This article needs additional citations for verification .(January 2010) |
Spalding High School | |
---|---|
Address | |
![]() | |
Stonegate , , PE11 2PJ England | |
Coordinates | 52°46′59″N0°08′35″W / 52.7831°N 0.1431°W |
Information | |
Type | Community grammar school |
Motto | Lampada Vitae Tradimus Hand on the Lamp of Life |
Established | 1920 |
Local authority | Lincolnshire |
Department for Education URN | 120642 Tables |
Ofsted | Reports |
Chair | P Gorton |
Head teacher | M K Anderson |
Gender | Girls |
Age | 11to 18 |
Enrolment | 972 |
Website | http://www.spaldinghigh.lincs.sch.uk |
Spalding High School (SHS) is a grammar school for girls and a mixed sixth form located in Spalding, Lincolnshire, England.
Spalding High School, situated on Stonegate, Spalding, halfway between the Welland (and B1173) and the Coronation Channel to the east. The rear of the school, to the east, backs onto Exeter Drain and the Spalding Academy playing fields. The school also accepts some girls from Cambridgeshire, Peterborough and Norfolk.
SHS admits pupils aged 11–18, all of whom are required to pass an 11+ exam. There are approximately 1,000 staff and students at the school. The headmistress is Michele Anderson.
The school opened on 22 January 1920, originally at Ayscoughfee Hall School, then moved to its current site in the late 1950s. There are a number of watercolours of the original site in the school's collection, as well as all full school photos (taken once every five years) dating back to the school's early days. The library keeps an archive of photos, programmes and other memorabilia.
A Guide unit was founded in 1925, the 4th Spalding group. In December 1931 Lady Hoskyns gave out the prizes; she attended the same Cambridge college as the headmistress. [1] The speech day on 15 February 1938 was given by Prof Charles Melville Attlee (1894-1971) of University College Nottingham. [2]
Sir John Gleed was the chairman of the governors until 1943. There were 265 at the school in the 1940s, with only 14 in the sixth form.
Due to lack of room, some girls chose to travel to Wisbech High School in preference. On 27 January 1944, Holland Education Committee purchased 8.5 acres for a new school. Planning permission was given by 1948. In 1948 a Biology laboratory and two classrooms were built on netball courts. In the early 1950s around one in a hundred women went to university. [3]
By 1953, there were 410 at the school, with 56 in the sixth form. The 'Daily Mirror' and 'Daily Herald' visited the school in 1953 to look at the cramped buildings. The Minister of Education announced that four classrooms would be built on the boys grammar school playing fields, for the girls' school. But a new school could not be built until 1958. The new classrooms opened in 1955 as the 'Medway Rooms'.
In February 1957 the new school foundations were started. The building was to be completed by September 1958, but it would take until January 1959. The school wanted a separate gym, but Sir Oswald Giles of the county council wanted the school hall to be the gym. The new school opened Thursday 8 January 1959. Biology, Chemistry and Physics were taught in separate laboratories. The new school was officially opened Friday 20 March 1959 by Sir Herbert Butcher, with chairman of Holland Education Committee. But the school was now a two-site school. By 1960 there were 500 at the school, with 80 in the sixth form. The swimming pool was built in 1967.
21 year old trainee classics teacher Miss Jennifer Jane Stearman, of 21 Redfearn Close in Cambridge, who taught with Mr Les Churchill, was killed in a vehicle collision, in a Morris 1000, with a truck on the evening of Sunday 18 February 1973, at the southern end of the A1073 Crowland bypass. She was visiting her grandmother in March, Cambridgeshire, and was taken to Peterborough Hospital. The bypass had opened in 1972, and this was the first death. [4] [5] [6] [7] [8]
By 1980 the sixth form was 160. [9] A new £1.3m block would open in 1985, with construction starting in May 1984, [10] which would allow all teaching to take place on one site from January 1986. [11]
It was officially opened in March 1986 by Frances Manners, Duchess of Rutland; her mother featured in the 2021 A Very British Scandal ; the Duchess was pleased that Lincolnshire retained grammar schools, saying 'freedom of choice is the sign of a free society'. [12] By 1989 there were 710 at the school. [13]
The £559,000 technology centre was officially opened on Thursday 14 October 1993 by Prof Richard Kimbell, of Goldsmiths College. Construction had started in April 1992, and it opened in January 1993. [14] A new six-classroom £409,000 Languages block was approved by Lincolnshire County Council in May 1994, to start construction in December 1994. [15] The school now had 900 girls, often travelling from Peterborough. [16]
The new Languages block was opened in February 1996 by the Leader of Lincolnshire County Council, although had been open since September 1995. [17] [18]
In the 1960s and 1970s, the school's playing field was frequently used for national and regional schools' hockey competitions. It achieved sports college status in 2003. [19]
On 28 April 1983, 13 year old Melanie Hampson had a serious javelin accident, and was taken to the Pilgrim Hospital. [20]
In July 1992, the school gymnastics team represented the UK in the European Schools Games in France. [21] [22]
In a typical year group at SHS there are five forms of approximately 30 pupils. Each form is a member of a house. There are five houses, each named after famous women of historic importance: