Hazlehead Primary School

Hazlehead Academy

The back of Hazlehead Academy. The building to the left is the swimming pool.
Established	c. 1970
Type	Secondary School
Head Teacher	James Purdie
Location	Groats Road Aberdeen AB15 8BE Scotland
Staff	72 FTE
Students	807
Gender	Mixed
Ages	11–18
Houses	Craigievar, Dunecht, Greyfriars & Marischal
Colours	Bottle green and navy blue
School years	S1-S6
Website	Hazlehead Academy

Hazlehead Academy is a comprehensive secondary school in Aberdeen, Scotland. It has four main feeder primary schools, Airyhall Primary School, Fernielea Primary School, Hazlehead Primary School and Kingsford Primary School - in addition to this, pupils who have been part of a Gaelic unit at Aberdeen's Gilcomstoun Primary School can transfer to Hazlehead, which offers Gaelic as part of the curriculum.

Hazlehead Academy is a six-year comprehensive school on the western edges of Aberdeen, adjacent to Hazlehead Park. It has a history stretching back for over 100 years. Hazlehead Academy was officially opened by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth on the 7th October 1970. This followed a move from the existing school based in Belmont Street, in what is now the Academy Shopping Centre. Plans were laid towards the end of the 1950s. The education committee at the time had under consideration the reorganisation of the existing Secondary provision of 3 Senior Secondary schools and a number of Junior Secondary schools into 10 co-educational comprehensives. Hazlehead Academy would become one of these senior secondaries and then a comprehensive school.

The design of the new school sought to reflect the priorities of the day and there are a few interesting quotes from the booklet produced for the occasion of the opening.

"In the building of the school provision is made for smaller groups of pupils so that they can dine together, have common facilities and be in a position to meet in a much more personal way. For the first time ever in any secondary school in Aberdeen, it has been possible to provide the entire playfield accommodation on the same campus as the school so that no journey is necessary and playfield provision becomes more than ever before an integral part of the school curriculum. The school has taken fully two years to build and the final cost will be approximately £900,000."

Following the move to the new site in Groat's Road, the new buildings were officially opened by Queen Elizabeth II on 7 October 1970.

The current Head Teacher is James Purdie who took up post in August 2016. The school roll is around 800 pupils.

In recent years there were five houses; Bruce (Blue), Craigievar (Green), Dunecht (Yellow), Greyfriars (White) and Marischal (Red). In 2010, Bruce house was dissolved with pupils being split among the remaining four houses.

Every year there is a two term long Interhouse competition which consists of a range of sporting and non-sporting events. House captains are appointed from the 6th Year to help organise teams and competitors providing them with an opportunity to develop their leadership skills.