← Back to the rankingLiceo Scientifico Statale Galileo Galilei
Siena, Italy · est. 1940 · State
Illustration · Siena
Liceo Galileo Galilei is the state scientific liceo of Siena, established in 1940 and named after Galileo in 1945; since 1967 it has been in the building on Via Cesare Battisti. It has 978 students in 42 classes. Tracks: the main scientific liceo, the scientific liceo with extra English and Latin or maths laboratories, the Cambridge section (since 2014) and the sports liceo, including one with extra English. Lessons are in Italian; in the Cambridge section five subjects are also taught in English with native speakers, with IGCSE exams in years 2-4 and a study week in England every year in years 1-3. The school is known for its scientific instruments: a Foucault pendulum, a rooftop observatory, a museum of historic instruments and a cosmic-ray detector built at CERN; it also runs a biomedical course, takes part in an outdoor schools network and has exchanges with Vietnam, Germany and Australia.
Key facts
Programmes
Cambridge · IGCSE · National programme
Languages of instruction
Italian, English
About the fees The school is state-run and tuition is free. Families pay a contribution towards the extended curriculum: voluntary in the main track, 100 EUR a year; compulsory in the Cambridge section - 370 EUR in years 1-2, 260 EUR in year 3 and 130 EUR in years 4-5; in the enhanced-English sections 140 EUR in years 1-2 and 100 EUR voluntary in years 3-5; in the sports liceo 160 EUR a year, with extra English 215 EUR in years 1-2 and 150 EUR in years 3-5. No school year is shown on the contribution table.
Admissions Year 1 enrolment is through the national online procedure; for 2026-2027 enrolment had to be confirmed by 12 July 2026 by sending documents to the school's official email. If applications to the Cambridge section exceed the places, a ranking is drawn up from the year 2 lower secondary average and the marks in English and the second foreign language (10 - 5 points, 9 - 3 points, 8 - 1 point; for students from an enhanced-English programme without a second language, the English score is doubled). The sports section also has its own admission criteria.
Stages and year groups Grades 1-5 scuola secondaria di secondo grado. A five-year liceo following the Italian curriculum with the esame di Stato. Tracks: liceo scientifico ordinamentale; liceo scientifico tradizionale with extra English and laboratories in Latin, science and physics or in maths, science and physics in years 1-2; liceo scientifico tradizionale «Potenziamento Cambridge»; liceo scientifico sportivo and sportivo with extra English; a biology course with a biomedical focus. The Cambridge section (since 2014-2015): five subjects in English with native or bilingual speakers - Geography and Computer Science (IGCSE exams in May of year 2), Mathematics (October-November of year 3), English as a Second Language (May of year 3, equivalent to B2) and Biology (October-November of year 4); English +2 hours in all years, one with a native speaker; 30 hours a week in years 1-2. Exams are optional. Every year in years 1-3 there is a week in England to prepare for the exams, in year 3 at Kew Gardens in London; year 4 students go on an exchange to Hanoi.
Address Via Cesare Battisti 13, 53100 Siena (SI)
Accreditations and programmes verified against official registries
Cambridge · IGCSE · authorised programmeThe Cambridge register names the school as its centre; it teaches Cambridge IGCSE. The Potenziamento Cambridge section of the science lyceum teaches Geography, Computer Science, Mathematics, English and Biology to IGCSE with native speakers; exams are optional, years 2-4.
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
CambridgeCambridge International Education
Part of the University of Cambridge. It allows a school to teach the Cambridge programmes and to enter pupils for the exams. There are four stages and they are authorised separately: primary, lower secondary, IGCSE and A Level. If the stages are known they are named in the line below; if that line is missing, the school does not publish them, and the Cambridge registry does not show stages either - it gives only the name of the centre, the country and whether private candidates are accepted. Cambridge calls what it does registration rather than accreditation, and the network holds about ten thousand schools.
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: IGCSE (ages 14-16). IGCSE means exams at around Year 10 or 11, the British counterpart of a lower secondary 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
✓Laboratories
·Theatre or assembly hallnot stated on the website
·Librarynot stated on the website
·Cateringnot stated on the website
·School transportnot stated on the website
·Boardingnot stated on the website
Clubs and activities: School Sports Centre · Baskin (inclusive basketball) · Football Referee Course · Mathematics Olympiad · Physics Championships · Chemistry Games · Philosophy Championships · Asimov Prize · Meteo Galilei (school weather station) · Young Astronomers at the Galileo National Telescope · Book and Movie Club · From Classroom to Stage (theatre workshop) · School Newspaper · Let's Talk Art at Galilei (art blog) · Introduction to Classical Music · New York Young Ambassadors · AI Course
Teaching staff
The school publishes neither the number of its teachers nor their qualifications.
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
✓Counsellor
✓Child protection policy
·Staff trainingnot stated on the website
·Anti-bullying policynot stated on the website
There is a psychological counselling service and a CIC counselling centre. The school has an inclusion protocol covering students with learning difficulties and special needs and rules for foreign students, school regulations, disciplinary rules, rules for trips and exchanges, and a first aid and defibrillator course.
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%)72 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 data65 Accreditation and verifiability (10%)85 Teaching staff (10%) scored on disclosed data55 Facilities (10%) scored on disclosed data60 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