Mascalls Academy (formerly Mascalls School) is a

co-educational Mixed-sex education, also known as mixed-gender education, co-education, or coeducation (abbreviated to co-ed or coed), is a system of education where males and females are educated together. Whereas single-sex education was more common up to t ...

secondary school and a sixth form with academy status located in

Paddock Wood Paddock Wood is a town and civil parish in the borough of Tunbridge Wells in Kent, England, about southwest of Maidstone. At the 2001 Census it had a population of 8,263, falling marginally to 8,253 at the 2011 Census. Paddock Wood is a centre f ...

Kent Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces ...

Etymology

The name comes from the nearby Mascalls corner.

History

The school opened in 1956 as Mascalls School, a foundation school administered by Kent County Council. It 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 philosop ...

in 2011, and in 2015 it joined the

Leigh Academies Trust Leigh Academies Trust is a multi-academy trust, formed of 31 schools based in the Kent, Medway and South East London areas. Its Head Office is on the same site as Strood Academy, housing its Executive Team and central teams including Finance, Est ...

. Stuart Reeves, headteacher since 2010 was promoted to LAT Executive Director of the

West Kent Kent is a traditional county in South East England with long-established human occupation. Prehistoric Kent Kent has been occupied since the Lower Palaeolithic as finds from the quarries at Fordwich and Swanscombe attest. The Swanscombe sku ...

cluster of academies at the time of the school's accession to the Leigh Academies Trust in 2015. Wayne Barnett then became principal, having previously served as vice principal since 2013. In 2019, Barnett was promoted by the Leigh Academies Trust to serve as the principal of Stationers' Crown Woods Academy. The vice principal at the time, William Monk was then promoted to principal of Mascalls. Monk oversaw the school's response to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...

, in line with the UK Government's policies. The Leigh Academies Trust has given all students in the trust, including the students at Mascalls,

Chromebooks A Chromebook (sometimes stylized in lowercase as chromebook) is a laptop or tablet running the Linux-based ChromeOS as its operating system. Initially designed to heavily rely on web applications for tasks using the Google Chrome browser, Chromeb ...

to help with learning. The academy had a therapy dog called "Levi" after

Claude Lévi-Strauss Claude Lévi-Strauss (, ; 28 November 1908 – 30 October 2009) was a French anthropologist and ethnologist whose work was key in the development of the theories of structuralism and structural anthropology. He held the chair of Social An ...

. He was a

cocker spaniel Cocker Spaniels are dogs belonging to two breeds of the spaniel dog type: the American Cocker Spaniel and the English Cocker Spaniel of which are commonly called simply Cocker Spaniel in their countries of origin. In the early 20th century, Cock ...

, born on 23 May 2019, and registered with the Pets As Therapy charity. Levi left Mascalls with his owner Miss Anna Mohamed in late 2021. When

High Weald Academy The High Weald Academy was a coeducational secondary school that opened in 1971 located in Cranbrook, Kent, England. The academy permanently closed in September 2022, with all the pupils from Year 7 to Year 10 offered places at Mascalls Acade ...

closed in September 2022, all pupils from Year 7 to Year 10 were offered places at Mascalls. Following the promotion of the current principal, William Monk, to a senior executive position within the Leigh Academies Trust, it was announced that Jo Brooks would become principle from 1st January 2023.

Houses

Mascalls Academy is organised into four houses (called "colleges"), named after "significant individuals". For the lower school: * Earhart (named after Amelia Earhart) * Shackleton (named after

Ernest Shackleton Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton (15 February 1874 – 5 January 1922) was an Anglo-Irish Antarctic explorer who led three British expeditions to the Antarctic. He was one of the principal figures of the period known as the Heroic Age of ...

) * Luther King (named after

Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister and activist, one of the most prominent leaders in the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968 ...

) For the sixth form: * Marie Curie (named after

Marie Skłodowska Curie Marie Salomea Skłodowska–Curie ( , , ; born Maria Salomea Skłodowska, ; 7 November 1867 – 4 July 1934) was a Polish and naturalized-French physicist and chemist who conducted pioneering research on radioactivity. She was the first ...

)

Mascalls Gallery

A small art gallery was located on the school site from 2006 to 2016. It had a frequently changing programme of exhibitions featuring national and internationally known artists. These included Henry Moore,

L. S. Lowry Laurence Stephen Lowry ( ; 1 November 1887 – 23 February 1976) was an English artist. His drawings and paintings mainly depict Pendlebury, Lancashire (where he lived and worked for more than 40 years) as well as Salford and its vicinity ...

Graham Sutherland Graham Vivian Sutherland (24 August 1903 – 17 February 1980) was a prolific English artist. Notable for his paintings of abstract landscapes and for his portraits of public figures, Sutherland also worked in other media, including printmaking ...

and

Lee Miller Elizabeth "Lee" Miller, Lady Penrose (April 23, 1907 – July 21, 1977), was an American photographer and photojournalist. She was a fashion model in New York City in the 1920s before going to Paris, where she became a fashion and fine art ...

as well as artists from

Latin America Latin America or * french: Amérique Latine, link=no * ht, Amerik Latin, link=no * pt, América Latina, link=no, name=a, sometimes referred to as LatAm is a large cultural region in the Americas where Romance languages — languages derived f ...

, Japan and the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

. In 2010, Mascalls Gallery exhibited for the first time in the UK drawings by Marc Chagall for the nearby

All Saints' Church All Saints Church, or All Saints' Church or variations on the name may refer to: Albania *All Saints' Church, Himarë Australia * All Saints Church, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory * All Saints Anglican Church, Henley Brook, Western Aust ...

Tudeley Tudeley is a village in the Tunbridge Wells borough of Kent, England. The village is home to All Saints' Church, the only church in the world that has all its windows in stained glass designed by Marc Chagall. The East window was commissioned by ...

. An exhibition of watercolour paintings by Roland Collins led to further exhibitions in London, raising the artist's profile. The gallery closed in June 2016 due to a lack of funds,https://twitter.com/MascallsGallery/status/745558621149233152 and the building has since been refurbished as the new Mascalls Library.

Ofsted

The school's last full inspection was in 2012 when it was judged as 'Good' by Ofsted.

Notable alumni

Philip Martin Brown Philip Martin Brown (born 9 July 1956) is a British actor from Manchester. He is known for his long-running portrayal of English teacher Grantly Budgen in the hit BBC One school-based drama series ''Waterloo Road (TV series), Waterloo Road'', w ...

, actor

References

External links

Mascalls Academy official websiteChapter in ''Teaching Art in a Postmodern World: Theories, Teacher Reflections and Interpretive Frameworks'' by Bill Hall, head of art at the school (2002)
{{authority control Secondary schools in Kent Educational institutions established in 1956 1956 establishments in England Academies in Kent Leigh Academies Trust Paddock Wood