← Back to the rankingStädtisches Gymnasium St. Leonhard Aachen
Aachen, Germany · State
Illustration · Aachen
Städtisches Gymnasium St. Leonhard is a city-run Gymnasium in the centre of Aachen, next to the cathedral; it is maintained by the City of Aachen. Pupils join in grade 5 after Grundschule and study through to the Abitur: grades 5-10 and three years of upper school (EF, Q1, Q2). The school has a bilingual French-German branch, Französisch Plus: French from grade 5, Geography and History taught in two languages from grade 7, and a French-German certificate can be earned at the end. The school offers the IB Diploma Programme in Q1 and Q2 in addition to the Abitur: students take both German and IB exams. All IB subjects are also taken as German courses, and Biology or Physics, History and Mathematics get an extra 2 hours a week in English in small groups. Regular teaching is in German. Besides English and French, Spanish, Latin and Dutch are taught, and the school prepares students for the French DELF exams. It is a Europaschule, an Erasmus+ participant and runs exchanges with Belgium, France, Spain, the USA, the UK and Argentina.
Key facts
Programmes
IB · DP · National programme
Languages of instruction
German, English
Languages taught
French, Spanish, Latin, Dutch
About the fees The Gymnasium is run by the City of Aachen and charges no tuition. Extra costs: canteen lunch 4.90 EUR by subscription or 5.40 EUR per meal, GanztagPlus supervision on Tuesdays and Fridays until 16:00 at 260 EUR per half-year, and class trips and exchanges within a cost plan approved by the school.
Admissions Grade 5 admits pupils leaving Grundschule: the school holds an information evening for primary parents in late November or early December and an open day on the first Saturday after the Christmas holidays; when registering for grade 5 families choose the second foreign language (French or Spanish from grade 7) or the French-German branch with French from grade 5. The bilingual branch accepts any child interested in French, with no prior knowledge required; the school says children from neighbouring Belgium who already learned French at primary school are welcome. Registration for the upper school (Sek II) is only possible after a prior advisory meeting. The IB Diploma Programme is aimed at motivated, high-achieving Q1 and Q2 students with international interests; the school recommends taking English as an advanced Abitur course. Individual IB subjects can also be taken for certificates. The website describes no separate IB entrance test.
Stages and year groups Grades 5-10, EF, Q1, Q2. A German Gymnasium of North Rhine-Westphalia: Erprobungsstufe (grades 5-6), Mittelstufe (grades 7-10, ending at the end of grade 10 with the central ZP 10 exam and the intermediate school certificate), Oberstufe (EF, Q1, Q2) with the Abitur (Allgemeine Hochschulreife); some advanced courses are run jointly with Couven-Gymnasium and Kaiser-Karls-Gymnasium. French-German branch: an advanced French course plus bilingual History in the Abitur earns a French-German qualification with a separate certificate. The IB Diploma Programme in Q1-Q2 runs alongside the Abitur: subjects are German A Literature, English, French or Spanish as a foreign language, History, Biology or Physics, Mathematics, and a sixth subject that is a second foreign language or a second science; three subjects at Higher and three at Standard Level, plus the Extended Essay (recognised for the Abitur as the Facharbeit), Theory of Knowledge and CAS.
Address Jesuitenstraße 9, 52062 Aachen
Accreditations and programmes verified against official registries
IB · DP · authorised programmeThe school is listed in the IB register and runs the Diploma Programme. The IB track runs inside a German Gymnasium: in the upper grades students take the IB Diploma alongside the Abitur.
school is in an official registryconfirmed by a school document, by membership or by taking part in a networkclaimed by the school, no confirmation, not counted in the scoreGuide to all organisations → What stands behind each entry
IBInternational Baccalaureate
A Swiss non-profit, working since 1968. Its programmes are among the most widely recognised school programmes in the world. Authorisation is granted stage by stage, so a school with the final stage does not necessarily run the younger ones; which stages this school holds is set out in the line below.
What the badge means for this school. The school is allowed to run this programme and to award its certificate. This is a confirmation of the programme, not a judgement on the school as a whole. The entry stands in the organisation's public register - anyone can check it. At this school: DP (ages 16-19). DP is the final stage, ages 16 to 19: six subjects plus a compulsory core of theory of knowledge, an extended essay and CAS. The diploma is accepted by universities all over the world, and in a number of countries it counts for admission on the same footing as the local leaving certificate.
