St. Aidan's C of E High School

Infobox UK school
name = St. Aidan's Church of England High School


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type = State
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head_label = Principal
head = Dennis Richards OBE
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street = Oatlands Drive
city = Harrogate
county = North Yorkshire
country = England
postcode = HG28JR
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free_label_1 = Grades
free_1 = A-Level - 61% A-B [ [http://www.staidans.co.uk/PDFs/sixthform/alevelsummary.pdf Official A Level Grades] ] GCSE - 93% A*-C [ [http://www.staidans.co.uk/PDFs/gcse06summary.pdf Official GCSE Grades] ]
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website = http://www.staidans.co.uk/
website_name = School website

St. Aidan's Church of England High School is a mixed Church of England School in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, England. It currently houses over 1800 students of both lower school and sixth form age. The school is well known for its academic performance and is well known for its extra-curricular activities, in which it specialises in music, sport and drama.

Notably, the school's Chamber Choir won the 2006 Songs of Praise School Choir of the Year Competition.

The school was labelled as "outstanding" [ [http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/reports/pdf/?inspectionNumber=292213&providerCategoryID=8192&fileName=\\school\\121\\s5_121719_20061113.pdf 2006 Ofsted Report] ] by an Ofsted report in October 2006. It is ranked 475th in the country [ [http://www.timesonline.co.uk/displayPopup/0,,115677,00.html The Times Top 500 schools for GCSE] ] for its GCSE results in 2006 by The Times.

History

St. Aidan's had its foundation stone laid by the former Bishop of Ripon, the Right Reverend John Moorman, on June 18 1966, and opened in September of that year to provide Church of England education for Harrogate's fast-growing population [ [http://www.staidans.co.uk/intros/historyofschool.asp] |http://www.staidans.co.uk/intros/historyofschool.asp] . Since then, it has grown hugely in pupil numbers.

Building Work

The school has seen vast amounts of building work since its opening. Perhaps most notably was the Constance Green Hall, built adjacent to Bede House, a building converted for the school's use, which was opened in 1997.

More recently, May 2006 saw the opening of a fully re-furbished Learning resources centre, with approximately 15000 resources and 42 computer workstations [ [http://www.staidans.co.uk/depts/library/libraryhomepage.asp] |http://www.staidans.co.uk/depts/library/libraryhomepage.asp] . The opening was heralded with a "Beatles Night", featuring tribute group the Plastic Beatles.

Further building work included the complete refurbishment of the sixth form cafe area and old chapel. The bottom tennis courts near the music block have been demolished, with classrooms and a new chapel in their place. The barn has also been demolished, being replaced by new tennis courts. [ [http://www.staidans.co.uk/causeway/causewaymay07.pdf St. Aidan's "Causeway" Newsletter May 2007] ]

The lecture theatre has been removed to make space for a Dance studio that was made available for students studying Dance in September 2007.

Awards

The school was made one of the first Beacon Schools in 1998. It also has Specialist College Science Status [ [http://www.staidans.co.uk/PDFs/policiesanddocuments/prospectus0607.pdf] |http://www.staidans.co.uk/PDFs/policiesanddocuments/prospectus0607.pdf] and won the International Schools Award from the British Council in 2006.

Catering

St. Aidan's has a reputation in the local area and nationally for an excellent catering department. Since 2002, around £1 Million has been spent on making meals healthier, so that currently around 95% of the school's pupils have school meals [ [http://www.harrogatetoday.co.uk/ViewArticle2.aspx?SectionID=17&ArticleID=1207058 Town leads school food revolution - Harrogate Today ] ] . The catering department is led by former hotel chef Trevor Whitehead, and has been awarded National Healthy School Status.

ixth Form

The school forms part of an associated sixth form with St. John Fisher Catholic High School.

Notable Faculty

The current Headteacher, Dennis Richards, was awarded an OBE in 2007 for services to education [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/16_06_07_hons_main.pdf Microsoft Word - Queens List.rtf ] ] . He also won the Ted Wragg Award for Lifetime Achievement at the 2007 Teaching Awards [ [http://www.teachingawards.com/winners/list?o=1&year=7&type=nat Teaching Awards ] ] .

External links

* [http://www.staidans.co.uk/ St. Aidan's School Website]
* [http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2006/04_april/10/choir.shtml BBC Press Release for Songs of Praise]
* [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/education/06/school_tables/secondary_schools/html/815_4611.stm St. Aidan's Examination Results 2006]
* [http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/reports/pdf/?inspectionNumber=292213&providerCategoryID=8192&fileName=\\school\\121\\s5_121719_20061113.pdf October 2006 Ofsted Report]
* [http://www.staidans.co.uk/PDFs/policiesanddocuments/prospectus0607.pdf School Prospectus 2006/07]

References