Royal Grammar School, High Wycombe
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| The Royal Grammar School | |
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| Scola Regia Grammatica | |
| Established | 1562 |
|---|---|
| School type | Boys' Grammar School |
| Headmaster | Mr Roy Page |
| Location | High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, United Kingdom |
| Students | 1,335 |
| Teaching staff | approx 100 |
| Colours | Maroon, Blue, Green |
| rmp.staff@royalgrammar.bucks.sch.uk | |
| Website | www.rgshw.com |
The Royal Grammar School (often just RGS) is a selective grammar school situated in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, United Kingdom. As a state school it does not charge a fee for students to attend, but they must pass an entrance exam. As a result it feels more akin to a top public school - teachers wear gowns, facilities are above average and discipline is key to the school's success. For the last twenty years the school has produced top class exam results, both at GCSE and A-level, surpassing many of its fee-paying competitors. In the mid and late 1990s the school received the top exam results for the country and a majority of its pupils attend top universities - with Oxford, Cambridge, York, Nottingham and Birmingham being some of the pupils' favoured destinations.
Established by Royal Charter in 1562, it is situated on Amersham Hill to the north of the town, and has a capacity of about 1350 boys aged between 11 and 18. The school has boarding facilities and is a DfES-designated Language College However more recently in 2007 it was also awarded the privilege of becoming a Mathematics and ICT college due to its outstandingly high performance in these areas which lead to Ofstead recomendation. It is highly regarded by bodies such as OFSTED, which gave it a Grade 1 ranking in every area of its 2006 inspection,[1] and it regularly achieves high rankings on a country-wide scale for GCSE and A-level results.[2]
The current headmaster is Mr. Roy Page (former Senior Deputy Headmaster, then former Acting Headmaster), who has held the post since Easter 2006, succeeding Timothy Dingle.
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[edit] Facilities
The school has over 100 classrooms, two sports gyms, several ICT rooms with high-end computers for student use, several art workshops and technology labs, an interactive library, large sports fields, an indoor swimming pool, sports hall, a well equiped canteen, large assembly hall, modern language block and a 3 floor science block.
As a Language College, it is compulsory for students to study French until GCSE. Other modern language subjects include Spanish and German as the main choices. In addition, students have the opportunity to study Japanese, Russian, Swedish, Chinese-Mandarin, Italian, Latin and Ancient Greek.
A state-of-the-art music centre was opened in late 2004, giving the school a great amount of modern music facilities, including the ability to now offer A Level students the subject Music Technology.
RGS High Wycombe is also recognised as a top sporting school, with internationals being produced in at least four sports in virtually every year group. Amongst the many extra-curricular activities, boys can participate in the on-site Combined Cadet Force, the Public Speaking Society, music and orchestras, drama, social service, fencing, and a very large variety of sports. The school has two very large playing fields for its sporting use.
[edit] History
Originally established by the mayor and burgesses of the town in 1550 the school received Royal charter in 1562. It was based in the buildings of the former Hospital of St John the Baptist in the town centre until 1883. After the old hospital was demolished, the school was moved to new buildings nearby for a short time, and was moved to its current location in 1915. T.S. Eliot taught at the school during this time.
The school celebrated its 400th anniversary in 1962 with a visit from the Queen. To commemorate the visit, the school's main hall became Queen's Hall and bore an engraving to mark the occasion. In 1997 a new building was erected (the Language Block) entirely dedicated to the teaching of languages, which was opened by the Duchess of Gloucester.
In 2001, the then-Headmaster Tim Dingle began an "Education Excellence" campaign to raise money for the school, as it would otherwise suffer serious cutbacks in its teaching quality. He aimed to raise £1 million, and this goal has since been passed, with a significant portion of the money being donated by various benefactors and alumni, as well as parents; the remainder from the installation of soft drink and snack vending machines and the sale of advertising space on corridor walls inside the school.
There are several Royal Grammar School sites in the UK, of which High Wycombe, Colchester, Clitheroe and Lancaster have maintained their grammar school status, whilst Guildford, Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Worcester are now privately-funded, independent schools.
[edit] Entry
In order to gain entry to the school, pupils from primary schools in the local area are invited to do an entrance exam, the 11+. Entry to a grammar school usually requires a score of 121/141, though pupils who gain scores of 117 and above are invited to appeal their case. RGS admits 182 day students each year and 10 boarding students. Entry for boarding is somewhat different, with the school creating its own entry test.
[edit] Boarding
Fraser Youens Boarding House opened in September 1999. It incorporates en-suite bedrooms, cutting-edge communication technology, three resident Housemasters and a committee of House Tutors. It has room for 70 resident boys, who stay throughout the week and return home for weekends (it is possible to stay weekends as well, if desired). This facility enables students to attend RGS, who would otherwise be unable to: students from Malaysia and Singapore reside in Fraser Youens. The house is named after alumni Edward Fraser and Frederick Youens, both of whom are war heroes, winners of the Victoria Cross.
Although there is no fee to attend the main school, boarding students pay a termly fee. In some cases, students may be awarded scholarships if they cannot afford this fee but nevertheless wish to attend the school and are too far away.
