County Upper School
Encyclopedia
Bury St Edmunds County Upper School is a 13 to 18 co-educational comprehensive high-performing academy part of the Bury St Edmunds Academy Trust comprising County Upper School, Horringer Court Middle School and Westley Middle School. It is one of three 13-18 schools serving the town of Bury St Edmunds in Suffolk
, England
and its surrounding villages. Pupils enter Year 9 primarily from three catchment Middle Schools in Bury St Edmunds but students are drawn widely from across the villages and towns of West Suffolk
particularly Newmarket and Mildenhall. The school is regularly over-subscribed with 266 first-choice applicants in 2009/10, 287 in 2010/11 and 282 for 2011/12 against a LEA
Planned Admission Number of 260. In September 2011 the number of students on roll was 1,039 and it is expected that will remain relatively unchanged for the foreseeable future. Attached to the main school is a Sixth Form
, which at present stands at around 260 students spread between Years 12 and 13 an increase of 40 on 2010-11. The school is located on Beetons Way, on the outskirts of town, next to St Benedict's Roman Catholic Upper School
, which has close links with the County Upper Sixth Form.
As a school rated by Ofsted as "Outstanding" (1999, 2005, 2008, 2011) under the Academies Act 2010 County Upper School applied to become an Academy – a publicly funded independent school – in a chain with Horringer Court Middle School and Westley Middle School, joined together by an “Umbrella Trust”, allowing the three schools to work together strategically to drive up even further their standards and results. The schools' applications to convert simultaneously to three separate academies were approved by the Department for Education and they all opened as academies within the overarching 9-18 Bury St Edmunds Academy Trust on 1 August 2011 thereby preserving a distinct Middle and Upper phase in the proposed two-tier education system after 2016 for the west of Bury St Edmunds and beyond.
County Upper School is designated a High Performing Specialist Science and Language College with a Gifted and Talented Focus, and is also accredited as a "Consultant School" by the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust
that gave County Councils the status of Local Education Authorities, greatly expanding their powers and their expenditure. Within a few years it was normal for half a county's budget to be devoted to education and the West Suffolk County School was opened in Northgate Street in Bury. A large red brick building, the former Falconbury School and site of the original Northgate House, had been purchased for the purpose in 1904, then altered and improved. This original building was then extended in 1907. At this time it was co-educational (for both girls and boys), with separate playgrounds. In the early 1950s the school became The County Grammar School for Girls with eligible boys from Bury and its surrounding villages attending the King Edward VI Grammar School.
In 1964 The County Grammar School for Girls moved from its Northgate Street site to brand new premises at the end of Tollgate Lane (now known as Beetons Way) in north west Bury St Edmunds. For many years the girls had walked to this new site to make use of the playing fields that the Local Education Authority
had acquired there. These long walks now became unnecessary. The school premises in Northgate Street gradually became used as an annex to the West Suffolk College
until 1988. Today, the old red brick building forms the core of the Northgate Street Business Park, housing, amongst other enterprises, a Dance
school, a Chiropractic
clinic, the Headquarters of the East of England Ambulance Service
and the East of England Museums Libraries and Archives, the original West Suffolk County School crest is still visible to passersby. In 1971 The County Grammar School for Girls became the co-educational and comprehensive
County Upper School. The old single-sex state grammar school
system, which divided children by gender and ability in Suffolk
was now dead.
The original West Suffolk County School crest, shown above the old Northgate Street building entrance, consisted of a gold cross fleury
between five martlets on a blue shield and were the arms of Edward the Confessor
, who in the 11th Century granted land to the Abbey
of St Edmund, and those of the old West Suffolk
County Council. The contemporary County Upper School crest has four birds around a cross surmounted by the Saxon Crown of St Edmund, the last King of East Anglia. The blue sweaters with an all gold crest worn by today’s pupils echo the colours of Edward the Confessor and are used by the school sports teams and on the school flag.
common rooms.
