(''Let us be judged by our actions'') , established = 1925 , closed = , type =

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 philosop ...

, religious_affiliation = , president = , head_label = Headteacher , head = Mr Alex Thomas , r_head_label =Head of Schools , r_head =Mr Anton McLean (Lower School) Ms Rachelle Regan (Upper School) , chair_label = Chair of governors , chair = Jag Minhas , founder = , specialist = , address = Princes Avenue (Upper School) Bacon Lane (Lower School) , city =

Kingsbury Kingsbury may refer to: Places United Kingdom * Kingsbury, London, a district of northwest London in the borough of Brent ** Kingsbury tube station, London Underground station * Kingsbury, Warwickshire, a village and civil parish in Warwickshi ...

, county =

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

, country =

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

, postcode = NW9 9AT (Lower School) NW9 9JR (Upper School) , local_authority = Brent , ofsted = yes , urn = 137685 , staff = , enrolment = 2036 (approx.) , gender = Mixed , lower_age = 11 , upper_age = 18 , houses = , colours = , publication = , free_label_1 = Former Pupils Known As , free_1 = Old Kingsburians , free_label_2 = , free_2 = , free_label_3 = , free_3 = , website = http://www.kingsburyhigh.org.uk/ Kingsbury High School is a large two-site

high 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 ...

with academy status in

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 ...

. Kingsbury County Grammar School was established on 15 September 1925 as Kingsbury County School. Prior to the establishment of the school, the area had been served by a number of schools, which, in keeping with the future history of Kingsbury County School, had been subjected to the prevailing changes in population and politics of the area. Although there are reports of a school being kept in the area in c. 1530, by John Bishop the curate of Kingsbury, there is no more evidence until the nineteenth century of schooling in Kingsbury. Schooling is mentioned in 1819, and in 1822 a day school was opened. This school was situated near the junction of Kingsbury Road and Roe Green, which itself is looked at open by the current Kingsbury High School. This school was closed in 1876. Other schools existed in the area as well, with nearly all children in Kingsbury said to have attended one school or another in 1847. Kingsbury School Board was set up in 1875 following a damning report as to the cramped premises of the British School at the Hyde end of Kingsbury Road, itself an 1870 replacement of an infant's school that had been built in 1861 to the Congregational chapel in Edgware Road. Kingsbury Board School on Kingsbury Road, opened by the Kingsbury School Board in 1876, was to accommodate 130 pupils. In 1903 this became Kingsbury Council School. In 1922 this became the first senior mixed school in the area after its infants had been transferred to the new Kenton Lane Council School in 1922. This school operated as a junior school after 1928 until it was bombed in the

Second World War 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 vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

."Kingsbury: Education"
''A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 5: Hendon, Kingsbury, Great Stanmore, Little Stanmore, Edmonton Infield, Monken Hadley, South Mimms, Tottenham'' (1976), pp. 87-88.

The establishment of Kingsbury County School

When Kingsbury County School was opened in 1925, it was originally housed in a building which once belonged to the Aircraft Manufacturing Company, (or

Airco The Aircraft Manufacturing Company Limited (Airco) was an early British aircraft manufacturer. Established during 1912, it grew rapidly during the First World War, referring to itself as the largest aircraft company in the world by 1918. Ai ...

as it was also known) on the Edgware Road opposite Colindale Avenue (now a Jewish school). The building had been adapted to take 380 pupils. The first headmaster was Mr Tracy, who had a staff of eight teachers, five full-time and three part-time. As the population of the surrounding area increased owing to the influx of workers to the aircraft industry, so did the roll of the school, and in 1929 a new school was built in Princes Avenue by John Laing and Co. at a cost of cost £43,638.

