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Valentines High School

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Type
  
Community school

Local authority
  
Redbridge

Ofsted
  
Reports

Phone
  
+44 20 8554 3608

Chair of Governors
  
Mr Andrew Bern

DfE URN
  
102857 Tables

Headteacher
  
Mr Richard Laws

Ages
  
11–18

Location
  
Cranbrook Road Ilford Greater London IG2 6HX England, UK

Address
  
348-360 Cranbrook Rd, Ilford IG2 6HX, UK

Motto
  
In Harmony, Achieving Excellence

Similar
  
Beal High School, Wanstead High School, Ilford County High Sch, Caterham High School, Seven Kings High School

Profiles

Valentines high school on bbc news


Valentines High School is a coeducational secondary school and sixth form located in the Ilford area of the London Borough of Redbridge, England. It has approximately 1300 pupils and 93 teachers. Valentines has been a teaching school since 2011, and is a member of the Leading Edge partnership programme. In 2006, it was designated as a specialist school for technology and had technology college status.

Contents

Valentines high school mytruthis campaign


History

The school was first opened in 1901 as the Park Higher Grade School, a coeducational secondary school, located at the opposite side of Valentines Park from the school's present location. The school had over 600 places and taught Latin and French among other subjects.

In 1929, the girls' wing of the school was moved to a new building on Cranbrook Road and was named Ilford County High School for Girls, a selective grammar school for girls, while the original site became known as Ilford County High School for Boys, which in 1935 moved to its present day location in Barkingside. In 1977, the school was renamed Valentines High School, and became coeducational, admitting boys for the first time the following year.

In 2007, a new sixth-form building was opened with state-of-the-art physical education facilities including a new astro-turf pitch, tennis courts, sports hall, and drama studio. The sixth-form building currently houses the modern languages, and humanities departments. Following demographic changes to the local area, the school has become very multicultural, with more than 80% of pupils speaking a first language other than English.

The current headteacher, Mr Richard Laws, took over as acting Headteacher in 2014, taking over from Mrs Sylvia Jones, who was Headteacher for over 10 years. The former PE teacher has put an emphasis on "discipline, respect and good behaviour" and considerably reduced the size of the sixth form. Ofsted have not inspected the school since before this change in leadership.

Results

The school was last inspected by Ofsted in 2006, when it was graded 'outstanding' in every category. As of 2016, the school has a 'Progress 8' score of 0.64, meaning that it is within the top 5% of schools nationwide for pupil progress, meaning that it is well above average.

In 2015, 66% of students achieved 5 GCSEs at A*-C including Maths and English, which is well above the national average, and the average within the London Borough of Redbridge, but was the school's worst result for over a decade. For A-level students, the average point score per student was 766, which is below the national average. 3% of students leave the sixth form with less than 2 A-level passes. The attendance rate for 2014-15 was 95.1%, which is marginally higher than the national average.

Notable former pupils

  • Nina Bawden, novelist and children's writer
  • Marion Foale, artist and fashion designer
  • Rebecca Front, BAFTA award winning actress, the Thick of It, Lewis and Humans
  • Rachel MacFarlane, principal of the Isaac Newton Academy, a secondary school in Redbridge
  • Hussain Munawer, Youtuber, astronaut and mental health campaigner, set to become the first British Muslim in space in 2018
  • Dawn Neesom, editor of the Daily Star since 2003
  • References

    Valentines High School Wikipedia