This list of the Top Five preparatory schools forms part of the Herald's UK Education Special Report on some of the leading preparatory and senior Catholic schools in the UK (the full report is available in the September 2025 edition of the magazine).
We have tried to give readers a feel of each school, while also providing information such as location, ethos, school fees and the inside track on the headmaster or headmistress. Criteria include academic performance and pastoral care, and how serious a role the Catholic faith plays in the life of the school.
Schools appear in alphabetical order. All fees are per term unless indicated otherwise.
Farleigh School
Hampshire
Head: Fr Simon Everson
Intake: Boys and girls, ages 3-13
Day fees: £5,600 to £10,485
Boarding fees: £11,427 to £13,890
Farleigh School, founded in 1953, is a Catholic preparatory day and boarding school in a rural village outside Andover. Surrounded by 70 acres of park and woodland, the main school building is a Georgian house, with capacity for over 460 pupils, about a quarter of whom are boarders.
This year, Farleigh received a "significant strength" commendation from the Independent Schools Inspectorate: "Pupils' understanding of the dignity of the human person is evident in the way they respect and are demonstrably kind to each other. Their positive behaviour, which strongly reflects the school's ethos, is a significant strength of the school."
The Catholic Schools Inspectorate marked Farleigh "outstanding" in every category, noting that "the warm Catholic ethos of Farleigh School permeates every area of school life". Children thrive personally and academically, often winning scholarships to top senior schools, including Ampleforth, Downside and St Mary's School Ascot.
Headmaster Fr Simon Everson is a convert from Anglicanism, and is adored by parents and children. Parents say Farleigh is a "magical" school which "lets children be children".
Moor Park
Shropshire
Head: James Duffield
Intake: Boys and girls, ages 3 months-13 years
Day fees: £8,742
Boarding fees: up to £13,224
Having just celebrated its 60th anniversary, Moor Park is a co-ed Catholic independent boarding and day school with 85 rolling acres, close to Ludlow in Shropshire.
The school was the former red-brick country house of the Salwey family and was started in 1964 by Derek Henderson and Hugh Watts, friends from Downside before the war. The recently appointed headmaster James Duffield is a former pupil of the school.
Moor Park attracts locals and pupils from all over the country, as well as boarders from France and Spain, because of its Catholic roots.
Regular services are held in the chapel, including Sunday Mass for full boarders. The most recent ISI inspection report rated the school as excellent in all areas, stating: "The moral awareness of the pupils, underpinned by the school's Catholic ethos, is extremely well-developed."
New Hall School
Essex
Principal: Katherine Jeffrey
Intake: Boys and girls, ages 1-18
Day fees: up to £9,547
Boarding fees: up to £15,348
New Hall School is a large day and boarding school, housed in Henry VIII's Palace of Beaulieu and set in 70 acres. The school is noted for its commitment to the common good and in 2012 became the first independent school in the country to sponsor a state primary school that was seeking to become an academy.
In 2024, New Hall's prep school was shortlisted for the Independent Prep School of the Year award at the Independent Schools of the Year Awards.
Students gather weekly in the historic chapel, participate in planning liturgies and take active roles in various ministries as servers, readers and musicians. The chaplaincy team holds Masses every Sunday and Wednesday, and at the beginning and end of each term. A smaller chapel in the prep school introduces younger children to the Faith.
Academic results are strong, with over two-thirds of A-level grades A* to B, and a quarter of GCSE grades 8+ in 2023. The school runs the New Hall Voluntary Service, which hosts community lunches for the elderly. New Hall also has an onsite farm.
Girls and boys can board from Year 3, either as full or flexible boarders, with the latter option allowing for overnight stays of one to six days a week.
St Mary's School
Hampstead
Head: Charlotte Owen
Intake: Girls, ages 2-11
Day fees: £8,100
St Mary's was established in 1871 in Hampstead as a Catholic convent boarding school for girls. The school has its own chapel with beautiful stained-glass windows, where Mass and weekly "Praying Together" sessions take place. St Mary's is proud of its chapel choir, which performs annually at the Royal Albert Hall. Girls are high achievers and facilities are excellent.
The school has recently opened its Global Learning Centre which includes an engineering and robotics lab, virtual-reality launch pad, art and design studio as well as a green room.
Westminster Cathedral Choir School
London
Head: Neil McLaughlan
Intake: Boys, ages 4-13
Boarding fees: £3,463 (excl VAT)
Day fees: £7,183 to £8,180 (excl VAT)
Westminster Cathedral Choir School is an academically selective boys prep school in Victoria, London. Boys, of whom there are around 265 aged four to 13, go on to some of Britain's best senior schools, often with scholarships. The school has 20 weekly boarding choristers who join in Year 4, all of whom must be baptised and practising Catholics.
Under headmaster Neil McLaughlan, the school has developed its own modern liberal arts education, based upon the "three Cs" of curriculum, canon and character. Boys are taught Classics from Year 4 and the school has an outstanding English department; pupils are asked to memorise poetry by Shakespeare, Milton, Eliot and Keats as part of their studies.
Photo: by Arcadia
This article appears in the September 2025 edition of the Catholic Herald. To subscribe to our thought-provoking magazine and have independent, high-calibre and counter-cultural Catholic journalism delivered to your door anywhere in the world click HERE.
