Rickmansworth School
Encyclopedia
Rickmansworth School formerly Rickmansworth Grammar School, is a coeducational secondary school
of around 1,200 pupils, situated in Croxley Green
(Hertfordshire
), near Rickmansworth
.
using tests in mathematics and verbal reasoning, with a further 10% selected for aptitude in music. Most children are admitted at 11 and there is an additional intake at 16 into the Sixth Form
.
As a foundation school
, Rickmansworth is self-governing and the governing body is responsible for the employment of staff, the admission of pupils, and all aspects of the organisation and running of the School.
woodland situated in a residential area well served by road and rail, on the south side of the A412
near the Royal Masonic School
. The M25 motorway
is five minutes distant by car, and Croxley
and Rickmansworth
Metropolitan line
stations are ten and fifteen minute walks respectively. Watford Junction station (National Rail to London Euston) is fifteen to twenty minutes by car.
to be built after the war, was formally opened on 20 June 1956 by Countess Mountbatten of Burma, the first students having arrived in September 1954. In the mid-1960s it had around 950 boys and girls, and was situated in eighteen acres of land.
status to become a self governing school.
Arts College
, with a major focus on performing arts, and in April 2008 was awarded a second specialism as in Science
.
, Colne
and Gade
. Previous conventions had seen the houses named Anson, Carey, Caius, and Penn and a system with houses named after ancient civilisations : Romans
, Sparta
ns, Athenians
and Trojans
.
Now each of the seven forms in each year group belongs to a different house, each with a different colour which students are encouraged to wear on Sports Day. Houses are named after famous performers and artists in line with the school's performing arts status. The houses are Hockney
, Ashton, McCartney
, Elgar
, Blake
, Turner
and Olivier
.
advertising campaign whereby a photo of the three year groups was taken to be displayed on approximately 600 billboards around the UK, with text beneath likely saying "Two thirds of them will end up with raised cholesterol
."
in the sketch "The Surprising Adventures of Sir Digby Chicken-Caesar", in which the heroic duo break into the house of an elderly woman, tie her up and pretend that they are visiting "Dear Auntie Marigold". They steal her television and are pursued. Ginger is beaten up. They break into Rickmansworth School and steal scientific equipment in order to make crystal meth.
Secondary school
Secondary school is a term used to describe an educational institution where the final stage of schooling, known as secondary education and usually compulsory up to a specified age, takes place...
of around 1,200 pupils, situated in Croxley Green
Croxley Green
Croxley Green is a small town and civil parish of approximately 5,000 dwellings and 12,000 residents located between Watford and Rickmansworth in Hertfordshire, England...
(Hertfordshire
Hertfordshire
Hertfordshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East region of England. The county town is Hertford.The county is one of the Home Counties and lies inland, bordered by Greater London , Buckinghamshire , Bedfordshire , Cambridgeshire and...
), near Rickmansworth
Rickmansworth
Rickmansworth is a town in the Three Rivers district of Hertfordshire, England, 4¼ miles west of Watford.The town has a population of around 15,000 people and lies on the Grand Union Canal and the River Colne, at the northern end of the Colne Valley regional park.Rickmansworth is a small town in...
.
Admissions
Rickmansworth is a day secondary school, providing education to boys and girls aged 11 to 18 of all academic abilities, although 25% of the 11+ intake are selectedPartially selective school (England)
In England, a partially selective school is one of a few dozen state-funded secondary schools that select a proportion of their intake by ability or aptitude, permitted as a continuation of arrangements that existed prior to 1997....
using tests in mathematics and verbal reasoning, with a further 10% selected for aptitude in music. Most children are admitted at 11 and there is an additional intake at 16 into the Sixth Form
Sixth form
In the education systems of England, Wales, and Northern Ireland, and of Commonwealth West Indian countries such as Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, Belize, Jamaica and Malta, the sixth form is the final two years of secondary education, where students, usually sixteen to eighteen years of age,...
.
As a foundation school
Foundation school
In England and Wales, a foundation school is a state-funded school in which the governing body has greater freedom in the running of the school than in community schools....
, Rickmansworth is self-governing and the governing body is responsible for the employment of staff, the admission of pupils, and all aspects of the organisation and running of the School.