A new library opened in October 2007, and a completely refurbished Performing Arts Centre opened Easter 2007 which contains facilities for Dance, Drama and Music. This was dedicated to the memory of Michael Woodhouse, a wheelchair bound student, who unexpectedly died during Easter 2007. Work on new facilities for Food Technology
and Art
were completed in Summer 2008 which forms part of a Visual Arts Centre, a Business Studies Centre was completed during Summer 2010 and the Science Block was refurbished in Summer 2011.
for Services to Education after many years at the school. As of 2011, there are around 80 teaching staff. The most recent workforce statistics from the Department for Education indicates the Academy's pupil-teacher ratio of 14.4:1 is lower than both the Suffolk LEA average of 16:1 in Secondary Schools and 15.7:1 for England as a whole.
In February 2008 County Upper School had obtained the distinction of being designated 'Outstanding' by Ofsted
for the third successive time. It placed the school amongst the top four rated in the East of England and it was the only school in Essex
, Suffolk or Norfolk
to have achieved such a long run of outstanding marks.
Between 2009 - 2011 nine County Upper Sixth Form students have achieved entry to Oxbridge
Colleges. and research by the Sutton Trust shows around three-quarters of students leaving Year 13 attend university after leaving County Upper with a third attending the 30 most selective universities and colleges.
The 2011 GCSE results showed similar success with a record 85% of students gaining 5 or more passes at grades A*-C across all subjects (compared with 72.1% for Suffolk and 78.8% for England overall), up from 82% in 2010, with 71% of students gaining 5 or more A*-C passes including English and Mathematics, compared with 54.4% in Suffolk and 58.3% for England nationally, and 100% of pupils gained 5 or more A*-G passes including English and maths. 34.5% of all passes were at A* or A compared with 23.2% for England as a whole and 24% of students achieved at least 8 A or A* grades.
35% of students also achieved an A*-C pass rate in the GCSE subjects required to gain them the new English Baccalaureate qualification, (English, Mathematics, 2 Sciences, History/Geography and a Modern Foreign Language) meeting the planned 2012 35% government target. This attainment was up from 26% in 2010 against an average of 13.6% in Suffolk for 2011 (unchanged from 2010) and 16.5% across England.
with a Gifted and Talented focus. An Ofsted subject inspection in May 2009 judged the overall effectiveness of science to be outstanding with no areas for improvement.
The school is the Suffolk partner school in the East of England Science Learning Centre promoting professional development amongst science education and learning professionals.
County Upper runs a Science and Engineering outreach programme including visits to universities and other science centres as well as workshops for gifted and talented students from feeder Middle Schools in West Suffolk. Year 9 Science students also participate in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) days run by the Smallpeice Trust promoting engineering careers for young people and lower school students participate in the new Go4Set STEM residential courses run by the Engineering Development Trust.
In summer 2010 the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust (SSAT) designated County Upper as a Consultant School in recognition of its assistance in helping other schools in Suffolk raise standards and achievement.
inspection County Upper was invited to apply for a second specialism. With effect from 1 February 2009 the school was designated as a Language College
with a Gifted and Talented focus.
The school offers French, German, Japanese, and Spanish for all pupils with Italian in the Sixth Form. It runs an overseas exchange programme to Kyoto
in Japan, the Ancona
region of Italy, Guadalajara, Spain
and the Rhineland
area of Germany. The Japanese programme involves annual language and scientific exchanges, summer camps and extensive cultural activities between Japan and Bury St Edmunds.
The school runs a Modern Foreign Language outreach programme with its feeder Middle Schools in West Suffolk where Gifted and Talented pupils take part in workshops and activity days hosted at County Upper during the course of the academic year.
County Upper School won the Suffolk Sport "Secondary School of the Year" Award sponsored by Ipswich Town FC Community Trust in 2011, won the St Edmundsbury "School of the Year Award" for sport in both 2008 and 2011, is partner school of both Sport England
and the Youth Sport Trust
via the Sportsmark
Scheme and offers a wide variety of sport and team games. It has achieved Football Association Charter Standard Secondary Development School status in recognition for the quality of its coaching. The school works with the East Of England coach for British cycling and also fields an equestrian team.
School teams are the Suffolk U15 cricket
and U16 netball
champions for the 2010-11 season and the U17 rounders
team reached the semi-finals of the English National Schools Championships in July 2011.
The captain of Suffolk County Cricket team, Mr Justin Bishop, is a PE teacher and cricket coach for the school and Miss Heather Lymburn, also on the PE staff, is a member of the England Senior Korfball
Squad.
