's 9 Grade 9s. What if you do 10 GCSEs and get over 81.

honestly yeah. but don't stress over it too much, you still have so much time.
even if you do ten they still only rank your best 9. so an applicant with 10 9s and another applicant with 9 9s and and 8 will both have a score of 81 and will be considered the same.

Ahh ok, that's sad but oh well, I'm gonna fail languages anyways. Also is a level econ better than a level comp sc.

you never know, when you're sitting exams with the rest of the country you could end up doing significantly better than you thought you would 🙂
im very biased because i don't do a-level comp sci but i definitely think econ is better. if you did the gcse a-level econ will probably be quite easy icl. if you didn't do the gcse its very difficult at first but if you put the effort in and like the subject it becomes much easier. i do bio, chem, maths and econ, and econ is definitely the easiest out of those. i'd definitely come to the open evening and talk to students about that - i'm sure there's a few who do both comp sci and econ

Tyyy! Are there too many guys as I go to an all girl's school and though I don't mind going to a more male school, I don't want to be one of the few girls there out of many guys.

you never know, when you're sitting exams with the rest of the country you could end up doing significantly better than you thought you would 🙂
im very biased because i don't do a-level comp sci but i definitely think econ is better. if you did the gcse a-level econ will probably be quite easy icl. if you didn't do the gcse its very difficult at first but if you put the effort in and like the subject it becomes much easier. i do bio, chem, maths and econ, and econ is definitely the easiest out of those. i'd definitely come to the open evening and talk to students about that - i'm sure there's a few who do both comp sci and econ