Dear Parents and Carers,
I am writing to share a wonderful letter I have received from Bridget Phillipson, Secretary of State for Education, congratulating us on our excellent results for disadvantaged children in 2025. The letter in full is attached for your perusal but to quote :
Dear Alison,
Congratulations to you and your team on the excellent outcomes the disadvantaged pupils at The Minster Junior School achieved at the end of the 2024/25 academic year. Your school’s performance places it among the very best nationally, and this is a significant achievement. This success reflects the dedication of your staff and the hard work of your pupils. It shows what can be achieved when ambition and commitment come together. Thank you for everything you do
to give children the best possible opportunities to succeed.
Your school’s achievements demonstrate what is possible, and I hope you will continue to share your experience and best practice with others. Even the strongest schools can go further. We encourage you to lead the way as a system leader – sharing effective practice, championing networks, supporting collaboration, and helping raise standards across the sector. There are real opportunities available for you to support improvement for a wider group of pupils
including through: engaging actively with your region’s RISE networks and partnering with nearby schools and trusts; contributing to regional roundtables and professional communities to spread the approaches that are working in your context; and sustaining excellence by continuing to focus on disadvantaged pupils
Please pass on my thanks and congratulations to your staff and pupils. I look forward to working with you as we strive together to raise standards for all.
Bridget Phillipson
Secretary of State for Education
I would like to add, my enormous thanks to all parents and carers at The Minster Schools who support their children’s learning at home throughout their time with us. This is invaluable as these results would not happen without you. As well as the excellent results for disadvantaged children, our results for all children were well above the national average in all subjects.
In addition, our results for able children, working at the the higher/greater depth standard were also well above or broadly inline with the national averages.
Please see the attached results document for the details of results in each subject with results well above the National average highlighted in green and the results broadly in line with national averages highlighted in yellow.
As well as our excellent academic performance, The Minster Schools are also the top performing school in Croydon for boys and girls football, netball, panathlon and basket ball. Many of our children have been inspired by this to follow successful careers in Sport.
I am also delighted to share that we have now won the National ‘Give Racism the Red card’ competition for the third Year running. This is a national competition with over 30,000 schools participating so it is an incredible achievement.
I feel blessed and extremely fortunate to be Executive headteacher of The Minster Schools, with our wonderful children , talented staff and extremely supportive parents.
I hope you all have a lovely weekend with your families.
Best wishes
Ali Silke
Executive Leader
