The Abbey School is an

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

selective day school for girls, in

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 ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

Overview

The Abbey School provides education for girls aged 3 to 18 years. The school is based in the centre of Reading, on Kendrick Road. The current Head is Will le Fleming. In 2006, the school had just over 1,000 students throughout the school, from Junior to Sixth Form. The school became an

International Baccalaureate The International Baccalaureate (IB), formerly known as the International Baccalaureate Organization (IBO), is a nonprofit foundation headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, and founded in 1968. It offers four educational programmes: the IB Dip ...

World School in 2008. In 2020, the IB cohort averaged 39.6 points, compared to the global average of 30. Founded in 1887, the school moved to its present site in 1905 under the leadership of headmistress Helen Musson. Notable alumnae include the novelist and social activist Brigid Brophy, the novelist

Elizabeth Taylor Dame Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor (February 27, 1932 – March 23, 2011) was a British-American actress. She began her career as a child actress in the early 1940s and was one of the most popular stars of classical Hollywood cinema in the 1950s. ...

the educationalist Baroness Brigstocke, and the historian

Lucy Worsley Dr Lucy Worsley (born 18 December 1973) is a British historian, author, curator, and television presenter. She is joint chief curator at Historic Royal Palaces but is best known as a presenter of BBC Television series on historical topics. Ea ...

. Around 100 years before the school was founded in 1887, the novelist

Jane Austen Jane Austen (; 16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist known primarily for her six major novels, which interpret, critique, and comment upon the British landed gentry at the end of the 18th century. Austen's plots of ...

briefly attended Reading Ladies' Boarding School within the Abbey Gateway,Reading Museum's local information on Jane Austen's school
/ref> which is commemorated by, and incorporated into, the Abbey School's crest. In 2017, HRH The Countess of Wessex visited the school as part of their 130th anniversary celebrations.

History

The school was founded in 1887, named Reading High School, replacing the privately owned Blenheim House Ladies' School. It was located at London Road (in the building which became the Gladstone Club). The

Church Schools Company The United Church Schools Trust (UCST) is a large education charity in the United Kingdom which owns and operates a group of 12 independent schools. The charity is operating under the name United Learning as of 2012. History UCST was founded in ...

, instrumental in founding the school, felt that Reading, with its growing population reaching 60,000, was in need of a new school. The school aimed to provide high quality education with a Christian ethos at an affordable price. When founded, the school had an enrolment of 40 girls, which steadily increased to 120 by 1902. In 1905, the school moved to its current Kendrick Road site. On 16 March 1905 William Methuen Gordon Ducat, the

Archdeacon of Berkshire The Archdeacon of Berkshire (also rendered Archdeacon of Berks) is a senior ecclesiastical officer in the Church of England Diocese of Oxford. The archdeacon is the head of the archdeaconry of Berkshire, a post historically found within the diocese ...

, laid the foundation stone of the school, which featured the inscription, "''In aedificationem corporis Chris''". This motto, taken from Ephesians IV:12, can still be seen on the school's crest and promotional t-shirts. The new site was a vast improvement on the old site: there were six classrooms, a hall and space for playing fields. The school changed its name to The Abbey School in 1913, after parting from the Church Schools' Company. The name was chosen to commemorate a former Reading school dating from 1835, which was based in the Abbey Gateway. A previous school in the Abbey Gateway operating in the 18th-century, named Reading Ladies’ Boarding School, included

among its pupils. The Abbey is now a day school, after ceasing to accept boarding pupils in 1946, and was a direct grant (C. of E.) grammar school in the 1950s . As of 2006, roughly 45% of entrants in the Upper Third (year 7) came from the Junior School. Also, students from other schools in Berkshire attended.

Reports

As an independent school,

Ofsted The Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills (Ofsted) is a Non-ministerial government department, non-ministerial department of Government of the United Kingdom, His Majesty's government, reporting to Parliament of the U ...

do not perform inspections of the school. However, Ofsted have inspected the Early Years Centre. The independent schools Inspectorate performed an inspection on the whole school in 2002. In 2004, Ofsted inspected the Early Years Centre only, that is, from ages 3 to 5. The

Good Schools Guide ''The Good Schools Guide'' is a guide to British schools, both state and independent. Overview The guide is compiled by a team of editors which, according to the official website, "''comprises some 50 editors, writers, researchers and contri ...

produced a report on the Abbey in 2005.

