In the 1980s, under the leadership of Dr Mervyn Flecknoe, its modular curriculum, elected student councils, and three-session day with an emphasis on tutorial contact and continuity were picked out by HMI for praise and the school was included as a model case study by Mortimore and Mortimore (1991)"The Secondary Head: Roles, Responsibilities and Reflections".

The intake of the school became overwhelmingly Muslim with many heritage languages during the late 1980s and early 1990s as the roll rose to 1400 students with a sixth form of 300.

On 15 March 1993, the school featured in a Panorama documentary called A Class Apart about the emergence of an underclass in Asian communities in Britain, narrated by Martin Bashir.

[3] In 2014 BBC Radio Four implicated the school's involvement in the Trojan Horse Scandal which enforces Islamist views through the board of governors.

Previously a community school administered by City of Bradford Metropolitan District Council, in June 2019 Carlton Bolling converted to academy status.

In March 2007, Carlton Bolling College was inspected by Ofsted and were ranked the first school in Bradford to get an outstanding result.

[4][5][6] In 2008, Carlton Bolling College 47.6% of students achieved 5 or more A*-C grades at GCSE levels and 26% including English & Maths.