Location
The school stands in twenty-six acres of Metropolitan Green BeltMetropolitan Green Belt
The Metropolitan Green Belt is a statutory green belt around London, England. It includes designated parts of Greater London and the surrounding counties of Bedfordshire, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Kent and Surrey in the South East and East of England regions.-History:The...
woodland situated in a residential area well served by road and rail, on the south side of the A412
A412 road
The A412 is a road in England that links Slough and Watford. It was previously the main artery for this corridor, prior to the construction of the M25. It provides interchange to the A40/M40 at the Denham Roundabout, the M25 in Maple Cross and the A41 north of Watford...
near the Royal Masonic School
Royal Masonic School
The Royal Masonic School for Girls is an independent school in Rickmansworth, England with both day and boarding pupils. The school was instituted in 1788, with the aim of maintaining the daughters of indigent Freemasons, unable through death, illness, or incapacitation to support their families...
. The M25 motorway
M25 motorway
The M25 motorway, or London Orbital, is a orbital motorway that almost encircles Greater London, England, in the United Kingdom. The motorway was first mooted early in the 20th century. A few sections, based on the now abandoned London Ringways plan, were constructed in the early 1970s and it ...
is five minutes distant by car, and Croxley
Croxley tube station
Croxley Station is a London Underground station at Croxley Green in the Three Rivers district of Hertfordshire. It is on the Watford branch of the Metropolitan Line...
and Rickmansworth
Rickmansworth station
Rickmansworth is a London Underground and National Rail station in the town of Rickmansworth, in the Three Rivers district of Hertfordshire to the north-west of London...
Metropolitan line
Metropolitan Line
The Metropolitan line is part of the London Underground. It is coloured in Transport for London's Corporate Magenta on the Tube map and in other branding. It was the first underground railway in the world, opening as the Metropolitan Railway on 10 January 1863...
stations are ten and fifteen minute walks respectively. Watford Junction station (National Rail to London Euston) is fifteen to twenty minutes by car.
Grammar school
Rickmansworth School, the fifth grammar schoolGrammar school
A grammar school is one of several different types of school in the history of education in the United Kingdom and some other English-speaking countries, originally a school teaching classical languages but more recently an academically-oriented secondary school.The original purpose of mediaeval...
to be built after the war, was formally opened on 20 June 1956 by Countess Mountbatten of Burma, the first students having arrived in September 1954. In the mid-1960s it had around 950 boys and girls, and was situated in eighteen acres of land.
Comprehensive
It was not until September 1969, that the student body came to be socially representative of the local communities. The School was maintained as a county school by Hertfordshire local education authority until September 1990 when it was amongst the first schools in the country to take advantage of the opportunity offered by grant-maintainedGrant-maintained school
Grant-maintained schools were state schools in England and Wales between 1988 and 1998 that had opted out of local government control, being funded directly by a grant from central government...
status to become a self governing school.
Specialist status
In 2003 the school was designated as a specialistSpecialist school
The specialist schools programme was a UK government initiative which encouraged secondary schools in England to specialise in certain areas of the curriculum to boost achievement. The Specialist Schools and Academies Trust was responsible for the delivery of the programme...
Arts College
Arts College
Arts Colleges were introduced in 1997 as part of the now defunct Specialist Schools Programme in the United Kingdom. The system enabled secondary schools to specialise in certain fields, in this case, the performing, visual and/or media arts...
, with a major focus on performing arts, and in April 2008 was awarded a second specialism as in Science
Science College
Science Colleges were introduced in 2002 as part of the now defunct Specialist Schools Programme in the United Kingdom. The system enabled secondary schools to specialise in certain fields, in this case, science and mathematics...
.
House system
From 2007, the school house system was reorganised. Formerly students were placed randomly in houses named after ex-teachers and later in houses named after local rivers: the ChessRiver Chess
The River Chess is a chalk stream which springs from Chesham, Buckinghamshire and runs through Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire, in south-eastern England. The Chess, along with the Colne and Gade, gives rise to the name of the district of Three Rivers, in which it forms its confluence with the...
, Colne
River Colne, Hertfordshire
The Colne is a river in England which is a tributary of the River Thames. It flows mainly through Hertfordshire and forms the boundary between the South Bucks district of Buckinghamshire and the London Borough of Hillingdon...
and Gade
River Gade
The River Gade is a river running almost entirely though Hertfordshire. It rises from a spring in the chalk of the Chiltern Hills at Dagnall, Buckinghamshire and flows through Hemel Hempstead, Kings Langley and Croxley Green to Rickmansworth where it joins the The River Colne...
