Led by our Head of Year and our dedicated Pastoral Support Officer, our School supports all our new Year 7 pupils through their transition to Westminster City School. We ensure pupils settle in, make friends, and enjoy coming to school.

We find our Year 7 pupils relish the challenge and variety of different subjects on offer at Westminster City School. From their very first day in Year 7, all our pupils are taught lessons by subject specialist teachers, as we believe this is the most effective method for pupils (of all abilities) to make progress.

For the majority of their Key Stage 3 lessons, pupils are taught in mixed ability form groups. In subjects like mathematics and the sciences, pupils are taught in ability groups. There are many opportunities, during the academic year, to move groups in order to make the best progress.

All Key Stage 3 pupils also study a comprehensive personal, social and health education programme which includes citizenship, economic and political awareness, and careers education. This programme provides an opportunity for pupils to discuss relevant, topical issues which, it is hoped, will improve their spiritual, moral, social and cultural development, allowing them to participate positively to life in modern Britain.

Our Key Stage 3 curriculum is broad and balanced to provide a strong foundation for further study. Pupils who need extra help with numeracy, reading or writing, or for whom English is an additional language, are helped in lessons by a support assistant. They may also be withdrawn from some lessons to meet individual requirements. Additionally, some pupils may be offered alternative programmes of study in our nurture group.

We offer a dynamic and innovative Key Stage 4 curriculum at Westminster City School. We believe traditional and academic qualifications provide the best opportunity for future success.

All our pupils choose their options and are placed on a learning route. This learning route is personalised and appropriate to each pupil’s needs and aspirations, with support and guidance provided by the staff who know each pupil best.

All our Key Stage 4 pupils study a core curriculum of English, Mathematics, Science, Religious Studies, Games, PSHE, Citizenship, Work-Related Learning and Enterprise. This provides a broad and balanced foundation appropriate for almost any 16-19 pathway.

Almost all our pupils study a curriculum of academic GCSE subjects, including History and/or Geography.

Our compulsory subjects are:
GCSE Combined Science (double qualification) or GCSE Separate Sciences (Biology, Chemistry, and Physics)
GCSE English Language
GCSE English Literature
GCSE History and/or GCSE Geography
GCSE Mathematics
GCSE Religious Studies

Other available subjects are:
GCSE Art - click the link here to watch an introductory video.
GCSE Computer Science - click the link here to watch an introductory video.
GCSE Design and Technology
GCSE Economics - click the link here to watch an introductory video.
GCSE Music - click the link here to watch an introductory video.
GCSE Spanish - click the link here to watch an introductory video.
BTEC First Award Sport or GCSE PE - click the link here to watch an introductory video.
Home Languages (Arabic, Turkish, Russian, French, Spanish, German)

Westminster City School’s Sixth Form results are amongst the best in Westminster and Greater London. Our students progress to top universities, like Oxford, Cambridge and leading Russell Group institutions.

Our A Level courses are challenging and exciting, and can lead onto fantastic university courses and careers. They are expertly crafted by our passionate teachers to allow students to flourish and develop their own interests. Our teachers inspire through varied and engaging lessons and will go the extra mile in guiding students to reach their full potential.

The majority of our sixth formers choose three A Level subjects to study at the beginning of Year 12. This allows access to the maximum teaching time available. Students with a strong academic record may choose to undertake an Extended Project Qualification (EPQ), which is highly valued by universities. All students also study PSHE.

We follow a rigorous internal assessment process, culminating in the formal external A Level examinations at the end of Year 13. Some subjects also have a coursework elements.

The minimum entry requirement for A Level courses is five full GCSE grades at 5 and above including English and Mathematics. Students are also expected to meet the entrance requirements for each subject. Accordingly, we do not run classes in GCSE English or Mathematics for sixth formers.

We offer the following courses at A Level, as well as the Extended Project Qualification:

The aim of art at Westminster City School is to inspire our young people with creativity and imagination. Students will learn to critique and appreciate work from a rich variety of cultures and periods. They will also investigate and experiment with a wide range of materials and techniques, from traditional drawing and craft to digital technologies, developing fine motor skills and coordination and a deep understanding of the key elements of art.  

