Motto | Fortitudine Crescamus ('May We Grow in Strength') |
---|---|
Established | 1957 |
Type | Grammar Academy |
Headteacher | Mr Nick Webb |
Location |
Avebury Road Orpington London BR6 9SA England 51°22′01″N 0°04′37″E / 51.367°N 0.077°ECoordinates: 51°22′01″N 0°04′37″E / 51.367°N 0.077°E |
DfE number | 305/5405 |
DfE URN | 136551 Tables |
Ofsted | Reports Pre-academy reports |
Students | 987 |
Gender | Girls (Mixed in the sixth form) |
Ages | 11–18 |
Houses | Nightingale , Wren , Swift , Falcon , Griffin |
Website | www |
Newstead Wood School is a highly selective girls' Grammar school in Avebury Road, Orpington, London, England.
The school specialises in engineering and languages, and has strong links with nearby St Olave's Grammar School. The current acting head teacher is Nick Webb. The school's motto is Fortitudine Crescamus (Latin for: 'May we grow in strength'). The school has recently begun admitting boys into the sixth form.
It is situated in the Crofton area of Orpington, not far from the A21 and next to Darrick Wood. Darrick Wood School and the Princess Royal University Hospital are the other side of Darrick Wood, to the west. The London Outer Orbital Path passes adjacent to the playing fields. It lies in the parish of St Paul's, Crofton.
It was founded as the Orpington Grammar School for Girls in 1957, when administered by the Kent Education Committee. It became part of Bromley in 1965. There were firm plans for the school to become comprehensive in 1978. Nearby Bullers Wood School went comprehensive in the late 1970s.
In 1997, a survey in the Sunday Times found that the school was the best value in England for each A or B grade achieved at A-level, second to the St Olave's school; Bromley was a low spender (per pupil) comparative to other LEAs. In 2004, a pupil gained the best result at Maths GCSE in England. In 2009 the headteacher told the conference in Harrogate of the Girls' Schools Association that schools were not concentrating on brighter pupils, instead trying to raise average pupils' grades from D to C, and that girls in mixed-sex schools can have their ambitions crushed and be held back in male-dominated professions (girls from single-sex schools are statistically more successful in science-based professions than from mixed schools). She also criticised a government scheme to give one-to-one tuition to less able pupils, and not more-able students, when considering the lack of women in traditionally-male occupations, and she claimed there was a 'huge reluctance' to concentrate on top students.