The Girls' Day School Trust

As a charity that owns and runs a network of 23 schools and two academies in England and Wales, it reinvests all its income in its schools. Founded in 1872, the GDST has a long history of pioneering innovation in the education of girls, and is the largest single educator of girls in the UK (and the UK’s largest educational charity).

Because it is a group of 25 schools, the GDST is an extraordinarily effective network for knowledge-sharing and for the dissemination of best practice.

It is also able to develop and promote talented teachers through its network. In Trust schools, girls can find their ‘maximum stretch’ – in academic, musical, sporting, acting ability – and being able to develop their talents uninhibitedly in a single sex environment is enormously important for them.

The results speak for themselves – GDST girls outperform the independent school sector as a whole at GCSE and A-Level by a significant margin. GDST Oxbridge and Russell Group University results continue to be impressive, even as competition in higher education mounts. And Trust Key Stage 2 results show the outstanding performance of GDST junior schools.

Most GDST schools are all-through – ages 3/4 to 18 – and this gives the schools the unique advantage of being able to help a girl develop from the earliest years, building the foundations of curiosity, a love of learning and adventurousness in the classroom and on the sports field that will make the GDST school leaver so recognisable both to university tutors and future employers, for her confidence without arrogance, and her ability to take on every challenge, to ‘feel the fear and do it anyway’.

To learn more about the Girls Day School Trust, please visit the GDST website. 

GDST Schools offer  

• Excellent quality of education - Trust results are consistently well above the national average at Key Stage 2, GCSE and A-level
• Competitive fees - our high quality education for girls of educational promise is outstanding value for money – the Trust consistently features at the top of national newspaper league tables in terms of value as represented by results against fees.
• Accessibility - scholarships and bursaries make a GDST education available to those who would benefit, irrespective of means, religion or personal circumstances – the GDST Alumnae Network Fund currently supports bursary places for 20% of current senior pupils
• Central funding of facilities and equipment, allowing for major capital building projects and facilities development
• A national careers network, providing careers links across the whole body of the GDST
• GDST National Events, offering participation at an extremely high level in sporting, musical, public speaking and other artistic events
• GDST Northern Events, offering opportunities to develop relationships with nearby Trust schools through e-mails, pen friends and sport
• GDST prizes and awards, offering national recognition for individual excellence

The Chair of Trustees for the Girls Day School Trust is Vicky Tuck. She can be contacted at the following address: 10 Bressenden Place, London, SW1E 5DH.

The Undivided Charter

The GDST is committed to diversity, inclusion and real change, and social justice will be even more of a golden thread that runs through our work in the coming months and years. GDST schools strive to be inclusive environments in which the wellbeing of every young person comes first, and where every girl – no matter her background – can learn without limits.

The Undivided Charter lays out practical steps that GDST schools are committed to making - read more about it.