Old Swinford Hospital

Old Swinford Hospital

Mottoes	Ut prosim, vince malum bono
Established	1667
Type	Voluntary aided comprehensive Day and boarding school
Headmaster	Mr Paul Kilbride
Chaplain	Reverend Martin Soar
Founder	Thomas Foley
Location	Heath Lane Stourbridge West Midlands DY8 1QX England Coordinates: 52°27′03″N 2°08′39″W / 52.4507°N 2.1442°W / 52.4507; -2.1442
Local authority	Dudley
DfE number	332/5400
DfE URN	103870 Tables
Ofsted	Reports
Students	603
Gender	Boys; Coeducational Sixth Form
Ages	11–18
Houses	7 Senior Boarding Houses, 1 Junior Boarding House, 1 Day Student House
Colours
Publication	The Foleyan
Former Pupils	Old Foleyans
Website	www.oshsch.com

Old Swinford Hospital is a secondary boarding school in Oldswinford, Stourbridge, West Midlands, England^[1] that has been in continuous operation since the 17th century. It is one of 36 state boarding schools in England, meaning school fees are funded by the LEA and pupils only pay boarding fees. Girls are admitted into the sixth form as day pupils.

History

Old Swinford Hospital opened in the late summer of 1667. Originally called Stourbridge Hospital,^[2] it was founded by Thomas Foley, an ironmaster and prominent local landowner, whose main estate was at Great Witley, west of Stourport in Worcestershire, but with strong Stourbridge connections. It was to educate 60 boys from “poor but honest” families nominated by specified parishes in Worcestershire, Staffordshire and Warwickshire. The school was sometimes named as Foley's blue coat school or hospital, or Oldswinford Hospital Endowed School.^[3] The school had run to 70 boys by 1868.^[4]

Houses

The school consists of seven senior boarding houses:

House	Colour	Built	Namesake	Housemaster
Baxter	Grey	1990	Richard Baxter, a 17th Century Puritan Minister	Mr J Petfield
Dudley	Purple	1984	the Earls of Dudley, the family who bought the Foley's estate of Witley Court	Mr J Adey
Foley	Green	1982	Thomas Foley, the founder of the School	Mr N Linehan
Foster	Red		A prominent local family (see James Foster)	Mr A Coalter
Maybury	Royal Blue		William Maybury, headmaster from 1883–1928	Mr A Green
Potter	Sky Blue	2009	Chris Potter, headmaster from 1978 until 2001	Mr A Hannah
Witley	Yellow	1983	Witley Court, the Foley family mansion	Mr P Paternotte

There is one junior boarding house: Prospect House named after its location on Prospect Hill in Stourbridge. Its Housemaster is Mrs J Cooke.

Before the houses were associated with buildings, there was also a Lyttelton house, named after the Lyttelton family who built nearby Hagley Hall. Katherine Lady Lyttelton and her son Sir Henry Lyttelton, sold the manor of Old Swinford to Thomas Foley in 1661.^[5] In the mid-20th century, when day boys outnumbered boarders, there were also day houses called Stone and Chance. Stone and Lyttleton are now the names of teaching blocks at the school.

Admissions

There is no catchment area and admission is non-selective except for Out Boarders in Year 7 and Sixth Form day students. Boarding fees and day student facilities are charged but not tuition.^[6]

Sixth Form

The school also offers a Sixth Form to which girls are admitted. Applications externally are subject to an entrance exam and GCSE grades equivalent to 7 'A' grades. Boarding places are guaranteed for previous boarders, there is a minimum standard of 7 'C' grades at GCSE expected, this requirement can be wavered if the pupil is a clear benefit to the school through other contributions such as sport or music.

Scholarships and Burseries

Scholarships are available and ensure a 10% discount on school fees, these scholarships are available in music, sport and academia. They remain highly sought after due benefits such as a presentation of a cheque at every prize giving and a scholars medal.

In order to stay within the schools original purpose as a hospital (charity), one pupil per year group is awarded a grant, paid for by the schools governors, of up to 100% of the total fees, however, this place in highly competitive and this funding may be removed for poor or disruptive behaviour.

Academics

The school subject choices remain largely traditional, with many courses being offered as minor specifics to senior students. Mathematics is offered as Mechanics, Statistics, Pure, Core and Further. All 3 Sciences are offered, and for English you can take Language, Literature or both. History is split between standard History and Classical Civilisation. Latin is also an option which can be taken from Year 7.

Old Swinford Hospital is a specialist Business and Enterprise School, a Specialist Science School and has recently been awarded with an Artsmark and Sportsmark.

Foreign Language lessons are also compulsory and are offered as options to sixth form students as Spanish, French and German. Old Swinford Hospital benefits from foreign language assistants, who come as native speakers of the language to teach and help at the school. In return they get to live in one of the boarding houses, and also get the opportunity to better their own English language skills. In the past foreign language assistants have come from as far away as Argentina.

