Sir Henry Floyd Grammar School
Encyclopedia
Sir Henry Floyd Grammar School with Specialisms in Science and Performing Arts is a co-educational grammar school
in Aylesbury
, Buckinghamshire
. It is named after Sir Henry Floyd, a former Lord Lieutenant of Buckinghamshire
. It is one of three Grammar Schools in Aylesbury Town. The others are Aylesbury High School
and Aylesbury Grammar School
. As a selective state school, its entry requirements are governed by the exam
taken at the age of 10-11.
The school educates both boys and girls from the age of 11, in year 7, through to the age of 18, in year 13 (Upper VI). The school has its largest intakes at Year 7 followed by Year 12 (Lower VI). On completing GCSEs, most pupils stay on to complete their A-levels at the school's sixth-form.
In September 2002 the school was awarded specialist school
status as a Performing Arts College
, by the Department for Education and Skills (DfES). In 2007 the school was awarded specialist status as a Science College
. The school, since July 2007, is a Healthy School, which shows that the school has good practice and healthy outcomes for their students and staff.
The school is sometimes referred to as "SHFGS" or more usually as "the Floyd". The students are referred to as Floydians, a name introduced by deputy head teacher Mrs Hanham.
The Headmaster who took the school to Oxford Road and who masterminded the development of the school through the 1960s was Mr Harold Eton. Eton was a no-nonsense Northerner who ensured that his pupils not only had the best opportunities for an academic education but that they also had the option of developing badly needed practical skills in engineering, carpentry, domestic science, art and music. In the 1980s, the Geography Block (now the Humanities Block), the hall, gym and the terrapins were built after a major fire. In 1992, the Sixth Form Block was built and has won local architectural awards. In 1999, the New Block (now the Library Block) was built and in 2002, the Performing Arts Block was constructed as a result of the school’s first specialism, Performing Arts. In 2009, a new Sixth Form block was constructed which featured a new language floor and the Performing Arts building was extended giving pupils more space for rehearsing and of course attending performing arts lessons. In July 2011 the school became an Academy.
In September 2011 a fire broke out outside the Humanities block; about half a million pounds' worth of damage was caused. Two classrooms, a computer room, the canteen, the hall, and a corridor were damaged, although the hall and corridor were soon cleared. H15 (Miss Jones' room) was mostly smoke damaged and is scheduled to be useable again in December 2011. The computer room H13 has had the computers taken out. The canteen and H14 (Mr Barnett and Miss Pilkington's room) are severely damaged so that there is no wall at the back, and the clasroom and the canteen are now out of bounds until they are fixed.
The school has a modern performing arts building, complete with theatre, music practice rooms and a recording studio. It also has a fully equipped, modern library, which contains computers, internet access, and multimedia resources, as well as the usual books, newspapers and periodicals.
The school has four computer rooms, two of which are specialised for technology and performing arts departments, laptops available for departmental use, and a further suite of computers specifically for sixth form study. The whole school site has wifi access.
The school is fully DDA compliant and all areas are accessible for students with disabilities via lifts and ramps.
Significant improvements to accommodation have taken place in recent years, including refurbishment of all washrooms and a rolling programme is in place to ensure all communal areas, classrooms and offices are refurbished. Two new buildings officially opened in September 2009. These extended provision for the sixth from, dance and teaching in general. The new Dance building, attached to the Performing Arts building contains three purpose built studios with sprung floors, mirrors and barres. The other new building, named the Glover in memory of a former Chair of Governors, houses classroom for Modern Foreign Languages and Social Sciences, plus contains a large study are for Sixth Form students (G2), including computer facilities. Linked to this building is a new courtyard area containing outdoor picnic benches, which being adjacent to the canteen provides an external area where students can lunch.
The school has a large sports field which is used for football, rugby, hockey, cricket and athletics plus five tennis courts which are also used for netball. A new sports hall was given planning permission in 2006 but was not built as the LEA had its funding cut for new buildings however this is now a major project for the school to complete in order to complement the existing gym.
According to Buckinghamshire County Council, the net capacity of the school is 946 students, while the current number is 1021,with 300 of this number in the sixth form.
Grammar 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...
in Aylesbury
Aylesbury
Aylesbury is the county town of Buckinghamshire in South East England. However the town also falls into a geographical region known as the South Midlands an area that ecompasses the north of the South East, and the southern extremities of the East Midlands...
, Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan home county in South East England. The county town is Aylesbury, the largest town in the ceremonial county is Milton Keynes and largest town in the non-metropolitan county is High Wycombe....
. It is named after Sir Henry Floyd, a former Lord Lieutenant of Buckinghamshire
Lord Lieutenant of Buckinghamshire
There has been a Lord Lieutenant of Buckinghamshire almost continuously since the position was created by King Henry VIII in 1535. The only exception to this was the English Civil War and English Interregnum between 1643 and 1660 when there was no king to support the Lieutenancy...
. It is one of three Grammar Schools in Aylesbury Town. The others are Aylesbury High School
Aylesbury High School
Aylesbury High School was founded in 1959, in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, when the previously co-educational Aylesbury Grammar School became boys-only. The two schools remain on adjacent sites. The current headteacher is Alan Rosen....
and Aylesbury Grammar School
Aylesbury Grammar School
Aylesbury Grammar School is a single-sex male grammar school in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, England, which educates 1,250 pupils.-Admissions:As a selective state school, its entry requirements are dictated by the exam taken at the age of 10-11...
. As a selective state school, its entry requirements are governed by the exam
Eleven plus
In the United Kingdom, the 11-plus or Eleven plus is an examination administered to some students in their last year of primary education, governing admission to various types of secondary school. The name derives from the age group for secondary entry: 11–12 years...
taken at the age of 10-11.
The school educates both boys and girls from the age of 11, in year 7, through to the age of 18, in year 13 (Upper VI). The school has its largest intakes at Year 7 followed by Year 12 (Lower VI). On completing GCSEs, most pupils stay on to complete their A-levels at the school's sixth-form.
In September 2002 the school was awarded specialist school
Specialist 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...
status as a Performing 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...
, by the Department for Education and Skills (DfES). In 2007 the school was awarded specialist status as a Science College
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...
. The school, since July 2007, is a Healthy School, which shows that the school has good practice and healthy outcomes for their students and staff.
The school is sometimes referred to as "SHFGS" or more usually as "the Floyd". The students are referred to as Floydians, a name introduced by deputy head teacher Mrs Hanham.
History
The school was founded as the Aylesbury Technical College in 1947. The original school was built in Walton Road Aylesbury and remained there until the early 1960s. The School had been a "selective" school for many years requiring a "pass" in the "11 Plus" to attain entry. When it moved to its current site on Oxford Road, the name was changed to Aylesbury Technical High School. The original buildings on the Oxford Road site comprised (moving away from the road) the Practical Block, the Tower Block followed By Canteen, Hall and Gym in line abreast. As the name suggests, it specialised in subjects such as woodwork, metalwork and related subjects although a full curriculum of Maths, Sciences, Arts and Language were also available. The school still has some textbooks which date back to that era. In 1965, the school was renamed as The Sir Henry Floyd Grammar School, after Sir Henry Floyd, the then Lord Lieutenant of Buckinghamshire. There was no change in curriculum at that point although the additional workshops, laboratories and equipment offered greater flexibility than other grammar schools in the area, Aylesbury High, Aylesbury Grammar and the Royal Latin School.The Headmaster who took the school to Oxford Road and who masterminded the development of the school through the 1960s was Mr Harold Eton. Eton was a no-nonsense Northerner who ensured that his pupils not only had the best opportunities for an academic education but that they also had the option of developing badly needed practical skills in engineering, carpentry, domestic science, art and music. In the 1980s, the Geography Block (now the Humanities Block), the hall, gym and the terrapins were built after a major fire. In 1992, the Sixth Form Block was built and has won local architectural awards. In 1999, the New Block (now the Library Block) was built and in 2002, the Performing Arts Block was constructed as a result of the school’s first specialism, Performing Arts. In 2009, a new Sixth Form block was constructed which featured a new language floor and the Performing Arts building was extended giving pupils more space for rehearsing and of course attending performing arts lessons. In July 2011 the school became an Academy.
In September 2011 a fire broke out outside the Humanities block; about half a million pounds' worth of damage was caused. Two classrooms, a computer room, the canteen, the hall, and a corridor were damaged, although the hall and corridor were soon cleared. H15 (Miss Jones' room) was mostly smoke damaged and is scheduled to be useable again in December 2011. The computer room H13 has had the computers taken out. The canteen and H14 (Mr Barnett and Miss Pilkington's room) are severely damaged so that there is no wall at the back, and the clasroom and the canteen are now out of bounds until they are fixed.