Notable former pupils

Joyce Baird Joyce Elizabeth Leslie Baird (8 December 1929 – 3 October 2015) was a British trade unionist. Baird studied at The Abbey School, Reading, then at Newnham College, Cambridge, before training as a secretary. In 1952, she worked briefly as se ...

, trade union leaderBaird, Joyce Elizabeth Leslie
, ''

Who Was Who ''Who's Who'' is a reference work. It is a book, and also a CD-ROM and a website, giving information on influential people from around the world. Published annually as a book since 1849, it lists people who influence British life, according to i ...

'' * Baroness Brigstocke, High Mistress of

St Paul's Girls' School St Paul's Girls' School is an independent day school for girls, aged 11 to 18, located in Brook Green, Hammersmith, in West London, England. History St Paul's Girls' School was founded by the Worshipful Company of Mercers in 1904, using part o ...

* Brigid Brophy, novelist, essayist, feminist *

Jenni Falconer Jenni Falconer (born 12 February 1976) is a Scottish radio and television presenter. She appears on the ITV daytime show '' This Morning'' as a regular travel reporter and was a regular presenter of the National Lottery Draws on BBC One. She w ...

, television presenter *Amy Flaxman, scientist, working on

ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 ChAdOx1 is an adenoviral vector for vaccines that was developed by the Jenner Institute, University of Oxford. The vector is a chimpanzee adenovirus modified to avoid its replication. Adenoviruses are effective vectors for inducing and boosting ...

at the

Jenner Institute The Jenner Institute is a research institute on the Old Road Campus in Headington, east Oxford, England. It was formed in November 2005 through a partnership between the University of Oxford and the UK Institute for Animal Health. It is ass ...

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

(

Oxford AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the Un ...

) *

Kate Humble Katherine Mary Humble (born 12 December 1968) is an English television presenter and narrator, mainly working for the BBC, specialising in wildlife and science programmes. Humble served as President of the Royal Society for the Protection of Bir ...

, television presenter *

Joanna Kennedy Dr Joanna Kennedy OBE FREng FICE, (born 22 July 1950), is a British civil engineer and project manager. She is currently a non-executive director of the property company Native Land and a director of the ERA Foundation, having been Global Lead ...

, civil engineer *

Miranda Krestovnikoff Miranda Krestovnikoff (born 29 January 1973)'' Who's Who'' is a British radio and television presenter specialising in natural history and archaeological programmes. She is an accomplished musician, and also a qualified scuba diver which has l ...

, presenter of BBC TV 'Coast' *

Krissi Murison Krissi Murison (born 1981) is a British journalist. She is the editor of ''The Sunday Times Magazine'' and the former editor of the ''NME''. Murison attended The Abbey School in Reading from 1993–2000, before studying English Literature ...

, editor of the New Musical Express (

NME ''New Musical Express'' (''NME'') is a British music, film, gaming, and culture website and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a 'rock inkie', the NME would become a magazine that ended up as a f ...

) *

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 ...

, cricketer *

, author * Sally Taylor, television presenter (BBC South Today) *

Minette Walters Minette Caroline Mary Walters DL (born 26 September 1949) is an English crime writer. Life and work Walters was born in Bishop's Stortford in 1949 to Samuel Jebb and Colleen Jebb. As her father was a serving army officer, the first 10 year ...

, novelist *

, historian, author, curator and television presenter

References

External links

Official website

Abbey School Parents Association website

Abbey School Reading Old Girls' Association

Profile
by the

independent Schools Council The Independent Schools Council (ISC) is a non-profit lobby group that represents over 1,300 schools in the United Kingdom's independent education sector. The organisation comprises seven independent school associations and promotes the busin ...

Profile
at

The Good Schools Guide ''The Good Schools Guide'' is a guide to British schools, both state and independent. Overview The guide is compiled by a team of editors which, according to the official website, "''comprises some 50 editors, writers, researchers and contri ...