Beginnings

A phenomenon began…

The publication’s recent features on British schools had been devoured by a readership of upper class newly-weds, affluent young mums and those with designs on becoming both, who were trying to understand the options for educating their children. Royal Mail post bags, stuffed with letters of appreciation and requests for more of the same, were delivered to the magazine’s offices and bosses knew they had something big on their hands. The journalist responsible for many of these articles was called in to the editor’s office and asked whether she thought there could be a book in it…and so The Good Schools Guide was born.

Sarah Drummond was a freelance journalist harbouring a particular interest in education. With three young children of her own and many friends in a similar situation, discussions about schools were everywhere, from playgrounds to dinner parties, and she immediately saw the potential in a guide to schools, written by parents for parents. ‘There was nothing like it,’ she says, when recalling those early days. ‘There was a yearbook listing the names of schools with their address and phone number but you can’t tell a thing about a school from that. People did not know what a school in one part of the country was like, or how it compared to another school in a different part.’

Treated with suspicion…

Sarah brought in fellow features journalist Amanda Atha and together they drew up a list of state and private schools and assembled a small team of writers determined to visit as many of them as possible. Letters were sent to headteachers outlining their intentions and requesting a date to visit. News of the embryonic book was greeted with a variety of responses. Many were positive although the Independent Schools Joint Council promptly wrote to all its member schools advising them not to engage with this upstart new publication. 

For three years, The Good Schools Guide team toured schools the length and breadth of Britain. Our visits were treated with suspicion but mostly tolerated. We judged the majority to be of our required standard but plenty underwhelmed and were struck off the list. Two schools heeded the ISJC’s warning and refused to let us through their gates. Brush-offs such as these only underscored our independence – a boon when publicising the book – and anyway, we would turn up to open days, entering children that didn’t exist and covertly canvassing parents for their opinions – a recourse we still occasionally employ today when our overtures are not welcomed.

And so it truly begins…

The first Guide was published in November 1986 with reviews of 253 schools. As our name suggests, all those featured were of course ‘good’, but our reviews also contained honest, occasionally biting, criticism, something that became a hallmark of The Good Schools Guide. It was serialised in The Times in the weeks leading up to publication and the paper’s letters page filled up with correspondence from indignant headteachers and supportive parents. The book captured the imagination of the public and flew off shop shelves.

The second edition arrived in the spring of 1989. The number of schools now totalled 276; new ones had been added, others had fallen out of favour and all reviews had been updated. Sarah and Amanda published their third edition in the autumn of 1991 and for the next decade new editions, each with more schools and requiring a larger team of writers than the one before, arrived in shops every two to three years. In time, another string was added to the company’s bow in the form of a consultancy service. Given the accumulation of expertise, offering bespoke help to parents was a logical next step and something that had often been requested since The Guide’s earliest days.

Let’s get digital…

The digital era brought challenges for traditional publishing and necessitated a Good Schools Guide presence on the internet, thus in 1998 The Good Schools Guide went online. The first website launched with all 306 of our school reviews alongside advice articles and a shop which sold our now well-established books and other education publications. Up-to-date information and data to do with school catchment areas and academic performance were added and improved upon continually.

When Amanda Atha died in 2000, her husband Ralph, The Lord Lucas, assumed control of publishing and ownership of The Guide. In the following decade he introduced new titles focused on SEND education and US universities, established The Good Schools Guide International and grew the SEND advice service. More recently, guides to schools in London and boarding schools were launched.

Where we are now…

The world of schools and education is constantly moving; our mission has always been to keep up with it. The days of a single book featuring a few hundred school reviews are a proud but distant memory. Our latest website is the sixth we’ve had and the most comprehensive yet with more than 1,600 reviews of schools in the UK and around the world, all written and updated by a team of 90 writers. Our data, advice, analysis and opinion provide an invaluable resource for thousands of parents striving to make the best possible decisions for their children. And our team of education consultants deliver detailed one-to-one advice for hundreds of families every year.