Windlesham House School

Windlesham House School
Established 1837
Type Preparatory school
Headteacher Richard Foster
Location London Road
Washington
Pulborough
West Sussex
RH20 4AY
 England Coordinates: 50°53′24″N 0°25′07″W / 50.88994°N 0.41848°W
DfE number 938/6028
DfE URN 126113 Tables
Students 350
Gender Coeducational
Ages 4–13
Website www.windlesham.com

Windlesham House School is a prep school near Washington, West Sussex, England. It was founded in 1837 by Charles Robert Malden and was the first boys' preparatory school in the United Kingdom.[1] The school moved to its current location in 1934. It caters for over 300 pupils, both boarding and day, aged from four to thirteen years. The pre-prep is called Little Windlesham and teaches the four- to seven-year-olds. The 65-acre (260,000 m2) site nestles in the South Downs and has a variety of facilities including six sports pitches, woods, the Malden Family Theatre, a new library, indoor swimming pool and tennis courts.

Charles and Elizabeth Ann Malden were the last of five generations of Malden heads from 1837 - their joint headship alone lasted nearly 40 years (1957 to 1994). They were leaders of their time, insisting on being known not by their surname, Malden, but by the more informal Mr & Mrs Charles. In 1963 the School was among the first to become a Trust and in 1967 Windlesham was the first traditional boys' boarding prep school to become co-educational.

There is also an alternate naming convention for the pupils - for example, the children who have one year left at the School are called the Ones (Year 8), the children who have two years left are called the Twos (Year 7), and so on and so forth down to the Fives (Year 4) and Transition (Year 3), so called because that is the transition year between 'Little Windlesham' and the main school.

The school hosted a large outdoor event in the summer of 2010 called Odyssey.[2] This followed on from an Elements event in 2007 that raised £35,000 for the nearby Chestnut Tree House Hospice.

The school frequently sends its leavers to public schools such as Eton, Harrow, King's Canterbury, Marlborough, Sevenoaks and Wellington, with many students gaining scholarships for achievement in academia, sport, or the arts.

The Headmaster, Richard Foster, has been at the school since September 2007. The new Chairman of Governors, Christina Maude, is married to the Rt Hon. Francis Maude MP. The school was founded way back in 1837. Previous Heads include Charles and Elizabeth Ann Malden.


Notable former pupils

References

  1. ↑ "Windlesham ages 10 to 15 - Summer School - St Bede's Day and Boarding School". St Bede's School. Retrieved 29 April 2012. Windlesham House School, which was the first school in the country to be established as a preparatory school, was founded in 1837 and has occupied its current location since 1934.
  2. ↑ "Top awards for New Hall School and Windlesham House School". Gabbitas. 24 November 2011. Retrieved 29 April 2012. West Sussex’s Windlesham House School received the Outstanding Community Initiative for their outstanding Odyssey weekend, which took place in early July.
  3. ↑ Reginald Courtenay Welch, The Harrow School Register, 1800-1911 (1894), p. 393
  4. ↑ Percival Serle, "Head, Frederick Waldegrave" in Dictionary of Australian Biography (Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1949)
  5. ↑ 'Mr. D. H. Beves' (obituary) in The Times of London, issue 55127 dated 7 July 1961, p. 18
  6. ↑ Jason Tomes, 'John Emerson Harding Davies' in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004)
  7. ↑ James Hamilton-Paterson profile in The Guardian dated 5 June 2004
  8. ↑ 'Francis William Harding Davies' in Canadian Who's Who, vol. XLI (University of Toronto Press, 2006)
  9. ↑ Duncan Goodhew, Victoria Hislop, Fix Your Life - Now! (2003, ISBN 0091884500), p. 12
  10. ↑ Noah Huntley at filmreference.com, accessed 7 February 2014
  11. ↑ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tamzin-merchant/
  12. ↑ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/culture-obituaries/tv-radio-obituaries/7589085/Sir-Michael-Hordern.html

External links