Edgeborough School

Edgeborough School
Motto Carpe Diem (Seize the day)
Established 1906
Type Prep school
Headmaster Chris Davies
Location Edgeborough
Frensham
Farnham
Surrey
GU10 3AH
England
Coordinates: 51°10′59″N 0°47′40″W / 51.18297°N 0.79455°W / 51.18297; -0.79455
Local authority Surrey
DfE URN 125337
Students 350
Gender Coeducational
Ages 3–13
Houses
  • James
  • Mitchell
  • Jackson
  • Burton
Colours Green and Gold
Website www.edgeborough.co.uk

Edgeborough School is a prep school in Farnham, Surrey in England, which provides education for 350 students aged between 2 and 13. The school occupies the 1880s-built Frensham Place with many additions and became co-educational in 1992. The Headmaster is Chris Davies, former Head of Abingdon Prep School.

Overview

Edgeborough is became co-educational in 1992 and celebrated its centenary in 2006.[1] The Headmaster is Chris Davies, former Head of Abingdon Prep School.[1] Its grounds measure approximately 45 acres, including parts of its woodland which are centuries old. Frensham Place, a former country house.[2][3][1]

The school is divided into four departments: Nursery, Pre-Prep, Lower Prep and Upper Prep, age-appropriate in terms of staffing, curriculum and resources.[3] The school offers a broad curriculum to prepare students for their senior school of choice at age 13+.[3] French is available from age three onwards and Latin from age nine. ICT, music, drama, art, pottery and design technology are taught by specialist teachers.[3]

The school offers a range of extracurricular sporting activities including athletics, badminton, basketball, canoeing, a climbing wall, cricket, cross country, football, golf, gymnastics, hockey, lacrosse, martial arts, netball, rounders, rugby, swimming, table tennis, tennis and volleyball.[2]

Edgeborough has four houses: Jackson, Burton, James and Keville, bi-weekly chapel services and Friday morning assemblies which include prayers and hymns.[1] There is a prefectorial system in which sixth formers (year 8 students, aged 12–13) may become prefects, monitors or house or sport captains. Competition between houses sees a house point system in which students can earn points for their house supplemented with inter-house competitions in athletic, many field sports, swimming, art, music and basketball.

Facilities

Buildings and grounds include a floodlit astroturf pitch, golf course, theatre, dance studio, chapel and an open-air swimming pool.[2][3] In addition, there are several pitches and two cricket pavilions, one of which has a mechanical score board. In the year 2000, the school underwent an extensive building and rebuilding programme, replacing its library and building its science labs. The Year-6-to-8 classroom block was renovated and a new dance studio was built.

History

Edgeborough was established in 1906 in Guildford as a small, privately owned boarding school for boys. It moved to its present site in Frensham in 1939. It became a charitable trust in 1966, and co-education was introduced in 1992 when the Pre-Prep and Nursery departments were opened.[4]

Frensham Place, which now houses the school's weekly boarders, was built about 1880. It is an imposing stone building with shaped gables which the school has not had listed. Two cottages by the walled garden area were designed by the architect Edwin Lutyens.[5] Frensham Place was the former home of the Woodroffe family, and the house's chapel was the first place of worship for Catholics from Farnham since the Reformation. Local masses were celebrated by the Woodroffe's chaplain Father Gerin, who had come to Farnham in 1888 to escape persecution in France.[6]

The building was also the former home of the newspaper proprietor and magnate Sir Cyril Arthur Pearson, the founder of the Daily Express. Pearson died at the house after hitting his head on the bath tap.[7] The contents of the house, including all Pearson's furniture and pictures, were put up for sale in 1913.[8]

Frensham Place was also the birthplace of Count Antonie Seilern, one of the most noted art collectors of the twentieth century. He was born at the house on 17 September 1901, the son of an Austrian nobleman Count Carl Seilern and his American wife Antoinette Woerishoffer.[9]

During World War II the school was requisitioned by the army, and housed a contingent of Māori from New Zealand. A local resident recalls that the driveway was guarded by sentries carrying rifles and the quiet country roads were often filled with convoys of heavy vehicles and marching men.[10]

Notable alumni

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 "School website - "A warm welcome to the Edgeborough website"". Retrieved 13 February 2012.
  2. 1 2 3 Edgeborough profile. Independent Schools Council
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 Edgeborough Education Trust Accounts 2008. Charities Commission. 31 August 2008.
  4. ↑ Edgeborough School inspection report from the Independent Schools Inspectorate
  5. ↑ Ian Nairn and Nikolaus Pevsner. The Buildings of England: Surrey. Second edition revised by Bridget Cherry. Yale University Press, London and New Haven, 1971.
  6. ↑ History of St Joan of Arc church
  7. ↑ Luke McKernan, 'Pearson, Sir (Cyril) Arthur, first baronet (1866–1921)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Jan 2008 accessed 13 Feb 2012
  8. ↑ The contents of the house including Frensham Place sale catalogue. Contents of the residence, comprising furniture, pictures and prints, ivories, bronzes, clocks and decorative porcelain ... 1913 Oct. 20-29
  9. ↑ Count Antonie Seilern (1901-1978). Obituary. The Burlington Magazine. Vol. 120, No. 908, November 1978.
  10. ↑ A Wartime Childhood 1939-45: Part 2- No Comfort by Kent County Council Libraries & Archives - Maidstone District. BBC World War II People's Archive
  11. ↑ Jon Stallworthy, ‘Douglas, Keith Castellain (1920–1944)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 accessed 13 Feb 2012
  12. ↑ GURDON, Sir John (Bertrand), Who's Who 2012, A & C Black, 2012; online edn, Oxford University Press, Dec 2011 ; online edn, Nov 2011 accessed 15 Feb 2012
  13. ↑ Brian Holden Reid, 'Hart, Sir Basil Henry Liddell (1895–1970)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online Jan 2008 accessed 13 Feb 2012
  14. ↑ Stephen Snelling. Gallipoli, 1995
  15. ↑ Cincinnati, the Queen City, 1788-1912, Volume 3, S J Clarke Publishing Company, 1912
  16. ↑ "Actor Donald Sinden's son on the horror of being abused by his headmaster at Edgeborough". Mail on Sunday. 8 November 2015. Retrieved 10 November 2015.
  17. ↑ John Strachey by Hugh Thomas
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