[edit] Television
In 2003, the school was thrown back into history when it served as the location for two seasons of the television series That'll Teach 'em for Channel 4. The school was re-branded as "King's Grammar School" and took thirty sixteen year olds for a summer of 50's style boarding school education. This first series was nominated for a BAFTA. The second series saw thirty sixteen year olds of lesser academic achievement experience 60's style Secondary Modern School education; in this case the school was re-branded "Hope Green Secondary Modern". However, different parts of the school were used in each series, giving the impression that the school used in the second series was not that used in the first.
The school was also used as one of the sets in the 2001 thriller film The Hole, as a police-station. Various scenes were also filmed inside the school's old boarding house.
The school took legal action against Chris Morris after he used the image of the school's Maths Block in the highly controversial Paedogeddon special edition of his Brass Eye series. During the infamous "paedophile dressed as a school" scene[3] parodying appeals for witnesses of crime on the BBC programme Crimewatch, the building was seen with the body of, what was supposed to be, a paedophile superimposed on it walking down a street.
[edit] In the news
In 2004 the school was at the centre of a debate based around the qualifications required to teach. Dr David Wolfe, a physics teacher with a PhD, had been working as a school teacher for the maximum time allowed without having Qualified Teacher Status (QTS), one requirement of which was a grade C or higher in GCSE mathematics, or an equivalent qualification. Wolfe refused to take the GCSE, saying that at 65 he was "too old for that sort of thing", even though in his opinion he could easily pass it. The problems began when, despite an official stance of "flexibility" by the Department for Education and Skills with regards to equivalent qualifications, correspondence sent to the school was more bureaucratic. However, after much media attention (during which time the DfES announced that the mathematics GCSE was not in fact a concrete requirement) Wolfe was told that he could obtain QTS by submitting to a short teaching assessment, and he continued to teach at the school until 2006.[4]
In February 2006, Tim Dingle (then Headmaster) appeared in a double-page Daily Mail article, alleging he led "a fantasy life fuelled by sex and drugs".[5] Dingle, already scheduled to leave in April 2006, was claimed to have had various extramarital affairs and false identities. It was also alleged that he had been a user of cocaine and cannabis, the latter confiscated from pupils at his school where Dingle had been a hard-line anti-drugs advocate, vociferously opposing New Labour's proposed declassification of cannabis, and regularly speaking on Christian morality at his school. A report on the drug claims was published by independent investigation team in March 2006 and was passed to the governors of the Royal Grammar School for scrutiny. Dingle was forced to resign from his post at St. George's School, Buenos Aires, which he was due to take up after Easter 2006.[6] He was later sacked from his post at the Royal Grammar School by the school governors, for "gross misconduct".[7] The governors did state that there was no evidence to support the claim that he had used cannabis confiscated from pupils.[8]
[edit] Notable alumni
- Nick Beal - rugby union player
- Glyn Cannon - playwright
- Jimmy Carr - comedian and TV presenter
- Lance Dann - sound artist.
- Matt Dawson - rugby union player
- Paul Dazeley - Junior Commonwealth Games - silver medalist
- Luke Donald - European Ryder Cup golfer
- Nick Duncombe - England (2 caps) and Harlequins rugby player who died at the age of 21. A bench has been laid in his memory between the Sports and Science blocks.
- Ian Dury - rock musician and actor
- Paul Foot - comedian
- Ian Edward Fraser - Victoria Cross recipient in World War Two
- Richard Hickox - conductor of choral, orchestral and operatic music
- James Honeyben - rugby union player.
- Richard Johnson - cookery writer
- Howard Jones - rock musician
- Paul Kingsnorth - author and former Deputy Editor of The Economist
- Andrew McIntosh, Baron McIntosh of Haringey - Labour minister
- Phil Newport - former England (3 caps) and Worcestershire cricketer
- Tom Rees - rugby union player
- Roger Scruton - philosopher and author
- Tom Springfield - pop musician (with The Springfields), record producer, songwriter, Academy Award nominee - real name Dion O'Brien
- Denis Stevens - musicologist, conductor and professor, C.B.E.
- Tim Tolkien - sculptor
- Frederick Youens - posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross in World War One
[edit] Photographic time line
- School Photos from the years 1947 to 1960 - includes identifications of boys in the 1956 photo, scans from Grey Books, scans from the Programmes for the Gilbert & Sullivan operetta performances 1948 - 1963 and other miscellanea.
- 1964 Junior School Photo
- 1967 School Photo
[edit] The Gilbert & Sullivan Operettas
In 1947 Bernarr Rainbow directed the first of the Gilbert and Sullivan operettas to be performed at the school and these continued for some years.[9]
[edit] References
- ^ 2006 OFSTED Report (PDF). Grade 1 is "outstanding".
- ^ BBC Report.
- ^ You Tube
- ^ Wolfe report from BBC. BBC Video.
- ^ Site dedicated to Dingle case.
- ^ Bucks Free Press.
- ^ Governor's response to allegations against Dingle.
- ^ BBC News on the dismissal of Tim Dingle.
- ^ Scans from some of the original programmes can be seen here