We continually aspire to provide a diverse extra-curricular programme to encourage our young people to engage with the subject, to dream big and to express themselves.

Art is a subject which has the ability to transcend language and geographical borders helping shape opinion and our environment. At Westminster City School, our vision is that every student will be offered not only a broad understanding of the curriculum but the confidence and understanding to participate in the great conversations of society, debating and shaping the future of the discipline.  

At Westminster City School, we recognise that students need a vast arsenal of skills to successfully navigate modern world. Computing is the key to this. We are committed to developing students’ digital literacy and computing competency, exposing them to high level coding and IT skills to prepare them to lead successful lives in a technological world.  

Using the concepts of abstraction, logic, algorithms and data representation, our young people will develop the skills to analyse problems in computational terms. We want them to move away from using technology as an entertainment medium and allow them to develop the skills to harness its creative and business-related capabilities.  

With modern day innovations stemming from computer science, we endeavour to give our learners an understanding of this challenging discipline, giving students the ability to make choices in relation to software chosen and confidence with the reading, writing and understanding of pieces of code, enabling them to become resilient learners and risk takers, learning from their mistakes.

Computing students will be provided with the opportunity to develop their computational thinking to solve problems that can ultimately shape our world.  

Our DT curriculum aims to equip young people with powerful knowledge of the core principles addressed within the subject. We encourage our students to be creative thinkers and risk takers, as they learn about new technologies and methods of construction. This allows students to develop an understanding of the complexities within the design process, which helps build a positive ethos in which they can thrive.

Through projects covered in DT, our students will engage with topics addressing the greater conversations on how DT can impact society, through in-depth analysis of social, moral and environmental issues, including the developing world and diversity. Each project will offer a different challenge which will develop the student's independence, empowering them with confidence and building character.  

We want students to develop crucial life skills through the exploration of drama.

Students will explore what it means to be a team player through collaborative work; students will learn what it means to be a reflective learner by completing learning diaries and reflection logs in response to their learning; students will develop their skills in giving and receiving constructive feedback through peer assessment; and students will develop their confidence through performing stories and presenting their ideas to a group and class.

Through collaborative and reflective work, students will learn to explore their sense of character and identity. We want our students to develop into risk- taking, kind and determined people of society, developing the courage to truly voice and embody excellence. We our students to have a love for play, a love for creation and a love for oneself.

At Westminster City School, our English Department are dedicated to creating independent, thoughtful and resilient learners. Our powerful knowledge curriculum is designed to make English meaningful to students’ lives, to allow them to think beyond their own experience, and to enable them to gain a greater understanding of their place in the context of the wider world. We celebrate hard-work and risk taking, and encourage students to develop as critical thinkers. Fortified with these life skills and this knowledge, we want our students to assume the mantle of personal agency and seize the opportunities that allow them to follow their chosen path. 

Our Enterprise Department at Westminster City School aims to provide our students with not just a passion for business and economics but to also create an atmosphere that is stimulating, engendering an awareness of events and issues within the global business and economic environment. This is, in part, done to give students the skills to thrive in the job market in the future through a rich and contextual curriculum. We achieve this through focusing on the essential powerful knowledge needed to access the intricacies of the subject, ranging from economists from BAME backgrounds to a focus on development and inequality to develop our students' sense of compassion and understanding of different issues they won’t necessarily face firsthand.

In Business Studies, powerful knowledge encompasses a range of areas such as management, marketing, information systems, and finance for small and large enterprises.

Our enterprise curriculum at Westminster City School aims to engage students in the ‘great conversations’ in society, such as why the level of inequality in the UK and around the world is increasing, how should resources be allocated in a time of extreme scarcity, what responsibility do businesses have in ensuring the inequities in society are fixed? We believe that the great conversations are not simply superficial, general arguments but class discussions focusing on realistic solutions that our students are encouraged to develop. This is achieved though the teaching of quantitative skills as well as the teaching of dissecting arguments and concepts to allow for enhanced critical thinking and problem solving.

