The Quest Assessments two-stage test, Priority Area, and preparation strategy for one of South West London's top grammar schools.
Tiffin School in Kingston upon Thames is consistently ranked among the top 5 state schools for boys in England, with exceptional GCSE and A-level results and an outstanding record of Oxbridge, medical school, and Russell Group university admissions. Founded in 1880, the school now educates approximately 1,200 boys from Year 7 to the sixth form and admits 180 Year 7 boys each year from a pool of well over 1,800 applications — the school's own admissions guidance describes application numbers as "over ten times" the number of places, a ratio of roughly 10:1 or higher.
Tiffin is a state grammar school and therefore free to attend, making it one of the most sought-after and competitive school places in South West London. The combination of outstanding academic results, strong co-curricular provision, and zero fees makes the school genuinely extraordinary value and accounts for the extremely high demand.
Tiffin School does not use GL Assessment, CEM, or the Sutton SET. Its Year 7 entrance test is a bespoke examination set each year in partnership with Quest Assessments — the school states directly that it "works in partnership with Quest to set our Year 7 Entrance Tests," creating a test specific to Tiffin that changes annually. There are only two subjects — English and Maths — sat across two stages:
Stage One (early October): A single day of standardised, computer-marked multiple-choice testing — around 50 English questions and 50 Maths questions, each timed at roughly 50 minutes. This is a sifting stage: scores are age-weighted and used to invite a shortlist of boys through to Stage Two. There is no verbal reasoning or non-verbal reasoning paper at any point in the process.
Stage Two (mid-November): Written papers in English and Maths for shortlisted boys, sat on the same day. English moves from multiple-choice to open-answer comprehension plus a creative writing task; Maths moves to multi-step problems where boys must show their working, rather than select an answer. This is a different skill set from Stage One, and families whose sons pass Stage One should not assume Stage One preparation alone is sufficient.
Offers are decided on a Combined Score, not a simple total: half the weight comes from the Stage Two English result, and the other half comes from Maths — itself a blend of 40% Stage One and 60% Stage Two. This means Stage Two carries more weight than Stage One in both subjects, and a boy's Stage Two written performance matters more to the final outcome than his Stage One multiple-choice score. Results are typically confirmed in the new year, well ahead of secondary school offer day in March. The school also holds open days in the autumn term — attending is strongly recommended to help your son understand what a Tiffin education involves.
Unlike super-selective grammar schools such as QE Boys or Henrietta Barnett, Tiffin School applies geography as one part of its admissions process — but not through a borough-based "designated area." Tiffin's Priority Area is defined simply as any address within 10km in a straight line of the school gates, measured using computerised geographical systems. There is no borough list: a family's postcode is either inside or outside that 10km radius, and in recent admissions cycles every offer has gone to a boy living within it.
The oversubscription process runs, in order: any boy with an Education, Health and Care Plan naming the school; then the boys with the 450 highest Combined Scores (within this group, Looked After and Pupil Premium-eligible boys in the Priority Area are prioritised); then remaining Priority Area residents by rank; then boys living outside the Priority Area by rank; and finally up to 18 places reserved for sporting or musical aptitude, open only to Priority Area boys. In practice this means living within 10km of the school materially improves a boy's chances at a given score, but it does not replace the need for a strong Combined Score — geography and academic rank both matter. For the Tiffin Girls' School's separate (and differently structured) admissions area, see our Tiffin Girls' Designated Area Guide — the two schools use genuinely different systems and should not be assumed to share a boundary.
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No — and this is one of the most common misunderstandings families have about Tiffin. There is no fixed standardised "pass mark" of the kind used by GL Assessment schools (where scores cluster around a mean of 100). Tiffin's own admissions policy defines the cut-off simply as "the lowest Combined Score of any boy gaining a place" in that year's cycle — a relative rank, not a fixed number that can be studied for in advance or compared reliably year to year. With 180 places against 1,800+ applications, and only 450 boys invited to Stage Two in the first place, every stage of the process is genuinely competitive, and the right preparation target is "as high a Combined Score as possible," not a specific number pulled from a previous year's results.
