Apply to Queen Elizabeth's Grammar School, Horncastle, in plain English.
QEGS Horncastle is a co-educational selective academy in Horncastle, Lincolnshire, and shares the Lincolnshire Consortium 11+. Your child qualifies by reaching a fixed standardised-score standard of 220 across the two Autumn-term papers — a pass mark, not a ranking. It has a designated free transport area (its traditional catchment), and children living in it take priority, so register for the test by 31 March 2026.
The three things to know first.
If you read nothing else on this page, read these. They're the bits that catch parents out.
The 11+ is a pass mark of 220, not a ranking. Reaching it makes your child eligible — the catchment then decides priority.
The Lincolnshire Consortium 11+ is two papers sat in the Autumn term. The standardised scores are added together, and a child needs an aggregate of 220 (intended to identify the top 25% of children by ability) to reach the qualifying standard. Once a child has reached 220 they are fully qualified for QEGS. If too many qualified children apply, it is the oversubscription criteria — chiefly whether you live in the designated transport area — that decide. The 11+ score is used only to rank within a criterion that is oversubscribed.
QEGS has a designated area — its "free transport area" — and living in it gives strong priority.
QEGS Horncastle has a designated area for free transport (its traditional catchment), covering Horncastle and the surrounding villages out towards Woodhall Spa, Coningsby, Spilsby and the Lincolnshire Wolds. Qualified children living inside it (criterion 3) are placed above qualified children from everywhere else (criterion 4). Any qualified child can apply, but living in the area is the single biggest factor after the disadvantage criteria.
Registering for the test and applying for the place are two separate jobs — with two separate deadlines.
Register your child for the 11+ by 31 March 2026 (when they are in Year 5) — sitting the test is not an application. You then have to name QEGS on your home council's secondary application form by 31 October 2026. Miss the test registration and they cannot sit; miss the application and they cannot be offered a place, even if they passed.
Five steps — register in spring, sit the tests in autumn, apply by 31 October.
Registration for the test closes in March, six months before the papers are sat. Put the registration date in your calendar now — it is the easiest one to miss.
If too many children qualify, these four criteria decide — in order.
Children with an EHCP naming QEGS are admitted before these criteria apply. All other qualifying children are placed in the highest criterion that applies to them; within an oversubscribed criterion they are ranked by 11+ score. Tap any criterion to read the detail.
In plain English: Children who are currently in council care, or who were previously in care and left it through adoption, a child arrangements order or a special guardianship order (including those adopted from state care outside England), get the highest priority — provided they have reached the qualifying standard. Where they live does not matter.
What the document says: Looked after children and previously looked after children … if they have reached the required standard for entry.
In plain English: Next come qualified children who are eligible for the pupil premium (free-school-meals-related funding) or, for armed-forces families, the service premium. This deliberate boost for disadvantaged and forces children applies wherever they live — it sits above the designated-area criterion, so a qualified Pupil Premium child outside the area still ranks ahead of an in-area child without one.
What the document says: Children who have reached the qualifying standard for entry and who are eligible for pupil premium or the service premium.
In plain English: Qualified children whose permanent home is inside the school's designated free transport area. This is usually the criterion in which the remaining places run out. If it is oversubscribed, children are ranked by their 11+ total score (highest first); straight-line distance to the school is only the tie-break, then a random allocation.
What the document says: Eligible children whose permanent address is within the school's designated area for free transport with priority being given to the order of their total scores in the entrance tests.
In plain English: Any places still left go to all other qualified children who live outside the designated transport area. Here the 11+ total score does the ranking — highest scores first — with straight-line distance, then a lottery, breaking ties.
What the document says: Eligible children from all other areas with priority being given to the order of their total scores in the entrance tests.
A designated "free transport area" — living inside it puts you ahead.
QEGS Horncastle's catchment is its designated area for free transport — the school's traditional catchment, covering Horncastle and the surrounding villages out towards Wragby and Bardney to the west, Woodhall Spa and Coningsby to the south, Spilsby to the east and the Lincolnshire Wolds to the north. Once your child reaches the qualifying standard of 220, a child living inside the area (criterion 3) is placed above a child living anywhere else (criterion 4). A test score above 220 makes no difference unless a criterion is oversubscribed — and then it ranks children within that one criterion.
The boundary on our map is an approximate traceApproximate traceQEGS publishes its designated transport area only as an interactive map on the school and Consortium websites, with no parish or postcode list and no downloadable file. The boundary on our map is a hand-built approximation of the area's published extent (accurate to roughly a couple of miles), so treat it as an indicative guide rather than an exact legal edge — check your address against the school's own map if you are near the boundary. of the school's published transport-area extent, so treat it as an indicative guide near the edge.
See the catchment area on the GrammarBound mapTwo qualified children, neither on a disadvantage criterion — the one inside the area ranks higher.
Both children have reached the qualifying standard of 220 and neither is eligible for the pupil premium or service premium. Child A lives inside the designated transport area, so ranks above Child B, who lives outside it — even if Child B scored higher in the 11+. Score only separates children within the same criterion.
You have two routes, and you can use both.
Reserve list
If your child met the qualifying standard but was offered a lower-preference school, they are placed on QEGS's reserve list automatically (unless you were offered a higher preference). The list is held in oversubscription-criteria order — not by how long you have waited — so a higher-priority later applicant can move above them. The list is kept by the LA's admissions team until the end of August, after which the school keeps it.
Appeal
You can appeal if a place is refused, provided you named QEGS on your application form. Appeals are lodged in accordance with the Lincolnshire County Council deadline; details of how to appeal are sent with the refusal. An independent panel hears the appeal and its decision is binding. Appealing does not affect your position on the reserve list.
Joining Year 12 — up to 40 external places.
QEGS's sixth form admits students from other schools alongside its own Year 11. The grade floor is at least grade 4 in GCSE English Language and Maths, plus a points total across the best GCSEs.
Grade 4 in English and Maths, plus 24 points from the best four GCSEs.
All applicants need at least grade 4 in GCSE English Language and GCSE Mathematics, together with either a total of at least 24 points from their best 4 GCSEs (which may include English and Maths), or 18 points from their best 3 GCSEs plus one further Level 2 qualification at Distinction / A grade. Individual A-level subjects set their own GCSE requirements, listed in the sixth form prospectus.
Apply direct to the school — internal students continue automatically.
The published admission number for external Year 12 entry is 40, over and above students continuing from QEGS's own Year 11. If more qualified external students apply than there are places, they are ranked by straight-line distance to the school, with the highest capped GCSE points score breaking ties. Contact the school for a sixth-form application form.
See qegs.lincs.sch.uk for the sixth form prospectus and subject entry requirements.