After the Butler Education Act of 1944

When the

Government passed the

Butler Education Act The Education Act 1944 (7 and 8 Geo 6 c. 31) made major changes in the provision and governance of secondary schools in England and Wales. It is also known as the "Butler Act" after the President of the Board of Education, R. A. Butler. Historians ...

in 1944 a

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 ...

was established dividing secondary schools into three categories,

grammar schools 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, ...

technical schools In the United States, a technical school is a type of two-year college that covers specialized fields such as business, finance, hospitality, tourism, construction, engineering, visual arts, information technology and community work. Associa ...

and

secondary modern school 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 ...

s. The grammar school was deemed the place of education for the academically gifted (as determined by the

11-plus 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 ...

) and Kingsbury County School was selected to become the grammar school at which point the school changed its name to Kingsbury County Grammar School. The headmaster, Dr Payling (who had succeeded Mr Tracy after his retirement in 1949), saw the beginning of extensions in 1954. At this point in time, Kingsbury was also being served by a second mixed secondary school, which was chosen to become the area's secondary modern school after the 1944 Act was passed. The increase in the population of Kingsbury had continued unabated and building had started on a second mixed secondary school at a site in Bacon Lane in 1939 but this was not finished, mainly to do with constraints placed in the continuation of the building by the

. In the meantime, Kingsbury Secondary Modern School began operating from the converted ex-

building, which had been vacated by Kingsbury County School in 1931. In 1952, what were to be Tyler's Croft county secondary schools, were opened as separate boys' and girls' secondary modern schools, and the pupils from the mixed Kingsbury Secondary Modern School were transferred to the new schools on Bacon Lane.

Adoption of the comprehensive system

In 1967 with the local authority Brent Borough Council having adopted the comprehensive system of education, Kingsbury County Grammar and the two Tyler's Croft schools were amalgamated to form the giant Kingsbury High School. Mr Jones, who had succeeded Dr Payling back in 1954, faced the task of managing the school's transition from being a grammar school to a comprehensive school. The Bacon Lane site was designated by the head as the Lower School under the management of a Head of Lower School, with the buildings of the former Kingsbury County Grammar to be used for the upper years. Three years after this huge reorganisation Mr Jones retired and the governors appointed Mr C. Mitchell in 1970. Mr Mitchell served 18 years as Headmaster and was responsible for a series of important developments. In Mr Mitchell's era, the ethnic makeup of Kingsbury began to change with the growth of a large Asian community. In this time the school roll increased to 1750 and the proportion of ethnic minority children in the school increased apace. After Mr Mitchell retired in 1988, the former head of neighbouring Preston Manor High School, Philip Snell, was appointed to succeed as Headmaster.

Grant maintained status and the growth of computing

In 1993 a majority of parents voted for the school to gain grant maintained status which meant that the school was to benefit financially with an expanding budget and was also able to take control of its own admissions. During the subsequent period the school's reputation from computing also began to grow and flourish. This has been attributed largely to Mr Snell's interest in curricular advances and new information technology and the resultant building of the first computer based Open Learning Centre in Princes Avenue with a special link for weather forecasting. When the Queen, chose the school for her launch of the royal web site this both enhanced and highlighted the school's reputation for computing excellence. Mr Snell retired in 2003 and was succeeded by the previous head, Mr C. Chung, who, in common with a number of his predecessors, is a former teacher of the school. The school currently takes on more than 300 pupils a year culminating in just under 2,000 pupils (including

sixth form In the education systems of England, Northern Ireland, Wales, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago and some other Commonwealth countries, sixth form represents the final two years of secondary education, ages 16 to 18. Pupils typically prepare for A-l ...

Ofsted rating

In 2014, the school was determined Good, by inspecting body Ofsted. In 2018, they were again inspected and this status was reconfirmed. The full report can be found on the ofsted website.

School motto and badge

The school's motto, ''

Spectemur agendo Spectemur Agendo is a Latin motto meaning ''Let us be judged by our acts''. Sources It comes originally from Book XIII of Ovid's Metamorphoses where it is attributed to the hero Ajax: ''Denique (quid verbis opus est?) spectemur agendo! '' which is ...