Our overall aim is to allow our students to become critical thinkers and to be able to successfully analyse and critique issues faced in the modern economy, as well as issues they will personally face in their lives.

At Westminster City School, our intent, when teaching geography, is to inspire in our learners a curiosity and fascination about the world and people within it. We wish to promote their interest and understanding of diverse places, people, resources, and the natural and human environments, together with a deep understanding of the Earth’s key physical and human processes.  

At Westminster City School, through our teaching, we seek to nurture a sense of ownership and responsibility to manage the social and environmental challenges that our many and diverse communities face. We seek to develop an awareness of the world beyond their doorstep and of the "bigger" thinking, and to develop a sense of duty to the environment and fellow citizens. Our aim is that our young people become custodians of the planet, and are responsible and active global citizens who understand the importance of working together to solve problems on a variety of scales, from local issues to global matters. 

In History, we are committed to developing an understanding of the nature of humanity. We aim to engender a powerful knowledge through differing perspectives from across the world, representing the community we serve, in a measured way. The exploration of their impact and evaluation of the decisions that these people made will ensure our students have a global understanding of the world they live in. This will enrich our students’ understanding of what all of humanity has achieved and what difficulties humanity has overcome, and empower our students to understand what issues are likely to remain significant challenges for all people living in the current times and in the future.

It is in every way that the study of history enriches the soul and mind, and our curriculum is steeped in intellectual challenge, strong cultural capital, and academic excellence. Through the subject’s very foundations, we question the meaning of humanity through a study of communities, cultures and the leaders representing these people. Inevitably, this stimulates questions relating to the way we currently think and behave as well as the decisions we will make in the future.

Through a study of the individuals and communities in the past, we encourage students to question the integrity and excellence of these characters, allowing them to apply this evaluation to themselves and their own personal footprint on the world.  

Our vision is to develop aspirational young people who thrive in a challenging and changing world. Our students will develop the confidence and mind-set to recognise that coming up against obstacles is part of the challenge of strengthening understanding and be able to employ strategies to cope with unfamiliar contexts and problems.  

Mathematics should be an intellectual experience and our students should value the cognitive skills they will develop by studying it. Our students will have a deep understanding and enjoyment of mathematics so they can be creative and confident in solving problems, discovery, and reasoning, and in applying these skills to the wider world. 

At Westminster City School, we are proud to offer a wealth of musical opportunities both in and out of the classroom, which promote pride, success and achievement. We deliver a curriculum which stretches and challenges each student, motivating them to become critical thinkers and unlocking their potential to be lifelong learners.

We give special attention to provide many music performance opportunities which help our students develop character, determination, and self-confidence, empowering them with qualities that they can take forward into their communities and careers.   

Our vision is that every student leaves Westminster City School as a well-rounded musician, with a deep, rich understanding of a wide range of music allowing them to join and advance the great conversations of society. Music has been, and forever will be, a key contributor to culture worldwide, as well as financially important to many global economies. Therefore, we believe attaining good knowledge of this diverse, creative and influential subject is powerful, promotes transferrable skills, and now, more than ever, is greatly relevant to many walks of life. 

At Westminster City School, we aim to give our students a lifelong love of sport. We aim to do this by covering a broad range of sports in both our school and extra-curriculum programmes. Our students will develop a fundamental appreciation of the value of a healthy active lifestyle and regular exercise on their physical, emotional and mental well-being.

Whilst we offer a wide range of sports, we want students to be the best they can in their chosen sport and so give opportunities for students to excel at a particular sport.

We want our students to enjoy sport and we promote the values of sportsmanship, including humility, being magnanimous in defeat and victory, being respectful of team mates and opponents, and being proud to represent Westminster City School. 
 

Politics aims to help students to identify the underlying structures and systems which control the way things are; the people who occupy positions of power (and the people connected to them); and how students can engage with the people and structures of power. Students should be able to interpret today’s events, as well as place it into a context of the history of politics and political thought.

By the end of their studies at Westminster City School, our students should be able to understand the roots of their own beliefs (after considering a range of diverse ideologies), know the policies that they want to fight for, and understand the methods of how to change the world around them, so they can ensure that politics represents them, people like them, and the views that they hold. 

