Bottisham Village College is a mixed

secondary school A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper seconda ...

located in

Bottisham Bottisham is a village and civil parish in the East Cambridgeshire district of Cambridgeshire, England, about east of Cambridge, halfway to Newmarket. According to the 2001 census it had a population of 1,983, including Chittering, increasin ...

Cambridgeshire Cambridgeshire (abbreviated Cambs.) is a county in the East of England, bordering Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the north-east, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfordshire to the south, and Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire to t ...

, England. The school opened in 1937 as the second village college in part of the Local Director of Education Henry Morris' vision for providing

education Education is a purposeful activity directed at achieving certain aims, such as transmitting knowledge or fostering skills and character traits. These aims may include the development of understanding, rationality, kindness, and honesty ...

for local people in the countryside around

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

. Many classes for adults are offered in the evenings and at weekends. The

school A school is an educational institution designed to provide learning spaces and learning environments for the teaching of students under the direction of teachers. Most countries have systems of formal education, which is sometimes co ...

provides education for children aged 11–16 in the local area around Bottisham.Bottisham Village College prospectus 2009
/ref>

History

Bottisham Village College was designed by local

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

Urwin and built by Ambrose of Ely during the 1930s. Originally the school site included both a senior school (secondary school) and a junior school (primary school). The school was opened as a secondary modern on 1 January 1937.

Opening

The college was officially opened on 6 May 1937 by the Right Honourable Oliver Stanley -

President of the Board of Education The secretary of state for education, also referred to as the education secretary, is a Secretary of State (United Kingdom), secretary of state in the Government of the United Kingdom, responsible for the work of the Department for Education. ...

. Henry Morris and Mr. H. F. B. Fox - His Majesty's Inspector - along with Mr. Stanley and the Earl of Elgin were met at the college by Lord Fairhaven, Chairman of the Managers and the Warden. Mr. Stanley and

Lord Elgin Earl of Elgin is a title in the Peerage of Scotland, created in 1633 for Thomas Bruce, 3rd Lord Kinloss. He was later created Baron Bruce, of Whorlton in the County of York, in the Peerage of England on 30 July 1641. The Earl of Elgin is the h ...

met the staff and then inspected the buildings and equipment. At 12:50, the party left the college to take lunch with Lord Fairhaven at

Anglesey Abbey Anglesey Abbey is a National Trust property in the village of Lode, northeast of Cambridge, England. The property includes a country house, built on the remains of a priory, 98 acres (400,000 m2) of gardens and landscaped grounds, and a workin ...

. On return to the college, the group were met by a guard of honour consisting of boys and girls of the Senior School and a boy and girl representing the Junior School.

1937 to 1944

In the early days of the Village Colleges, they offered education up to the school-leaving age.

1944 to 1950

With the passage of the Education Act 1944, the school became a Secondary modern, as part of the

Tripartite System The Tripartite System was the arrangement of state-funded secondary education between 1945 and the 1970s in England and Wales, and from 1947 to 2009 in Northern Ireland. It was an administrative implementation of the Education Act 1944 and th ...

. Students who failed (or did not take) an

eleven plus exam The eleven-plus (11+) is a standardized examination administered to some students in England and Northern Ireland in their last year of primary education, which governs admission to grammar schools and other secondary schools which use academi ...

came to Bottisham where the curriculum was focused on the skills necessary for living in the countryside surrounding

. Lessons were very gender based, with boys studying

farming Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled peopl ...

woodwork Woodworking is the skill of making items from wood, and includes cabinet making (cabinetry and furniture), wood carving, joinery, carpentry, and woodturning. History Along with stone, clay and animal parts, wood was one of the first mater ...

sports Sport pertains to any form of competitive physical activity or game that aims to use, maintain, or improve physical ability and skills while providing enjoyment to participants and, in some cases, entertainment to spectators. Sports can, ...

science Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence ...

and

gardening Gardening is the practice of growing and cultivating plants as part of horticulture. In gardens, ornamental plants are often grown for their flowers, foliage, or overall appearance; useful plants, such as root vegetables, leaf vegetables, frui ...

whilst girls learnt more

cookery Cooking, cookery, or culinary arts is the art, science and craft of using heat to prepare food for consumption. Cooking techniques and ingredients vary widely, from grilling food over an open fire to using electric stoves, to baking in variou ...

needlework Needlework is decorative sewing and textile arts handicrafts. Anything that uses a needle for construction can be called needlework. Needlework may include related textile crafts such as crochet, worked with a hook, or tatting, worked wi ...