Examination wise, GCSEs are taken in Year 11. Lower Sixth take AS Levels, and Upper Sixth take A-Levels. Most Lower Sixth take 4-5 courses, and Upper Sixth take 3-4 Courses. For Upper Sixth students General Studies is an optional extra course, with untaught lessons, as well as many open university and finance courses open to the whole of the sixth form.

Old Swinford Hospital is placed in the top 5% of all schools at GCSE and with a strong record at A level. In October 2006, OFSTED rated the school as "outstanding" in each of the 39 inspection judgements.

Upon publication of the 2007/2008 academic year results tables, Old Swinford Hospital were the best school in the Dudley local area for pass and success rates in GCSEs with 89% of pupils gaining 5 or more A*-C grades. A Level students also performed well with 99% of examinations taken passed, and an average point score per pupil of 805.8; significantly higher than the Dudley local average of 733.1^[7][8] For 2010, it remained the highest performing school in the Dudley borough with 94% of GCSE students gaining 5 or more GCSEs at grade C or above.^[9]

Sport

Old Swinford Hospital has a large history of high level sporting achievement. Some Old Foleyans have gone on to play top level and international games in their sporting fields.

Sport is compulsory, during the Wednesday Afternoon sessions for the Senior Students, in line with the time university sports fixtures are played.

The main school sport is rugby, and it has been highly successful reaching the Semi-Finals in the U15 and U18 Daily Mail Cup, reaching the final in the U18 cup in 2012, and winning many other cups. From Michaelmas term the sport is played, with Sevens being played late in the Lent term. Other top level sports include Hockey and Cross Country. Cross Country had a successful 2007/2008 season, winning trophies in both 1st and 2nd team categories. The school runs 3 senior football teams which are coached by former professional footballer Dale Rudge.

In Summer the main school sport is cricket. This is played on front field cricket pitch, with Founders as the backdrop. The 1st team are usually very successful, in 2008 hardly losing a match. Teams throughout all of the year groups compete. A highlight of the season is the Senior teams match against the Old Foleyans played in the summer. David Banks, the former Worcestershire, Warwickshire and Staffordshire cricketer is one notable member of the teams coaching staff.

Basketball is fast becoming the schools second most popular sport. In 2011-2012 the team suffered only 2 defeats in the entire season. The juniors are coached by former England basketball guru Barrie Mann.

Other sports include Golf (Old Swinford Hospital owns Stourbridge Golf Club), Squash, Tennis, Rounders, Athletics, Volleyball, hockey and Mountain Biking.

Shooting is a sport also enjoyed at the school, with it more recently being involved in competitions. It is one of the most successful sports in the school with the shooting team coming 3rd in the nationals in 2010.

International links

Old Swinford Hospital has international links with schools and educational establishments abroad. The three most notable are in the table below. Old Swinford has a history of raising money, and assisting in many ways with St. John's Secondary School in Nandere, Uganda through various charitable events and days and through the Uganda Link society. When the school had power issues in 2007, Old Swinford managed to raise the money needed to get power supplies back within one day.

School	City
St. John's Secondary Senior School[10]	Nandere
St. George's College North[10]	Buenos Aires
St. Joseph's Nudgee College[10]	Brisbane

Famous Old Foleyans

Former students of the school are called Old Foleyans after the founder of the school, Thomas Foley.

Arts

• Nicholas Bailey - Actor - performed in Coronation Street, Casualty, EastEnders.
• Charles McKeown - Academy award nominated actor and writer. Films include, Brazil (1985), Spies Like Us, Time Bandits, The Missionary and Life Of Brian.

Media

• Matthew Chance - Journalist - International correspondent for CNN

Military

• Roi Wilson - Captain RN
• Neil Allcock MBE - Captain Army
• James Duffield - Captain Royal Australian Engineers

Politics

• Philip Davies - Conservative MP for Shipley

Sport

• James Collins- Rugby player for Worcester Warriors
• Dean Headley - Former England cricketer
• Chris Pennell - Rugby player for Worcester Warriors
• George Robson - Rugby player for Harlequins
• Joe Shaw - Rugby player for Newcastle Falcons
• Richard West - Former England Rugby Player
• Paul Doran-Jones - Rugby player for England and Northampton Saints
• Rhys Crane - Rugby player for England 7's and Sale Sharks
• Simon Green (cricketer)

Other

• William Henry Bury - Murderer and Jack the Ripper suspect

Headmasters since 1883

• Mr WJ Maybury (1883–1928)
• Mr HC Stone (1928–1951)
• Mr Lawrence Sheppard MBE (1951–1978)
• Mr Christopher Potter OBE (1978–2001)
• Mr Melvyn Roffe (2001–2007)
• Mr Peter Jones (2007–2014)
• Mr Paul Kilbride (2014–)

See also

• Old Swinford Hospital RFC

External links

• Old Swinford Hospital official website
• Stained Glass Window in the Great Hall
• Old Foleyans' Association
• School Leagues BBC

References