OUr Personal, Social, Health, Citizenship and Economic (PSHCE)  education allows students to develop the knowledge, skills, and attributes they need to keep themselves healthy and safe in preparation for life and work past school. Students will be taught how to identify risks and warnings signs, to resist internal and external pressures, and to make informed decisions. In this way, PSCHE endeavours to remove barriers to learning and allow every student to achieve their full academic potential.  

Throughout its delivery, PSHCE aims to build ‘soft skills’ such as resilience and empathy, allowing students to develop a healthy body, soul, and mind, and aiding students to build interpersonal and social effectiveness. PSHCE creates a safe space where students can question and critique the world for themselves, learning to address their current experiences with maturity, respect, and integrity. Ultimately, students should become agents of change now, and in the future, to help create a happier, healthier, safer and more just society.

Psychology at Westminster City School aims for students to understand people in a way that extends beyond their own experience. This will be informed by an appreciation of the role of research in forming theories, as well the ability to interrogate research with a critical and responsible eye.

The study of psychology will help students to build successful personal and professional relationships with a range of people and develop their understanding of their self.

Students will consider a range of approaches to psychology and engage in debates that abound in the subject such as the extent to which people are responsible for their actions. Students will consider the best ways of conducting robust and valid research which can be applied to the real world in a socially sensitive manner.

It is hoped that our students will one day shape the future of this relatively new and evolving subject in a way that serves contemporary society. 

RS should give students a deep knowledge and understanding of a range of religions and worldviews, so they can engage and investigate the different answers that they offer. It should allow them to critically develop their own answers to the 'big questions' of life and be able to express these reflections with increasing discernment.

The aptitude for dialogue which our students will develop during their learning should help them to engage better in the conversations of our multi-cultural society and develop in them a greater appreciation of different ways of life and beliefs.

RS welcomes everyone, is free of any discrimination and encompasses all four of our School's values. It should be relevant, informative, challenging and reflective. Above all, RS seeks from every student the ability to independently and logically think for themselves, regardless of belief or experience. 

Science at Westminster City School aims to inspire our students to become skilled critical thinkers, problem solvers, innovators, and team players. We work to develop the minds of our students by providing them with powerful knowledge that allows them to think beyond their own day-to-day experiences to become life-long learners, supporting creativity, curiosity, objectivity, and independence for all our students.  

At the conclusion of their studies at Westminster City School, our students will be capable of applying their scientific knowledge to contemporary issues and making connections between scientific disciplines and the wider world in general. This will allow them to participate in the great conversations in science, like climate change, artificial intelligence and conservation. We also encourage our students to pursue post-secondary education or careers in the fields of science. 

Sociology at Westminster City School gives students the knowledge to understand and question the inter-relationships between individuals, groups, institutions and societies, both within and beyond their own experience.

Sociology will give students the skills and vocabulary to discuss the causes, implications and complexity of social phenomena. Students will understand the role research plays in informing the answers to such questions, as well as examine the limitations of sociological research. Students will consider the best ways of conducting robust, valid and sensitive research so they can shape the future of this new and evolving subject in a way that serves contemporary society.

It is hoped that whatever paths our students travel down, sociology students will be equipped to foster a lifelong engagement in issues of social justice and to see the world with empathy.

Spanish at Westminster City School aims at developing respectful, tolerant, thoughtful and linguistically aware learners, who are able to express themselves in Spanish and fully embrace their ability to do so, at any stage of their learning.

We aim for our students to be curious about the extensive and varied Hispanic culture and the way Spanish language is used in both formal and informal contexts.

Our robust curriculum enables our students to identify and understand the many lexical common references that Spanish and English languages have, as well as develop grammatical awareness of Spanish syntax.

Our students are trained to use their acquired grammatical skills to develop and analyse their own processing (listening and reading) and production (speaking and writing) of Spanish language.

Learning Spanish will aid our students to be better equipped to understand today’s multicultural world and respond more effectively to social stimuli. It will also provide them with an opportunity to consider Spanish language-related professions and occupations, and even jobs in Hispanic countries, which would further expand their horizons.