Register to check for yourself, and the full guide →National programme
The state school programme of the country the school stands in: it is set by that country's ministry of education, which also licenses the school and awards the leaving certificate. That certificate is used for entry to local universities, and abroad it is matched to the local one.
What this means for this school. This entry does not count towards the score, and that is deliberate. Every lawful school in a country works to the national programme, so on its own it tells one school apart from no other - unlike the French, German or Russian programmes, which are carried abroad and confirmed by the register of their organisation. We show it because a parent needs to know what programme their child is taught and what certificate the child will get. Counting it would lift the whole ranking at once and still tell nobody apart.
Exams and destinations from the school's official website
The school publishes nothing about where its leavers go: no share going on to university, no exam results, no list of universities.
Facilities from the school's official website
·Swimming poolnot stated on the website
·Sports hallnot stated on the website
·Laboratoriesnot stated on the website
✓Theatre or assembly hall
✓Library
✓Catering
·School transportnot stated on the website
·Boardingnot stated on the website
Campus: A city-run Gymnasium in the centre of Aachen, near the cathedral, well served by buses. Compulsory all-day school (gebundener Ganztag) on Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays: lunch in the canteen made from organic food, supervised study time and clubs on Thursdays; on Tuesdays and Fridays lessons end at 13:15, followed by optional paid supervision GanztagPlus until 16:00. There is a library, opened in 1997, with computers and books in several languages, and an assembly hall with sound and lighting equipment. The school has held the MINT-freundliche Schule award since 2015 and Europaschule status, and takes part in Erasmus+.
Clubs and activities: Reit-AG (horse riding club) · Kletter-AG (climbing club) · Tennis · Instrumentalkurse (instrument lessons) · Modellbau-AG (model building club) · Jugend debattiert (school debating) · Karneval am Leo (carnival show)
Teaching staff from the school's official website
·Teachers listed by namenot published
·Teacher qualificationsnot stated
·Number of teachersthe school does not say
·Students per teacher or class sizenot stated
The staff page lists 84 teachers by name with their subjects. Separate coordinators run the IB, the bilingual branch, the all-day programme and each school stage. IB lessons in English are held in small groups.
Safety and wellbeing from the school's official website
·CCTVnot stated on the website
·Security staffnot stated on the website
·Access controlnot stated on the website
·Nurse or medical roomnot stated on the website
·Counsellornot stated on the website
·Child protection policynot stated on the website
·Staff trainingnot stated on the website
✓Anti-bullying policy
The Schule mit Herz programme: the subject social learning in grades 5-7 and prevention workshops up to the upper school, plus a team of teacher counsellors available daily in the lunch break, confidentially and voluntarily. A City of Aachen school social worker is on site Monday to Thursday. Trained student mediators resolve conflicts and mentor grade 5 classes.
Reviews
No reviews yet. The community rating counts towards the score once a school has five verified reviews - until then we do not show a zero, so as not to mislead.
Criteria breakdown criterion weight in brackets
Academics and programmes (16%)82 Community rating (16%)no dataparent reviews are needed: the criterion switches on at the fifth verified one Exams and destinations (12%) scored on disclosed data55 Safety and wellbeing (12%) scored on disclosed data60 Accreditation and verifiability (10%)85 Teaching staff (10%) scored on disclosed data55 Facilities (10%) scored on disclosed data75 Clubs and activities (8%) scored on disclosed data78 "Scored on disclosed data" stands where we count only what the school has written about itself on its own site: exams and destinations, safety and wellbeing, teaching staff, facilities, clubs and activities. A low score here means the school does not write about this, not that the school does not have it: a school with good security and a sparse site will score low. A school can fill in its profile, and the score will be counted again.
The score is counted from 8 of the 9 criteria.Only those with checkable data count: programmes and accreditations from official registers, the fee from a published price list. Where it says "scored on the median", the school has no data and the middle of the list is put in its place, so that a gap gives no advantage. Admissions, teaching staff and reviews come in as their data arrives.
The full methodology → Similar schools in the country