Rochester Grammar School

Original school building opened in 1889 and closed in 1990

Front view of part of the current school

The Rochester Grammar School for Girls was established in 1888 under the powers of the Endowed School’s Act of 1869, which allowed the charitable trustees of the Bridge Wardens to donate the necessary funds for a girls’ grammar school. This was seen as progressive as it pioneered education for girls. Each year the school celebrates its founding with a special service at Rochester Cathedral.[2]

The school building, near the centre of Rochester,[3] was opened in January 1889 by the Countess of Darnley.[4] The school included a morning Kindergarten, which closed in the late 1930s.[5]

In 1939, after the outbreak of the Second World War, the school building was taken over by the Civil Defence and the pupils were evacuated to Canterbury, moving in 1940 to Pontypridd then Porthcawl in South Wales. Several bombs fell on the school site during an incendiary raid in 1941, the main school building suffering slight damage. From 1941 an increasing number of pupils began to return to live in Rochester, and in 1942 the school was reopened, although parts of the building remained occupied by the Civil Defence until the summer of 1944.[6]

The first male teachers were appointed in the 1960s. In 1969 additional school buildings were opened 1.3 km south of the existing school on the outskirts of Rochester. The need for staff and pupils to commute between the two sites, overcrowding and the dilapidation of the old building eventually led to the decision to consolidate the school at one location, and in April 1989 work began on additional buildings on the newer southern site. The original school building was finally closed in 1990,[7] with the site sold for housing and a health centre.[8]

The move to the new site allowed an expansion in the school, and it has grown in size to over 1,100 students, with nearly 300 in the sixth form. Since 2004 male students have been admitted to the sixth form, resulting in a change in the school's title in 2006 to "Rochester Grammar School" – removing the words "for Girls".[2]

The school became grant-maintained in 1993, with funding directly from central government.[9] In November 2010 the RGS became an “Academy of Excellence” under the Government’s academy programme for outstanding schools, and is a combined Mathematics/ICT and Music specialist school, the first nationally. Facilities now include a sixth form centre, a newly built and hi-tech teaching and training suite named after one of the school’s famous ex-students – Evelyn Dunbar. Dunbar was the only woman commissioned as a war artist, and her pictures illustrating the home front during World War II decorate the suite.[2]

The school teaches a wide variety of subjects including Anthropology, Art, Business Studies, Computing, Classical Civilisation, Design and Technology, Drama, Economics, Film Studies, English, Geography, History, IT, Mathematics, Modern Languages (French, German, Japanese and Spanish) RS, PE, German, Sciences (Biology, Chemistry and Physics), Philosophy, Politics, Psychology, Product Design, Drama, Music, Sociology and Exel (PSHE). [10]

There are six school houses and colours associated with each – Byron (red), Cassidy (yellow), Fitzgerald (blue), Hildegard (black/white), Somerville (light blue) and Tomlinson (green). They are named after prominent women in the fields of music, mathematics, sports and literature. Each pupil wears a house flash with the colours of their house above the school badge on their blazer, showing which house they belong to. Sixth formers have pin badges with their house colours.

Each form group consists of a wide variety of different year 7-11 pupils who belong to the same house, known as vertical tutor groups. This plan was put in place in September 2007, and overhauled in September 2010, with vertical tutor groups including all year groups (i.e. years 7-13). These groups were changed again in 2013 to include only years 7-12 with separate forms for all students in Year 13.

The houses compete against each other in events throughout the year, including inter-house year tournaments such as netball, speed-stacking, benchball, dance and football. For harvest festival, each house has a specific theme allocated and each form creates a box that incorporates this theme. At the end of the year the houses compete in sports day, Olympiad and house arts day (competitions involving a variety of performances ranging from solo singing to creating art in a certain time).

Originally, there were only four houses, named after the patron saints of the four countries of the British Isles: Andrew (purple), David (yellow), George (red) and Patrick (green), the colours being taken from the flower emblems thistle, daffodil, rose and shamrock.

In 1999 a new sixth form block, the Peggy Saxby Suite, was opened, with a large common room, a silent study area and several classrooms. This has recently changed and the common room is now home to a very large silent study hall, the Independent Learning Centre, and has many computers and desks for students to use during study periods. There is no common room, but sixth-form students have access to a separate café during break and lunch time. The sixth form now includes male pupils, and the current year twelve has a record number of male pupils.

The school has many girls and a few boys (in sixth form) who represent the county and even the country in a range of sports, including football, skiing, sailing, netball and athletics.

All years take part in Physical Education with a different sport every term. These include Netball, Gymnastics, Football, Hockey, Athletics, Dance, Rounders.

The school has a well equipped gym and, outside the school, two full netball courts, an astro-turf hockey pitch and an athletics track.

Everyone is encouraged to take part in the Sports Day which is normally held at the end of the school year, which is one of the many ways to gain house points and win the house cup.

The school is known for the musical abilities of its pupils. There is an orchestra, a flute choir, a main (voice) choir, a gospel choir, a chamber choir, a year seven choir and 'NChant', a choir formed of students from years 9-13 who audition to become members. Year 8 students also are able to reach a bronze Arts award.

In April 2016 the Chief Executive Officer of the Thinking Schools Academy Trust, to which RGS belongs,[18] and former Headteacher Denise Shepherd were suspended due to allegations of snooping on staff emails, bullying staff and doctoring parts of an external inspection report.[19] In July 2016, the Thinking Schools Academy Trust Chairman, Peter Martin paid tribute to Ms Shepherd, who had since resigned,[20] stating that: "The Trust undertook a formal investigation, into allegations of misconduct made against Ms Shepherd. This has now concluded, with no further action required to be taken. It is extremely regrettable that these allegations were leaked to the press by an unknown source."[21]

In July 2017 RGS received national media coverage when it was disclosed that the History Department, when teaching pupils about the 19th Century African Slave Trade, had provided a worksheet that invited Year 8 pupils to take part in a fictional slave auction, using stereotypical negative qualities about African people. The Head of the History Department later apologised on behalf of the school.[22][23]

In June 2018 the school lost an unencrypted memory stick containing data of more than 1,000 pupils.[24][25]