Independent Schools of the Year 2025 is an awards programme brought to you by Independent School Parent magazine. The awards are designed to showcase our schools’ success stories and celebrate the extraordinary and compelling student experience they provide.

This year there are 25 award categories which schools can enter. They have been designed to reflect the breadth and diversity of life as a student in the independent education sector. The awards are open to all independent schools which are members of an association in membership of the Independent Schools Council or COBIS. The judges will be looking for schools to share stories of success underpinned by supporting evidence. Success comes in many forms and we want to celebrate them all. Nominations open 25 March 2025, close on 5 June 2025. Entries are easy to submit using the online forms on this website.

The 2025 Commended Schools will be announced on 4 July, Finalists on 10 September and the Winners will be revealed at an awards ceremony in October.

The Winners, Finalists and Commended Schools will be presented with specially commissioned rosettes and supporting collateral to use across their print and online marketing materials celebrating their success. Winning schools will also be awarded one of the much-coveted ISOTY trophies.

The awards will be chaired once again by Dr Helen Wright, international Education Adviser and past Vice Chair of the ISC, supported by a panel of judges which includes leading Head Teachers and representatives of the professional associations.

Dr Helen Wright comments:

“I am so pleased to be chairing the judging panel for the Independent Schools of the Year – now firmly established as a leading awards scheme in our sector – for an eighth time.

I am delighted that for 2025 we are launching our UK-wide regional awards. I hope that these new awards will help us celebrate the diversity and highly individual characters of our independent schools, so often reflecting and enhanced by their location within our islands.

I hope that the awards will provide our sector with an opportunity to showcase the extraordinary student experience our pupils receive and demonstrate beyond doubt to those who question our relevance that the sector is worthy of recognition and should be cherished and supported.

The announcement of the winners in the autumn will provide our schools with a great platform from which to tell their stories and underline the benefits of an independent school education as the sector pushes forward through this challenging period.”