Academy. The academy has its own Sports Director with students from across East Anglia attending the County Upper Sixth Form. Students are accommodated locally, attend the school and regularly enter regional and national-level competitions.
Gold award for its wide range of musical, dance and theatrical groups and events. The school is an accredited Arts Award Centre for the Trinity College London
and Arts Council England
scheme and an Examinations Centre for the Associated Board of the Royal School of Music and Rockschool.
School ensembles regularly perform in public holding numerous concerts and choral events in and around Bury St Edmunds including performances at the town's new Apex Venue. There are over 20 music ensembles including 2 orchestras, several choirs, string & jazz ensembles and wind bands. There have been three Swing Band tours of Suffolk Virginia USA together with music tours of Somerset
and the Channel Islands
. The bi-ennial school production takes place at the Theatre Royal, Bury St Edmunds
.
The school holds an annual Art Exhibition for the community displaying students' work. Paintings, textiles, pottery and visual arts installations are shown to the public each summer with some of the very best going on display in public buildings in and around Bury St Edmunds.
Department participates in the Prince of Wales
' Prince's Teaching Institute Schools Programme to enhance the quality and breadth of the history curriculum including visits to Berlin
, Rome
, the Somme
battlefields and Auschwitz and County Upper received an International School Award in 2007 and 2010 from the British Council
both for its strength in foreign language teaching and its scientific and cultural links with Europe, Japan and the USA. It earned a "Distinction" designation from Education Extra for its extensive range of extra-curricular activities consisting of more than weekly 60 clubs and activities, its musical, drama & dance productions, the Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme and its frequent sports and music tours abroad to countries including Malta, Jersey, Spain, Germany, Turkey and the USA.
St Edmundsbury Borough Council awarded the school catering department a maximum 5 star rating in October 2010.
The schools' Charity Fortnight raises around £12,000 annually for three good causes; one local, one national and one international.
Suffolk
Suffolk is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in East Anglia, England. It has borders with Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south. The North Sea lies to the east...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
and its surrounding villages. Pupils enter Year 9 primarily from three catchment Middle Schools in Bury St Edmunds but students are drawn widely from across the villages and towns of West Suffolk
West Suffolk
West Suffolk was an administrative county of England created in 1889 from part of the county of Suffolk. It survived until 1974 when it was rejoined with East Suffolk. Its county town was Bury St Edmunds....
particularly Newmarket and Mildenhall. The school is regularly over-subscribed with 266 first-choice applicants in 2009/10, 287 in 2010/11 and 282 for 2011/12 against a LEA
Local Education Authority
A local education authority is a local authority in England and Wales that has responsibility for education within its jurisdiction...
Planned Admission Number of 260. In September 2011 the number of students on roll was 1,039 and it is expected that will remain relatively unchanged for the foreseeable future. Attached to the main school is a Sixth Form
Sixth form
In the education systems of England, Wales, and Northern Ireland, and of Commonwealth West Indian countries such as Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, Belize, Jamaica and Malta, the sixth form is the final two years of secondary education, where students, usually sixteen to eighteen years of age,...
, which at present stands at around 260 students spread between Years 12 and 13 an increase of 40 on 2010-11. The school is located on Beetons Way, on the outskirts of town, next to St Benedict's Roman Catholic Upper School
St Benedict's Roman Catholic Upper School
St Benedict's Roman Catholic Upper School is a co-educational Roman Catholic state school in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, England. Opened in 1967, it is part funded by the Catholic diocese of East Anglia and Suffolk Local Education Authority. Its headteacher is Hugh O'Neill. The school has around 560...
, which has close links with the County Upper Sixth Form.
As a school rated by Ofsted as "Outstanding" (1999, 2005, 2008, 2011) under the Academies Act 2010 County Upper School applied to become an Academy – a publicly funded independent school – in a chain with Horringer Court Middle School and Westley Middle School, joined together by an “Umbrella Trust”, allowing the three schools to work together strategically to drive up even further their standards and results. The schools' applications to convert simultaneously to three separate academies were approved by the Department for Education and they all opened as academies within the overarching 9-18 Bury St Edmunds Academy Trust on 1 August 2011 thereby preserving a distinct Middle and Upper phase in the proposed two-tier education system after 2016 for the west of Bury St Edmunds and beyond.
