North Leamington School (NLS) is a mixed, non-selective, comprehensive school for students aged 11 to 18 years located at the northeastern edge of Leamington Spa,

Warwickshire Warwickshire (; abbreviated Warks) is a county in the West Midlands region of England. The county town is Warwick, and the largest town is Nuneaton. The county is famous for being the birthplace of William Shakespeare at Stratford-upon-Av ...

, England. It is rated as a ''good'' school by Ofsted, and has 6.7% of children eligible for free school meals. Mike Lowdell is the current headteacher.

Admissions and performance

North Leamington is a mixed 11 to 18 comprehensive school, 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 ...

since November 2016. It has an enrolment of around 1300, and maximum capacity of 1500 students: 240 for each year group from Years 7 to 11, and 150 for each of Years 12 and 13. Admission to Year 7 (transition from Year 6) is by application to

Warwickshire County Council Warwickshire County Council is the county council that governs the non-metropolitan county of Warwickshire in England. Its headquarters are located at Shire Hall, Market Square, in centre of the county town of Warwick. Politically the county is ...

Admissions service. Entry after term one of Year 7 is by application direct to the school. As of September 2020, it is oversubscribed. In 2019, NLS recorded an above average Progress 8 score of 0.46, with 53% achieving grade 5 or above in GCSE maths and English (compared to 43% average in England), and 76 per cent of students achieving grade 4 or above. At

A level The A-Level (Advanced Level) is a subject-based qualification conferred as part of the General Certificate of Education, as well as a school leaving qualification offered by the educational bodies in the United Kingdom and the educational au ...

, NLS has an above average progress score of 0.32. 60 per cent of pupils were awarded A* to B grades.

History

North Leamington School was created in 1977 by

, with the merger of three schools for 11-16 year olds: Blackdown High School (''Park Road'' site), Leamington College for Girls, a girls grammar school (''Cloister Way'' site) and Leamington College for Boys (''Binswood Hall'' site) on Binswood Avenue. The Cloister Way site became the ''Lower School'' for Years 7, 8 and 9, while the Park Road site became the ''Upper School'' for Years 10 & 11. The Binswood Hall site became a separate sixth form centre. In 1994 the sixth form fully merged with North Leamington (becoming Years 12 & 13). This resulted in some operational challenges for staff, with teachers having to move between the sites located approximately a mile apart. NLS was granted specialist school status as a

Performing 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 England in ...

in 1999, thanks to sponsorship by EMI Music Sound Foundation (now Universal Music UK Sound Foundation) and retained this status until 2008. It was the first

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 England i ...

school in Warwickshire. For September 2009, a new school complex was built on the former site of ''Manor Hall'' teacher training and conference centre. The new site on Sandy Lane, just off the B4113 road in the parish of Blackdown, was designed by Robothams Architecture, an architectural firm based in Warwick. The new buildings have a

BREEAM BREEAM (Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method), first published by the Building Research Establishment (BRE) in 1990, is the world's longest established method of assessing, rating, and certifying the sustainability of ...

'excellent' rating, and have been given awards by

RICS The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) is a global professional body for surveyors, founded in London in 1868. It works at a cross-governmental level, and aims to promote and enforce the highest international standards in the val ...

, the Leamington Society, and The Society for Construction and Architecture in Local Authorities. The Central Hub building features a prominent sculpture by

Walter Ritchie Walter Ritchie (1919–1997) was a British sculptor. Biography Ritchie was one of the last living pupil of Eric Gill at Pigotts near High Wycombe before the Second World War Eric Gill died in 1940. Many of his public works were in stone, wood, m ...

; ''Three Aspects of a Girl's Education'' was commissioned for the old Leamington College for Girls site by Warwickshire Education Committee in 1961, and features figures of Boudica,

Florence Nightingale Florence Nightingale (; 12 May 1820 – 13 August 1910) was an English social reformer, statistician and the founder of modern nursing. Nightingale came to prominence while serving as a manager and trainer of nurses during the Crimean War, i ...

and

Marie 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 ...

. NLS became an

on 1 November 2016. The current headteacher of NLS is Mike Lowdell (from 2021). Predecessors include Joy Mitchell (2011-2020), David Hazeldine (-2011), and C.R. Thackery.

