Newent Community School is a

secondary school A secondary school, high school, or senior school, is an institution that provides secondary education. Some secondary schools provide both ''lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper secondary education'' (ages 14 to 18), i.e., b ...

Newent Newent (; originally called "Noent") is a market town and civil parish in the Forest of Dean in Gloucestershire, England. The town is north-west of Gloucester. Its population was 5,073 at the 2001 census, rising to 5,207 in 2011, The population ...

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( , ; abbreviated Glos.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Herefordshire to the north-west, Worcestershire to the north, Warwickshire to the north-east, Oxfordshire ...

, England. It is an

Academy An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of tertiary education. The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy, founded approximately 386 BC at Akademia, a sanctuary of Athena, the go ...

of 1,340 students, serving the town and the rural community. The school provides secondary education for ages 11 to 18. The school offers GCSEs as well as A Levels. In 2001, the school was granted

Arts College An Arts College, in the United Kingdom, is a type of specialist school that specialises in the subject fields of the performing, visual, digital and/or media arts. They were announced in 1996 and introduced alongside Sports Colleges to En ...

specialist status. In 2007 the school was also granted

Science College Science Colleges were introduced in 2002 as part of the now defunct Specialist Schools Programme (abolished in 2011) in the United Kingdom. The system enabled secondary schools to specialise in certain fields, in this case, science and mathem ...

as a second specialism. In addition, the school has been awarded Sportsmark Silver, Artsmark Gold and Healthy School. The school became an academy in 2012. The campus consists of which includes extensive sporting and leisure facilities, including: a floodlit all-weather pitch; sports hall; squash courts; gymnasium; fitness suite and indoor heated swimming pool - all of which are for use by the school and wider community. As a community school, adult education classes, are held both in the school and in the dedicated community rooms.

Mark Harper Mark James Harper, Baron Harper (born 26 February 1970) is a British politician who served in the Cabinet as Chief Whip of the House of Commons from 2015 to 2016 and as Secretary of State for Transport from 2022 to 2024. A member of the Cons ...

MP was governor between 2000 - 2005.

History

Newent Community School and Sixth Form Centre was Gloucestershire’s first purpose-built comprehensive school. The present building was opened in April 1965, although previously it had operated on a split site in Ross Road. Originally there were four houses; Collingwood(blue), Mountbatten(red), Nelson (green)and Drake (yellow), but due to a low student numbers Drake was removed and only three remain.

Eco-Lab

The school required a new laboratory to meet curriculum requirements and inspired by exchange visits with a school in Kenya the pupils requested that it be developed as an eco lab. The building incorporates a comprehensive range of sustainable qualities; designed for low energy use with a high performance thermal envelope locally sourced and using renewable, low maintenance materials; good levels of north daylighting linked to automatically controlled artificial lighting and underfloor heating. Energy consumption results are published in the school news network.

Kenya student exchange

Newent Community School, along with two other Gloucestershire schools ( Dene Magna School and Lakers School) has been involved with student exchange with St George’s Secondary School near Kisumu in Kenya for twelve years. The school maintains a strong partnership with St George's Secondary School and provides financial and educational support through the use of

fundraising Fundraising or fund-raising is the process of seeking and gathering voluntary financial contributions by engaging individuals, businesses, charitable foundations, or governmental agencies. Although fundraising typically refers to efforts to gathe ...

. Students visited St George's in Kenya in 2004, 2006, 2009, 2011, 2013, 2015 and 2017.

Notable former pupils

* Alex Cuthbert, Welsh rugby union player *

Vicky Holland Vicky Holland (born 12 January 1986) is a British former triathlete who was part of the Great Britain and Northern Ireland Olympic team. Holland was the 2018 World Triathlon champion, the fourth British woman to win the title. She was also t ...

, British Triathlete, Commonwealth Games Gold medallist * Ed Leigh, TV Presenter * Stuart Fleetwood Football Player * Andi Gladwin, magician * Joe Edwards (footballer, born 1990) Football Player * Karen Holford, Chief Executive and Vice-Chancellor of Cranfield University, former Deputy Vice-Chancellor of

Cardiff University Cardiff University () is a public research university in Cardiff, Wales. It was established in 1883 as the University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire and became a founding college of the University of Wales in 1893. It was renamed Unive ...

References

External links

* {{authority control Secondary schools in Gloucestershire Academies in Gloucestershire Newent Specialist arts colleges in England