Kendrick School, London Road (geograph 3800931)

Kendrick School is a selective girls'

grammar school A grammar school is one of several different types of school in the history of education in the United Kingdom and other English-speaking countries, originally a school teaching Latin, but more recently an academically oriented secondary school ...

situated in the centre of

Reading Reading is the process of taking in the sense or meaning of Letter (alphabet), letters, symbols, etc., especially by Visual perception, sight or Somatosensory system, touch. For educators and researchers, reading is a multifaceted process invo ...

Berkshire Berkshire ( ; in the 17th century sometimes spelt phonetically as Barkeshire; abbreviated Berks.) is a historic county in South East England. One of the home counties, Berkshire was recognised by Queen Elizabeth II as the Royal County of Berk ...

, UK. In February 2011, Kendrick became an

Academy An academy ( Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary or tertiary higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membership). The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy ...

History

A Picture of a Southern Town- Life in Wartime Reading, Berkshire, England, UK, 1945 D25295

The school is named after John Kendrick, a Reading cloth merchant who died in 1624. John Kendrick left the then substantial charitable bequest of £12,500 to the towns of Reading and Newbury to provide employment and education for the poor. Initially this was used to provide a house of industry, or

workhouse In Britain, a workhouse () was an institution where those unable to support themselves financially were offered accommodation and employment. (In Scotland, they were usually known as poorhouses.) The earliest known use of the term ''workhouse'' ...

, called ''The Oracle'', a name that was revived for the Oracle shopping mall which now occupies the site. In later years the funds left by Kendrick were mismanaged and subject to legal challenge. In the 1870s this was resolved, and the remaining bequest used to found Kendrick Girls' School, along with the Kendrick Boys' School that was later to merge with

Reading School Reading School is a grammar school for boys with academy status in the English town of Reading, the county of Berkshire. It traces its history back to the school of Reading Abbey and is, thus, one of the oldest schools in England. There are no ...

. An oil painting of John Kendrick, rescued from the Oracle workhouse, still hangs in the hall at Kendrick School. The caption reads "John Kendrick, founder of this workhouse". The school in its current form was founded in 1877 and occupied

Watlington House Watlington House is a 17th-century building, with a large walled garden, in the town of Reading in the English county of Berkshire. The building is brick built and is reputed to be the oldest surviving secular building in the town. It is a list ...

in Watlington Street for the first 50 years of its life. In 1927, the school moved to its current site, situated on the corner of Sidmouth Street and London Road. The building is a Grade II

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

. The school was originally known as "Kendrick Girls' School" but is now called "Kendrick School". The current Headmistress is Christine Kattirtzi. She replaced Marsha Elms at the end of the Spring Term, 2012.

Academic performance

Kendrick School has an outstanding Ofsted rating and has a progress 8 score "well above national average". Pupils are selected on the basis of academic ability via an admissions test at age 11 (although entry is possible in other years too). The school was among the top five grammar schools in the UK based on GCSE performance in 2018, and in 2019. In July 2011, Kendrick School was identified by the

Sutton Trust The Sutton Trust is an educational charity in the United Kingdom which aims to improve social mobility and address educational disadvantage. The charity was set up by educational philanthropist, Sir Peter Lampl in 1997. Since then, it has unde ...

as the fifth highest state school for proportion of higher education applicants accepted at

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and

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Universities. The report found that 15.2% of pupils were accepted to

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and 79.4% were accepted to the highly selective Sutton Trust 30 universities over the previous three years. A 2016 report also ranked Kendrick among the top 10 state schools in Oxbridge admissions. As a state-funded school, there are no fees; as a result, it is severely over-subscribed, with over ten applicants per place.

House System

The Kendrick House system consists of three houses: Cedars, Sidmouth and Palmer House. Each house is assigned a colour and animal, as follows: Cedars — blue seal (Cedars seals), Sidmouth — yellow squid (Sidmouth squidmouth) and Palmer — green llama (Palmer llama).

Notable former pupils

Anne Treisman Anne Marie Treisman (née Taylor; 27 February 1935 – 9 February 2018) was an English psychologist who specialised in cognitive psychology. Treisman researched visual attention, object perception, and memory. One of her most influential ide ...

, cognitive psychologist *

Beryl Cook Beryl Cook, OBE (10 September 192628 May 2008) was a British artist best known for her original and instantly recognisable paintings. Often comical, her works pictured people whom she encountered in everyday life, including people enjoying th ...

, artist *

Chi-chi Nwanoku Chinyere Adah "Chi-chi" Nwanoku (; born June 1956) is a British double bassist and professor of Historical Double Bass Studies at the Royal Academy of Music. Nwanoku was a founder member and principal bassist of the Orchestra of the Age of Enl ...

, musician *

Janet Reger Janet Reger (née Chabinsky (Phillips); 30 September 1935 – 14 March 2005) was British lingerie designer and business woman, best known for her eponymous lingerie brand which became famous in the 1960s and 1970s. Early life and education B ...

, lingerie designer *

Rosi Sexton Rosemary Ann Sexton (born 16 July 1977) is a British athlete, sports therapist, osteopath, and politician. She had a career in mixed martial arts (MMA), from which she retired in 2014. In 2020, Sexton ran in the Green Party leadership electi ...

, retired professional

Mixed Martial Artist Mixed martial arts (MMA), sometimes referred to as cage fighting, no holds barred (NHB), and ultimate fighting, and originally referred to as Vale Tudo is a full-contact combat sport based on striking, grappling and ground fighting, incorp ...

and first British female to fight in the

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Yasmina Siadatan Yasmina Siadatan (born 1981 in Hull, England) is a British businesswoman of British and Iranian descent. She was the winner of the fifth series of the British television show ''The Apprentice''. As the winner, she was offered a job working for ...

, winner of the BBC television series,

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in 2009. *

Jessica Swale Jessica Swale is a British playwright, theatre director and screenwriter. Her first play, ''Blue Stockings,'' premiered at Shakespeare's Globe in 2013. It is widely performed by UK amateur companies and is also studied on the Drama GCSE syllabus ...

, theatre director and playwright *

Claire Taylor Samantha Claire Taylor (born 25 September 1975) is a former cricketer who represented England more than 150 times between 1998 and 2011. A top order batter,In women's cricket, "batsman" is commonly used, alongside "batter". Taylor was the f ...

, England cricketer *

Wendy Tan White Wendy Tan White MBE is a British technology entrepreneur and technology investor. She is the CEO of Intrinsic, a robotics software company under Alphabet Inc. She was previously a partner at BGF, a £2.5bn growth capital fund focusing on ear ...

, technology entrepreneur *

Imogen Rose Hart Imogen or Imogene may refer to: __NOTOC__ Places * Imogene, Iowa, a city * Imogene, Minnesota, a populated place * Imogene, South Dakota, an unincorporated community * Imogene Pass, a mountain pass in the San Juan Mountains of Colorado * Imogene La ...

, Producer Luanna the Podcast *Adhya Shastry, winner of the BBC television series,

BBC Young Dancer BBC Young Dancer is a televised national dance competition, broadcast on BBC Four and BBC Two since 2015. The competition, inspired by the success of the biennal BBC Young Musician of the Year, is designed for British amateur dancers of ballet, c ...

, in 2022

References

External links