Former locations

Binswood Hall - Leamington College for Boys - geograph

Binswood Hall is a Grade II*

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

in the

Tudor revival Tudor Revival architecture (also known as mock Tudor in the UK) first manifested itself in domestic architecture in the United Kingdom in the latter half of the 19th century. Based on revival of aspects that were perceived as Tudor architecture ...

style, with later additions and alterations including a chapel built in 1867 and gymnasium dating from 1893. Having started as a Girls' Convent School it became ''Leamington College for Boys'', a Boys Grammar School, in 1848. It has now been redeveloped by

Audley Retirement Audley Group (formerly known as Audley Retirement, trading name of Audley Court Ltd) is a builder (retirement communities) and manager in the British retirement property industry. It is based in Egham. The company has two property brands in the UK ...

as a retirement village of 114

leasehold A leasehold estate is an ownership of a temporary right to hold land or property in which a lessee or a tenant holds rights of real property by some form of title from a lessor or landlord. Although a tenant does hold rights to real property, a l ...

properties, with a health club and Whittles Restaurant. The old Park Road site was demolished and used for private housing (with the creation of two new streets, Sir Frank Whittle Gardens and Canberra Mews). The Cloister Way site remained derelict for several years, and was damaged by fire on 20 September 2016. It has since been demolished and is under redevelopment for private housing.

Colleges

Students in years 7-11 are put into one of five

college A college (Latin: ''collegium'') is an educational institution or a constituent part of one. A college may be a degree-awarding tertiary educational institution, a part of a collegiate or federal university, an institution offerin ...

s: Binswood, Blackdown, Croft, Manor, or Park. Each college has its own leader who is responsible for the pastoral and academic support within their college. Siblings are normally allocated within the same college. From the 2021-22 academic year, NLS has horizontal

tutor group A tutor group is a term used in schools in the United Kingdom to denote a group of students whose pastoral and academic needs are looked after by one tutor. This will happen either through regular tutorials, or on a more casual basis. A group of s ...

s, each made up from students within the same year. This follows 12 years of vertical tutoring (VT).

Facilities

The ''Central Hub'' building of NLS has a main hall with sprung floor, 315 retractable seats, and lighting, audio and AV equipment for use as a theatre. There is a dining hall with mezzanine floor for extra seating. The Central Hub also holds the school administration, library, sixth form, and performing arts teaching spaces. These include dance and drama studios, a 62 seat lecture theatre, and music practice rooms. The ''Physical Education'' building contains a gymnasium and a sports hall, both with sprung floors, plus changing rooms and access to outdoor spaces, including an all-weather pitch (with

floodlights A floodlight is a broad-beamed, high-intensity artificial light. They are often used to illuminate outdoor playing fields while an outdoor sports event is being held during low-light conditions. More focused kinds are often used as a stage ...

), grass pitches, and a hard-floored, multi-use games area (MUGA). There are three academic buildings for teaching, all linked by bridges: * A three-storey ''Humanities'' block, for languages, humanities and individual educational needs. * A three-storey ''Science and Maths'' block, for science, maths, and IT. * A two-storey ''Design and Technology'' block for technology, art, and photography.

Awards

In 2002 the school won Arts Council England's '

Artsmark Gold Artsmark is the creative quality standard for schools and education settings, awarded by Arts Council England. The Artsmark award provides a clear framework for teachers and education professionals to plan, develop and evaluate their arts and cu ...

' award and also gained '

Sportsmark Sportsmark is Sport England's accreditation scheme for secondary schools. The scheme recognises a school's out of hours sports provision.

' status from

Sport England Sport England is a non-departmental public body under the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. Its role is to build the foundations of a community sport system by working with national governing bodies of sport, and other funded par ...

in 2004. Due to vast improvement in exam results between 2000 and 2003, NLS received a "School Achievement Award" from the government and in addition, the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust Council elected NLS to its 'Most Improved Schools Club'.

Sports memorabilia

Inside the school's sports building are various sports tops from notable pupils such as former

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 ...

and Manchester United goalkeeper Ben Foster. There is also a signed

Celtic F.C. The Celtic Football Club, commonly known as Celtic (), is a Scottish professional football club based in Glasgow, which plays in the Scottish Premiership. The club was founded in 1887 with the purpose of alleviating poverty in the immigran ...

