Coventry Blue Coat Church of England School

Context

Blue Coat Church of England School is a specialist Music, Maths and Science college. The original Blue Coat school was founded in 1714 as a school for girls and was located close to Holy Trinity church in the city centre. A new school was opened on the present site in 1964 under headmaster William J Grimes, who ran the school until his retirement in 1980, replaced by Rev R Lewie as Head until 1986. Stephen Timbrell was the headteacher from 1999, when he took over from Dr. R Lewin, until 12 May 2008. Dr J.Roberts was the most recent headteacher; she took up her role in September 2009 but left the school in 2015. the school had an interim headteacher Mr F. Peacock. In 2016 Mrs Shelly became the new headteacher of Blue Coat

Current enrollment is around 1460 pupils, and the school gained an outstanding SIAMS grading in July 2015. It is one of very few specialist Music Colleges in the country. The school has ties with Coventry Cathedral, and holds several services there every year.

Year and school councils

At the start of the school year, each form elects several representatives to serve on the year council. Two or three of these year council representatives are elected to serve on the school council. The year councils discuss issues regarding school life and pass their findings to the school council, who consider them. The school council has a budget to facilitate resolution of these issues as long as they support the Christian ethos of the school.

Choir and Mobo Awards

The school has an 8-part choir, typically performing choral works ranging from the early works of Thomas Tallis through Joseph Haydn's Insanae et Vanae Curae to the recent works of composers such as John Tavener. The choir visits cathedrals around the country annually, where it sings services for the week whilst the resident choir is away. These have included Chester, York, Blackburn, Salisbury, and Liverpool. The choir has sung mass in St Mark's Basilica, Venice. In the summer of 2007 the choir visited Wells Cathedral, and has been invited back this coming July.

Other choir activities have included: 2010: During the summer the choir sang services in Wells Cathedral. Whilst they were there a CD was recorded, which is still available to purchase from the school's Music Department. 2011: The choir sang services at York Minster during the summer. 2011: The boys section were selected to appear in the recently released film, 'Nativity 2: Danger in the Manger". Part of the storyline involved having David Tennant as conductor! Venues for the filming were Warwick Castle and the Courtyard Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon. 2012: As part of Coventry Cathedral's Golden Jubilee celebrations, a group of senior members performed in front of a congregation of 2000, which included the Princess Royal and the Archbishop of Canterbury. 2012: The choir sang services at Salisbury Cathedral during the summer. In the summer of 2013 and in 2014 the choir will be taking up the invitation to sing again in Wells Cathedral. Future engagements will also include opportunities to sing live on BBC Radio 4.

The choir receives additional support from members of the public who bolster the ranks when support is required, providing a more balanced bass and tenor sound.

The choir has been entering the BBC Songs of Praise School Choir of the Year competition for the last three years, and has come close to winning several times, with the Choir winning the competition in the 2008 finals. The choir is a regular on the BBC Radio 4 programme The Daily Service.

Mobo Awards

A group of boys made a song called Blue Coat Cypher and made a hit on Youtube, getting up to 1 million views worldwide and they got nominated as Best Grime Song and came first winning the award after beating J Hus with his song Lean and Bop.

Dramatic productions

The School has an annual dramatic production, which is open to all students. The school's former Head of Drama, Matthew Connor-Hemming, directed many productions,including Bertolt Brecht's The Caucasian Chalk Circle and musicals, such as Oliver!, Calamity Jane, Les Misérables, and The Wizard of Oz. Head of Music Norman Owen directed the music for these productions. Current Head of Drama, Andy Raffle, is currently rehearsing for a production of The Sound of Music. This year the school have chose to do a production of Hairspray, which will be performed in 2017

Uniform

The current Blue Coat School uniform consists of-

For Boys: white shirt (all year), black/grey trousers (all year), Blue Coat tie (4+ stripes), black socks, black shoes (not trainers).

For Girls: white blouse with Blue Coat tie (4+ stripes)(Winter), check white/blue blouse (Summer), blue trousers (all year), black shoes (no heel).

Financial crisis 2015

It was announced in a letter home to parents on 5 March 2015 the whole governing body of the school was to step down to make way for an interim governing body as the school was facing "serious financial issues". The school has put a small number of support posts at risk.

On BBC CWR's radio Breakfast show on 5 March there were calls from a parent for Head Dr Julie Roberts to stand down.

The BBC later reported that there was a £1.4 million shortfall in funding.