. Evening classes for the whole community were equally as varied, with examples including Musical Appreciation, Folk dance classes, woodwork, the operatic society, first aid and Fire Fighting. There were Saturday night dances in the main hall as well. As well as acting as a hall for the school, in the early years of its existence the main hall at Bottisham served as a cinema. The

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, however, was a testing time for Bottisham Village College, especially with an airforce base in the village. The British and American

airmen An airman is a member of an air force or air arm of a nation's armed forces. In certain air forces, it can also refer to a specific enlisted rank. An airman can also be referred as a soldier in other definitions. In civilian aviation usage, ...

played a large part in the life of the college, attending school dances but also other functions at the school. Staff stayed up all night on watch on top of the school buildings, watching for incendiaries, and with the

rationing Rationing is the controlled distribution of scarce resources, goods, services, or an artificial restriction of demand. Rationing controls the size of the ration, which is one's allowed portion of the resources being distributed on a particular ...

of clothing, school uniform was absent from life at the school until 1946. During the nationwide '

Dig for Victory Victory gardens, also called war gardens or food gardens for defense, were vegetable, fruit, and herb gardens planted at private residences and public parks in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and Germany during World War I ...

' campaign, the tennis courts, located behind the wardens lawn, were converted to cabbage patches in an attempt to grow as many vegetables as possible.

The 1950s

In January 1955, Charles Brereton arrived at the school to take up the post of Warden. This was the last appointment of a Village College Warden made personally by Henry Morris before he retired. In his time, Charles Brereton formulated some monumental changes to the school. The fact that he was Warden through the ROSLA to 15 and later to 16 allowed him to see the growth of the College in numbers, from 350 to 850 as well as the extension of buildings, equipment and grounds into the school that it was when he left in the end of 1975. Charles Brereton had spent over 20 years as Warden and to date the longest serving Warden. In 1996, following his death there was a memorial service, planting of a tree and unveiling of a plaque in the courtyard. Out of school activities for pupils, still uncommon to

secondary schools A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' secondary education, lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) ...

that were not Village Colleges, formed an important part of the lives of pupils during the 1950s with many school sports teams taking part in a variety of inter-school competitions in disciplines such as

hockey Hockey is a term used to denote a family of various types of both summer and winter team sports which originated on either an outdoor field, sheet of ice, or dry floor such as in a gymnasium. While these sports vary in specific rules, numbers o ...

and

athletics Athletics may refer to: Sports * Sport of athletics, a collection of sporting events that involve competitive running, jumping, throwing, and walking ** Track and field, a sub-category of the above sport * Athletics (physical culture), competi ...

. As well as sports, the school had a

scout Scout may refer to: Youth movement *Scout (Scouting), a child, usually 10–18 years of age, participating in the worldwide Scouting movement ** Scouts (The Scout Association), section for 10-14 year olds in the United Kingdom **Scouts BSA, secti ...

group and a youth group. At the time, Bottisham was a show place, only second to Impington for all those influential people who were captivated by Henry Morris' ideas. Consequently, the school received many high-profile visitors including

Hugh Dalton Edward Hugh John Neale Dalton, Baron Dalton, (16 August 1887 – 13 February 1962) was a British Labour Party economist and politician who served as Chancellor of the Exchequer from 1945 to 1947. He shaped Labour Party foreign policy in the 19 ...

and J. B. Priestley.

