Sir Joseph Williamson’s Mathematical School (or ‘the Math’ as it is known locally) is a boys’ grammar school with 1450 students on roll that admits girls in the sixth form. The school is very popular and is regularly oversubscribed. The school became an Academy in April 2011.

We are a National Support School and the Principal is a National Leader of Education. The school also became one of the first 100 schools in the country to have been designated a National Teaching School and as such is the lead school in the Thames Gateway Teaching School Hub. It is also the lead school in the Kent and Medway Maths Hub, one of just 40 national hubs across the country.

Ofsted judge the school to be ‘Outstanding’, a grading the school has held since 2005. In our last report the lead inspector noted that ‘ Pupils and students are thoughtful, polite, courteous and respectful. The school’s culture helps them to feel safe and happy. Their behaviour is exceptional. Pupils have extremely high ambitions. Parents and carers are enormously positive about the school .’

Recent years have seen the school consistently improve on already outstanding examination results.  The results for 2022 saw 99% of pupils gain Maths and English grade 4 with 96% gaining grade 5 in both, and a progress 8 score likely to be higher than 0.8. There were also some of the best A Level results in the school’s history with 57% of grades at A*-A.  However, the school offers more than outstanding academic outcomes, it also provides exceptional opportunities for individual development in sport, the arts, music and many other areas.

On 1st January 2019 the Williamson Trust merged into Leigh Academies Trust, providing a stronger and more developed central infrastructure to further improve the school.

Eliot Hodges | Principal