Shirt from 2007 and a

Ronaldinho Ronaldo de Assis Moreira (born 21 March 1980), commonly known as Ronaldinho Gaúcho () or simply Ronaldinho, is a Brazilian retired professional association football, footballer who played mostly as an attacking midfielder, but was also deplo ...

signed match jersey from the same year.

Alumni

Leamington College for Boys

*Sir

David Baulcombe Sir David Charles Baulcombe One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety.org website where: (born 1952) is a British plant scientist and geneticist. he is a Royal Society Research Professor and Regius Profe ...

, professor of botany since 2007 at the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a public collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209 and granted a royal charter by Henry III in 1231, Cambridge is the world's third oldest surviving university and one of its most pr ...

, and president from 2003 to 2004 of the International Society of Plant Molecular Biology * Thomas Byles, priest * D. J. Enright, writer * Edgar Jepson, novelist *

Vivian Dering Majendie Colonel Sir Vivian Dering Majendie, (18 July 1836 – 25 March 1898) was a British engineer who was one of the first bomb disposal experts. He served as Chief Inspector of Explosives to Queen Victoria from 1871 until his death in 1898.

, chief inspector of explosives from 1871 to 1898 *

Wilfrid Mellers Wilfrid Howard Mellers (26 April 1914 – 17 May 2008) was an English music critic, musicologist and composer. Early life Born in Leamington, Warwickshire, Mellers was educated at the local Leamington College and later won a scholarship to Dow ...

, composer * Adam Osborne, computing author and businessman *

Norman Painting Norman George Painting (23 April 1924 – 29 October 2009) was an English actor, broadcaster and writer. He played Phil Archer in the BBC Radio 4 soap opera ''The Archers'' from the pilot episodes aired on the BBC Midlands Home Service in s ...

, actor * John Scholes, computer scientist *

Charles Spearman Charles Edward Spearman, FRS (10 September 1863 – 17 September 1945) was an English psychologist known for work in statistics, as a pioneer of factor analysis, and for Spearman's rank correlation coefficient. He also did seminal work on mod ...

, president from 1923 to 1926 of the British Psychological Society, and creator of the

Spearman's rank correlation coefficient In statistics, Spearman's rank correlation coefficient or Spearman's ''ρ'', named after Charles Spearman and often denoted by the Greek letter \rho (rho) or as r_s, is a nonparametric measure of rank correlation ( statistical dependence betwee ...

, used in statistics * Sir

Bernard Spilsbury Sir Bernard Henry Spilsbury (16 May 1877 – 17 December 1947) was a British pathologist. His cases include Hawley Crippen, the Seddon case, the Major Armstrong poisoning, the "Brides in the Bath" murders by George Joseph Smith, the Crumbles ...

, took part in the WWII deception for the invasion of Sicily known as

Operation Mincemeat Operation Mincemeat was a successful British deception operation of the Second World War to disguise the 1943 Allied invasion of Sicily. Two members of British intelligence obtained the body of Glyndwr Michael, a tramp who died from eating ...

, and the father of modern forensics *

Lytton Strachey Giles Lytton Strachey (; 1 March 1880 – 21 January 1932) was an English writer and critic. A founding member of the Bloomsbury Group and author of '' Eminent Victorians'', he established a new form of biography in which psychological insight ...

, writer and critic * Hugh Whitby, cricketer and schoolmaster *Sir

Frank Whittle Air Commodore Sir Frank Whittle, (1 June 1907 – 8 August 1996) was an English engineer, inventor and Royal Air Force (RAF) air officer. He is credited with inventing the turbojet engine. A patent was submitted by Maxime Guillaume in 1921 fo ...

, inventor of the jet engine * Henry James Grasett, chief constable of Toronto from 1886 to 1920

North Leamington School

* Kelly Sibley, Olympic table tennis player * Ben Foster,

Watford F.C. Watford Football Club is an English professional football club based in Watford, Hertfordshire. They play in the EFL Championship, the second tier of English football. The club’s original foundation is 1881, aligned with that of its antecede ...

and

England international The England national football team has represented England in international football since the first international match in 1872. It is controlled by The Football Association (FA), the governing body for football in England, which is affilia ...

goalkeeper

References

External links

Official websiteNLS Sixth Form Media Studies Website

Planning proposal for the new school (PDF)EduBase
{{authority control Academies in Warwickshire Secondary schools in Warwickshire Schools in Leamington Spa Educational institutions established in 1977 1977 establishments in England