Medway grammar schools & catchment areas, in plain English.
Medway — Rochester, Chatham, Gillingham and Rainham — has 6 grammar schools, separate from neighbouring Kent and with its own Medway Test. Every one admits by distance or catchment once a child has qualified. This page explains how it works and lets you check your postcode against all 6.
Check your postcode against every Medway grammar
See which catchments you fall inside, your distance to each school and your eligibility — free, no account needed.
Real, published boundaries and the latest distance cut-offs — not straight-line estimates.
How Medway grammar admissions work.
Medway runs its own 11+ — the Medway Test — separate from the Kent Test next door (though many families sit both). Children take it at the start of Year 6; you register with Medway Council over the preceding summer. A qualifying standard decides who is assessed as suitable for grammar school.
You then apply through your home council by 31 October, naming the grammars you want. Offers go out on 1 March.
None of Medway’s grammars are super-selective — so once a child qualifies, distance or catchment decides who gets a place.
How distance and catchment work.
5 of the 6 admit the nearest qualifying children by straight-line distance, with the cut-off (the “last distance offered”) shifting each year with demand; 1, Fort Pitt, uses a defined area with a radius.
Sir Joseph Williamson’s, Rochester Grammar and Rainham Mark are among the most oversubscribed, so distance can be decisive even after a clear pass.
GrammarBound maps each school’s latest distance cut-off and area — open the map or check your postcode above.
Every Medway grammar school.
All 6 Medway grammar schools. Each links to a plain-English admissions guide with that school’s exact criteria and distance rules.