Tiffin's academic results are consistently outstanding. At GCSE, the overwhelming majority of pupils achieve grades 7-9 across all subjects, with grade 9 rates — the highest possible grade — significantly above national averages even for selective schools. The school's Progress 8 score consistently places it among the top 10 state schools in England.
At A-level, Tiffin regularly achieves average grades of A/A*, with subjects including Maths, Further Maths, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, History, and Economics all producing exceptional results. Oxbridge progression is a regular feature — typically 15-25 boys per year — and the school has a strong record for competitive courses including Medicine and Law. The sixth form attracts both internal candidates from Year 11 and external applicants from other local schools.
Tiffin offers strong co-curricular provision across sport, music, drama, and the arts. The school competes at a high level in rugby, cricket, football, and rowing, and has produced a number of nationally competitive athletes. Music at Tiffin is taken seriously — the school has several orchestras, ensembles, and a choir, and regularly performs at venues in London and internationally. The debating society and model United Nations programme are active, and there is a wide range of academic enrichment clubs running throughout the year.
The Duke of Edinburgh Award is popular, and the school runs a programme of STEM enrichment including competitions in mathematics (UKMT), science olympiads, and computing. Boys at Tiffin are expected to engage broadly — the school's ethos holds that academic excellence and co-curricular achievement are complementary rather than competing.
A well-structured preparation programme for Tiffin's Quest-set examination should begin in Year 5 and needs to build two distinct skill sets — fast multiple-choice technique for Stage One, and extended written technique for Stage Two. Key milestones:
Year 5: Introduce English (comprehension, vocabulary, grammar) and Maths practice systematically, in multiple-choice format to mirror Stage One. Build stamina for timed practice through short (20-minute) sessions initially, increasing to full 50-minute papers from the summer of Year 5.
Year 6 (January to August): Move to full timed mock papers in both subjects, then start layering in Stage Two-style written work — extended comprehension answers, creative writing under time pressure, and multi-step maths problems where working must be shown, not just an answer selected. Review mistakes by question type to identify specific weaknesses and target them directly. Aim for one full mock per week from Easter onwards.
Year 6 (September to October — Stage One): Light consolidation only for Stage One. The child should be maintaining familiarity and confidence rather than introducing new material. Ensure exam logistics are practised — timing, reading instructions carefully, pacing within each section.
Year 6 (November — Stage Two, for shortlisted boys): A different kind of preparation is needed here. Since Stage Two carries the larger share of the Combined Score (all of the English weighting and 60% of the Maths weighting), boys who pass Stage One should treat the roughly month-long gap before Stage Two as a distinct preparation phase — focused on extended writing stamina and showing full mathematical working — not simply "more of the same."
At Leading Tuition, our specialist 11+ tutors have helped many boys prepare for Tiffin School entry. We provide structured programmes covering both stages of the Quest-set examination — Stage One's timed multiple-choice English and Maths, and Stage Two's written comprehension, creative writing and multi-step maths — plus full timed mock examinations and detailed feedback on each child's performance. We also prepare boys simultaneously for Tiffin School, Wilson's School, and other South West London grammar schools, making preparation efficient for families applying to multiple schools.
For families in Kingston, Richmond, Merton, and across South West London, we offer both in-person and online tuition. Book a free consultation with our team to discuss your son's preparation.
Mock exams are a crucial but sometimes underused part of Tiffin 11+ preparation. Many families complete plenty of individual practice papers at home but never replicate the full conditions of sitting the Quest-set test under genuine exam pressure. This is a significant gap — children who have sat multiple full-length mock exams in exam-like conditions consistently perform more reliably on the day than those who have only practised at home.