The 1970s and 1980s

The 1970s brought a period of great change for the college, mainly for the remarkable change of the school from a

Secondary Modern A secondary modern school is a type of secondary school that existed throughout England, Wales and Northern Ireland from 1944 until the 1970s under the Tripartite System. Schools of this type continue in Northern Ireland, where they are usuall ...

to Comprehensive. The school's buildings were extended and upgraded and many new staff were appointed. In five years, the school doubled in size as the

catchment A drainage basin is an area of land where all flowing surface water converges to a single point, such as a river mouth, or flows into another body of water, such as a lake or ocean. A basin is separated from adjacent basins by a perimeter, ...

area was extended and pupils who previously attended the old

Grammar school joined

. However, there were also some drastic cuts that hit the Community Education sector the hardest. Evening classes were now expected to be financially self-sufficient. However, Brereton was determined to maintain the spirit of the Village College, an uplifting environment and a caring community. Canings were also phased out and the school embraced instead a new era of technology. During the 1970s and the 1980s, many new buildings such as the English block, the

gym A gymnasium, also known as a gym, is an indoor location for athletics. The word is derived from the ancient Greek term " gymnasium". They are commonly found in athletic and fitness centres, and as activity and learning spaces in educational i ...

nasium, the technology block (including the drama studio) and the science block were added onto the original school buildings to accommodate the new subjects that would be taught at the school as a comprehensive school. As well as this, in 1976 the college governors opened a new swimming pool, planned from 1971, north of the college. (fn. 43) The pool was covered with a large building in 1982 and extended in 1988.

1990s onwards

The school has seen four different faces walk in and out of the Warden's office since Charles Brereton left in 1976, but still the school holds onto its key values laid out by Henry Morris. More buildings were added during the 1990s, including the maths block, a new community library and a new music block to further the schools facilities. In 1997, the school changed the uniform from blue blazers and ties to a more casual bottle green polo shirt and sweatshirt. In 2004, the school became a Humanities Specialist College, a specialism that increased the amount of funding the school received for the teaching of Humanities thus allowing the school to broaden in its teaching of these subjects. The school was then recognised with a High Performing School status, and following a successful Ofsted Inspection, was invited to apply for Applied Learning status in 2009. This introduced additional vocational GCSE and BTEC courses for students in

Key Stage 4 Key Stage 4 (KS4) is the legal term for the two years of school education which incorporate GCSEs, and other examinations, in maintained schools in England normally known as Year 10 and Year 11, when pupils are aged between 14 and 16 by August 31 ...

. In 2009, the school began construction of a new block on the site that would mirror the original semi-circular buildings of the school and therefore complete the initial plans for the school as they were laid out in 1937. This new building includes a new suite of English classrooms as well as a new purpose built SEN (Special Educational Needs) unit. Along with new buildings, this has also led to the redevelopment and landscaping of the Wardens lawn as well as the installation of a new sculpture to be designed and constructed by the local sculptor Matt Sanderson., The school newsletter. The school officially opened the new Morris Wing on Saturday, 3 November 2018. Adding to the celebrations was the 80th anniversary of the school's history. The building cost £16.7 million and was constructed in a partnership project between Cambridgeshire County Council and Anglian Learning Trust. The Morris Wing, named in honour of the founder Henry Morris, contains 12 new classrooms, as well as the Evans auditorium (named after departing CEO Kate Evans), a dance studio, recording studio and practice rooms to be utilised by students.

Trust and academy status

The Governing Body of Bottisham Village College proposed a change of school category from community school to

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. Foundation schools were set up under the School Standards and Framework ...

, thus acquiring a Charitable Trust to be called The Bottisham Education Trust, which took effect in September 2010. BVC Consultation Document The institution had been identified as a High Performing School by the Department for Children, Schools and Families, and the Local Authority was 'fully supportive' Trust Status FAQ Document of the move towards Trust status for schools. In February 2012 the school converted to academy status. In February 2016 The school became the lead school in Bottisham Multi-Academy Trust, which also includes

Netherhall School The Netherhall School and The Oakes College is a mixed secondary school and sixth form located in the Queen Edith ward of Cambridge, England. Its logo is a modified version of the arms of the City of Cambridge. It is one of the largest schools ...

. In July 2012, the school was rated by

Ofsted The Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills (Ofsted) is a non-ministerial department of His Majesty's government, reporting to Parliament. Ofsted is responsible for inspecting a range of educational institutions, incl ...

as "outstanding".Ofsted Bottisham Village College
/ref>

Catchment area

References

{{authority control Academies in Cambridgeshire Secondary schools in Cambridgeshire Educational institutions established in 1937 1937 establishments in England Village College