. Previous conventions had seen the houses named Anson, Carey, Caius, and Penn and a system with houses named after ancient civilisations : Romans
Ancient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
, Sparta
Sparta
Sparta or Lacedaemon, was a prominent city-state in ancient Greece, situated on the banks of the River Eurotas in Laconia, in south-eastern Peloponnese. It emerged as a political entity around the 10th century BC, when the invading Dorians subjugated the local, non-Dorian population. From c...
ns, Athenians
Classical Athens
The city of Athens during the classical period of Ancient Greece was a notable polis of Attica, Greece, leading the Delian League in the Peloponnesian War against Sparta and the Peloponnesian League. Athenian democracy was established in 508 BC under Cleisthenes following the tyranny of Hippias...
and Trojans
Troy
Troy was a city, both factual and legendary, located in northwest Anatolia in what is now Turkey, southeast of the Dardanelles and beside Mount Ida...
.
Now each of the seven forms in each year group belongs to a different house, each with a different colour which students are encouraged to wear on Sports Day. Houses are named after famous performers and artists in line with the school's performing arts status. The houses are Hockney
David Hockney
David Hockney, CH, RA, is an English painter, draughtsman, printmaker, stage designer and photographer, who is based in Bridlington, Yorkshire and Kensington, London....
, Ashton, McCartney
Paul McCartney
Sir James Paul McCartney, MBE, Hon RAM, FRCM is an English musician, singer-songwriter and composer. Formerly of The Beatles and Wings , McCartney is listed in Guinness World Records as the "most successful musician and composer in popular music history", with 60 gold discs and sales of 100...
, Elgar
Edward Elgar
Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet OM, GCVO was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestral works including the Enigma Variations, the Pomp and Circumstance Marches, concertos...
, Blake
William Blake
William Blake was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of both the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age...
, Turner
J. M. W. Turner
Joseph Mallord William Turner RA was an English Romantic landscape painter, watercolourist and printmaker. Turner was considered a controversial figure in his day, but is now regarded as the artist who elevated landscape painting to an eminence rivalling history painting...
and Olivier
Laurence Olivier
Laurence Kerr Olivier, Baron Olivier, OM was an English actor, director, and producer. He was one of the most famous and revered actors of the 20th century. He married three times, to fellow actors Jill Esmond, Vivien Leigh, and Joan Plowright...
.
Flora advertising campaign
On 22 May 2007, the school's 7th, 8th and 9th years participated in a FloraFlora (margarine)
Flora is a brand of margarine, sold in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Finland, Sweden, Spain, Poland, Portugal, South Africa, Hong Kong, Singapore, New Zealand and Australia. It is produced by Unilever and sold in other parts of the world under the brand name of Becel...
advertising campaign whereby a photo of the three year groups was taken to be displayed on approximately 600 billboards around the UK, with text beneath likely saying "Two thirds of them will end up with raised cholesterol
Cholesterol
Cholesterol is a complex isoprenoid. Specifically, it is a waxy steroid of fat that is produced in the liver or intestines. It is used to produce hormones and cell membranes and is transported in the blood plasma of all mammals. It is an essential structural component of mammalian cell membranes...
."
Mitchell and Webb
The school appeared in an episode of the BBC comedy That Mitchell and Webb LookThat Mitchell and Webb Look
That Mitchell and Webb Look is a British television sketch show starring David Mitchell and Robert Webb. Shown on BBC Two since 2006, its first two series were directed by David Kerr, who also directed Mitchell and Webb's previous television sketch show The Mitchell and Webb Situation, whereas...
in the sketch "The Surprising Adventures of Sir Digby Chicken-Caesar", in which the heroic duo break into the house of an elderly woman, tie her up and pretend that they are visiting "Dear Auntie Marigold". They steal her television and are pursued. Ginger is beaten up. They break into Rickmansworth School and steal scientific equipment in order to make crystal meth.
Academic results
Its standing in comparison with the national average is very favourable at GCSE level and A Level. Its results at GCSE and A level are similar to a grammar school.Notable alumni
- Adam GodleyAdam GodleyAdam Godley is an English actor.-Biography:Adam Godley has appeared in numerous movies including Love Actually, Elizabeth: The Golden Age and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory ....
, actor - Christopher FraserChristopher FraserChristopher James Fraser is a British Conservative Party politician who was the Member of Parliament for South West Norfolk from 2005 to 2010.-Early life:...
, Conservative MP from 1997-2001 for Mid Dorset and North Poole and from 2005-10 for South West Norfolk
Rickmansworth Grammar School
- Robert Jobbins OBE, Director of News, BBC World ServiceBBC World ServiceThe BBC World Service is the world's largest international broadcaster, broadcasting in 27 languages to many parts of the world via analogue and digital shortwave, internet streaming and podcasting, satellite, FM and MW relays...
from 1996-2001