Facilities
The school is situated on Oxford Road in Aylesbury, sharing a large site adjacent to Aylesbury College. As a result, there is the option for Sixth Form students to study some A-Levels subject at the College if they are not offered at the school, e.g. Law, Latin, Beauty etc.The school has a modern performing arts building, complete with theatre, music practice rooms and a recording studio. It also has a fully equipped, modern library, which contains computers, internet access, and multimedia resources, as well as the usual books, newspapers and periodicals.
The school has four computer rooms, two of which are specialised for technology and performing arts departments, laptops available for departmental use, and a further suite of computers specifically for sixth form study. The whole school site has wifi access.
The school is fully DDA compliant and all areas are accessible for students with disabilities via lifts and ramps.
Significant improvements to accommodation have taken place in recent years, including refurbishment of all washrooms and a rolling programme is in place to ensure all communal areas, classrooms and offices are refurbished. Two new buildings officially opened in September 2009. These extended provision for the sixth from, dance and teaching in general. The new Dance building, attached to the Performing Arts building contains three purpose built studios with sprung floors, mirrors and barres. The other new building, named the Glover in memory of a former Chair of Governors, houses classroom for Modern Foreign Languages and Social Sciences, plus contains a large study are for Sixth Form students (G2), including computer facilities. Linked to this building is a new courtyard area containing outdoor picnic benches, which being adjacent to the canteen provides an external area where students can lunch.
The school has a large sports field which is used for football, rugby, hockey, cricket and athletics plus five tennis courts which are also used for netball. A new sports hall was given planning permission in 2006 but was not built as the LEA had its funding cut for new buildings however this is now a major project for the school to complete in order to complement the existing gym.
According to Buckinghamshire County Council, the net capacity of the school is 946 students, while the current number is 1021,with 300 of this number in the sixth form.
Houses
The students at SHFGS are divided into five houses, which are named after grand estates in the local area.| House | Colour |
|---|---|
| Ascott Ascott House Ascott House, sometimes referred to as simply Ascott, is situated in the hamlet of Ascott near Wing in Buckinghamshire, England. It is set in a estate.... |
Yellow |
| Claydon Claydon House Claydon House is a country house in the Aylesbury Vale, Buckinghamshire, England, close to the village of Middle Claydon. It was built between 1757 and 1771 and is now owned by the National Trust.... |
Purple |
| Hartwell Hartwell Hartwell is a village in central Buckinghamshire, England. It is to the south of Aylesbury, by the village of Stone.The village name is Anglo Saxon in origin, and means "spring frequented by deer". In the Domesday Book of 1086 it was recorded as Herdeuuelle and Herdewelle.The ruined Hartwell... |
Red |
| Mentmore Mentmore Towers Mentmore Towers is a 19th century English country house in the village of Mentmore in Buckinghamshire. The house was designed by Joseph Paxton and his son-in-law, George Henry Stokes, in the revival Elizabethan and Jacobean style of the late 16th century called Jacobethan, for the banker and... |
Green |
| Waddesdon Waddesdon Manor Waddesdon Manor is a country house in the village of Waddesdon, in Buckinghamshire, England. The house was built in the Neo-Renaissance style of a French château between 1874 and 1889 for Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild . Since this was the preferred style of the Rothschilds it became also known as... |
Blue |
Uniform
Students are required to wear uniform, however there are different uniform codes for the different schools:- Lower School - Yr 7 - 8 Pupils are required to wear a maroon school jumper, a school tie (with the pupil's house colour), black socks for boys, white socks for girls (black or flesh tights are acceptable), and smart black shoes. For boys, a white shirt and black trousers should be worn. For girls, a white blouse and either a black skirt or a pair of smart black trousers are required.
- Upper School - Yr 9 - 11 Students are required to wear a black blazer with the school emblem, a school tie, black socks, and smart black shoes. For boys, a white shirt and black trousers should be worn. For girls, a white blouse and either a black skirt or a pair of smart black trousers are required. The maroon jumper is not permissible, however a black V-neck jumper may be worn.
- VI form - VI form has a less restrictive uniform policy compared to the rest of the school. For boys a tailored suit with an optional skirt for girls. The VI form are not required to wear school uniform, however as they are setting a good example to the younger years, smart dress is required.