'' (meaning Let us be Judged by our actions) has remained consistent from the school's foundation being that of the original Kingsbury County School in 1925. The badge has altered over time although there are still elements of consistency. Both the original and current badges have a crown in the centre of the badge. The original badge had the crown sitting atop three drawn sabres arranged horizontally on top of each other, reducing in size from top to bottom. The current badge has the crown sitting atop a triangle which has replaced the sabres but is representative of the shape the sabres formed. The current badge has also lost the top portion of the original badge which represented two turrets of a battlement. Kingsbury High Crest

This is the current badge, updated in 2018. The colours have been slightly adjusted with a few colour refinements to make it look more modern.

Notable alumni

Notable alumni of the school include: *

Mutya Buena Rosa Isabel Mutya Buena (born 21 May 1985) is an English singer and songwriter who rose to fame as a member of girl group the Sugababes. With the Sugababes, Buena had four UK number one singles, an additional six top-ten hits and three multi-p ...

, pop singer, founding member of

Sugababes Sugababes are a British girl group composed of Mutya Buena, Keisha Buchanan and Siobhán Donaghy. The lineup changed three times before returning to the original lineup in 2011. Formed in 1998 by All Saints manager Ron Tom, Sugababes releas ...

Ekow Eshun Ekow Eshun (born 27 May 1968) is a British writer, journalist, broadcaster, and curator. He is the editor-in-chief of the quarterly magazine ''Tank'', a former editor of ''Arena'' magazine, and the former director of the Institute of Contempor ...

, journalist and broadcaster, former Artistic Director of the

Institute of Contemporary Arts The Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) is an artistic and cultural centre on The Mall in London, just off Trafalgar Square. Located within Nash House, part of Carlton House Terrace, near the Duke of York Steps and Admiralty Arch, the ICA c ...

* Ja-vantae Clarke, Videographer , member of Eleven38 *

Courtney Pine Courtney Pine, (born 18 March 1964), is a British jazz musician, who was the principal founder in the 1980s of the black British band the Jazz Warriors. Although known primarily for his saxophone playing, Pine is a multi-instrumentalist, also ...

, jazz saxophonist * Malcolm Press , Vice Chancellor of

Manchester Metropolitan University Manchester Metropolitan University is located in the centre of Manchester, England. The university has over 40,000 students and over 4,000 members of staff. It is home to four faculties (Arts and Humanities, Business and Law, Health and Educat ...

Notable alumni from the previous schools include: *

Shirley Eaton Shirley Jean Eaton (born 12 January 1937) is an English actress, author and singer. Eaton appeared regularly in British films throughout the 1950s and 1960s, and gained her highest profile for her iconic appearance as Bond Girl Jill Masterson in ...

- Actress *

Steve Nardelli Stephen Louis Nardelli (born 10 April 1948 in London) founded the Syn in 1966 with Chris Squire, Martyn Adelman and others. In 1968, Nardelli left the band for a business career in the fashion and sports industries before reforming the band in 2 ...

- singer and songwriter

The Syn The Syn are an English band that were active from 1965 to 1967, and then reunited as a progressive rock band in 2004. The band was founded by Steve Nardelli, Chris Squire, Andrew Pryce Jackman, Martyn Adelman and John Painter. Chris Welch, in ...

* Dennis H Osborne -artist *

Julie Rogers Julie Rogers (born Julie Rolls, 6 April 1943, Bermondsey, London, England) is an English pop singer. She is best known for her multi-million selling song, " The Wedding". Career Rogers, the youngest of five children, had piano lessons and star ...

- singer * Charlie Watts, the Rolling Stones drummer *

William Woollard William Woollard (born 23 August 1939, London) is a historian and retired British television producer and presenter. Biography Woollard went to a state grammar school in London and Oxford University. He trained to be a fighter pilot with the ...

- TV producer and presenter

References

External links

Kingsbury High SiteKingsbury High School Alumni & Old ScholarsOfsted Report
{{authority control Academies in the London Borough of Brent Secondary schools in the London Borough of Brent