A good Stage One mock session for Tiffin should replicate both multiple-choice papers — English and Maths, roughly 50 minutes each — sat back to back with a short break in between, matching the real single-day sitting. Children should practise sitting for this duration with no parental assistance, no opportunity to ask questions, and a clear time boundary for each paper. Getting this stamina right in advance removes one major variable from the actual exam.
On the day of the Tiffin 11+ examination (Stage One takes place in early October), children report to the school's examination centre. Parents do not accompany children into the examination room. Children should arrive having eaten a proper breakfast, carrying any permitted equipment (pencil, rubber, ruler — no calculators), and without revision materials that could cause last-minute anxiety. Arriving ten to fifteen minutes early is sensible to allow time to settle.
Stage Two, for those invited, takes place in mid-November and involves open-answer mathematics and English papers — a different format from the multiple-choice Stage One. Preparation for Stage Two requires specific focus on written workings in maths and structured written English responses. Families whose children pass Stage One should not assume that Stage One preparation is sufficient for Stage Two; the two stages test overlapping but distinct skills.
There isn't a fixed pass mark. Tiffin's admissions policy defines the cut-off as the lowest Combined Score of any boy who gains a place that year — a relative rank, not a fixed number families can target in advance. With 180 places, only 450 boys invited to Stage Two out of 1,800+ applicants, and results depending on the whole cohort's performance, the realistic goal is the strongest possible Combined Score rather than a specific historical figure.
Both schools are extremely competitive but use entirely different examination systems. Tiffin sets a bespoke two-stage test with Quest Assessments (English and Maths only, 180 places, 1,800+ applications) with a 10km Priority Area; Wilson's uses the Sutton SET (verbal reasoning, non-verbal reasoning and maths, no separate English paper) with Sutton Borough priority. Direct comparison is difficult because the tests measure different skills and a boy cannot sit both on the same day. Both require exceptional performance under time pressure.
Yes. The examinations are entirely separate — Tiffin's Quest-set test and Wilson's Sutton SET — and are taken at different times, so there is no clash. Preparation overlaps for Maths, but Tiffin's English component (comprehension and creative writing at Stage Two) has no equivalent in the SET, which has no English paper at all. Families within both schools' priority zones routinely apply to both in the same year.
The Combined Score is the figure Tiffin actually ranks applicants by. It is weighted 50% Stage Two English and 50% Maths — and that Maths half is itself a blend of 40% Stage One and 60% Stage Two. In practice this means Stage Two performance (in both subjects) counts for more than Stage One, so a boy who does well in the Stage One multiple-choice papers but struggles with extended writing or shown-working maths at Stage Two can still be overtaken in the final ranking.
Not as a borough list. Tiffin School's Priority Area is defined purely as any address within 10km in a straight line of the school — not a set of named boroughs. Depending on exactly where a family lives, parts of Richmond, Kingston, Merton, Sutton or Elmbridge may fall inside or outside that 10km radius, so the only reliable way to check is to measure the straight-line distance from your address, not to assume borough membership. This is a different system entirely from Tiffin Girls' School's designated area, which is defined by named postcode districts rather than distance.
Leading Tuition specialises in preparing boys for the Tiffin School 11+ entrance examination. Tiffin uses its own bespoke test set with Quest Assessments — not GL Assessment, CEM, or the Sutton SET — and the Stage Two written papers in particular reward depth of thinking and extended writing stamina beyond standard KS2 content. Our specialist tutors work with boys from Year 4 through to the November Stage Two examination, covering both stages: Stage One's timed multiple-choice English and Maths, and Stage Two's written comprehension, creative writing and multi-step maths. Our track record with Tiffin preparation is strong, and we are rated 4.8/5 on Trustpilot by families we have worked with across Kingston, Richmond, and Surrey. To discuss a structured preparation plan for your son, book a free consultation at leadingtuition.co.uk/consultation or message us on WhatsApp.
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