County Upper School is designated a High Performing Specialist Science and Language College with a Gifted and Talented Focus, and is also accredited as a "Consultant School" by the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust
Origins
County Upper School traces its origins back to the Education Act 1902Education Act 1902
The Education Act 1902 , also known as Balfour's Act, is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom affecting education in England and Wales. At the time of passage of the Act, the Conservative Party was in power...
that gave County Councils the status of Local Education Authorities, greatly expanding their powers and their expenditure. Within a few years it was normal for half a county's budget to be devoted to education and the West Suffolk County School was opened in Northgate Street in Bury. A large red brick building, the former Falconbury School and site of the original Northgate House, had been purchased for the purpose in 1904, then altered and improved. This original building was then extended in 1907. At this time it was co-educational (for both girls and boys), with separate playgrounds. In the early 1950s the school became The County Grammar School for Girls with eligible boys from Bury and its surrounding villages attending the King Edward VI Grammar School.
In 1964 The County Grammar School for Girls moved from its Northgate Street site to brand new premises at the end of Tollgate Lane (now known as Beetons Way) in north west Bury St Edmunds. For many years the girls had walked to this new site to make use of the playing fields that the Local Education Authority
Local Education Authority
A local education authority is a local authority in England and Wales that has responsibility for education within its jurisdiction...
had acquired there. These long walks now became unnecessary. The school premises in Northgate Street gradually became used as an annex to the West Suffolk College
West Suffolk College
West Suffolk College is a Further Education college in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk. It is also a member of the University Campus Suffolk and as part of this affiliation it offers a range of Higher Education degree courses.-Mission:...
until 1988. Today, the old red brick building forms the core of the Northgate Street Business Park, housing, amongst other enterprises, a Dance
Dance
Dance is an art form that generally refers to movement of the body, usually rhythmic and to music, used as a form of expression, social interaction or presented in a spiritual or performance setting....
school, a Chiropractic
Chiropractic
Chiropractic is a health care profession concerned with the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of disorders of the neuromusculoskeletal system and the effects of these disorders on general health. It is generally categorized as complementary and alternative medicine...
clinic, the Headquarters of the East of England Ambulance Service
East of England Ambulance Service
The East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust is the authority responsible for providing National Health Service ambulance services in the counties of Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Norfolk and Suffolk, in the East of England region.It is one of 12 Ambulance Trusts providing...
and the East of England Museums Libraries and Archives, the original West Suffolk County School crest is still visible to passersby. In 1971 The County Grammar School for Girls became the co-educational and comprehensive
Comprehensive school
A comprehensive school is a state school that does not select its intake on the basis of academic achievement or aptitude. This is in contrast to the selective school system, where admission is restricted on the basis of a selection criteria. The term is commonly used in relation to the United...
County Upper School. The old single-sex state grammar school
Grammar school
A grammar school is one of several different types of school in the history of education in the United Kingdom and some other English-speaking countries, originally a school teaching classical languages but more recently an academically-oriented secondary school.The original purpose of mediaeval...
system, which divided children by gender and ability in Suffolk
Suffolk
Suffolk is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in East Anglia, England. It has borders with Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south. The North Sea lies to the east...
was now dead.
The original West Suffolk County School crest, shown above the old Northgate Street building entrance, consisted of a gold cross fleury
Cross fleury
In heraldry, a Cross fleury is a cross adorned at the ends with flowers, generally with Fleur-de-lis, Trefoils, etc. Synonyms or minor variants include fleuretty, fleuronny, floriated and flourished....
between five martlets on a blue shield and were the arms of Edward the Confessor
Edward the Confessor
Edward the Confessor also known as St. Edward the Confessor , son of Æthelred the Unready and Emma of Normandy, was one of the last Anglo-Saxon kings of England and is usually regarded as the last king of the House of Wessex, ruling from 1042 to 1066....
, who in the 11th Century granted land to the Abbey
Abbey
An abbey is a Catholic monastery or convent, under the authority of an Abbot or an Abbess, who serves as the spiritual father or mother of the community.The term can also refer to an establishment which has long ceased to function as an abbey,...
of St Edmund, and those of the old West Suffolk
West Suffolk
West Suffolk was an administrative county of England created in 1889 from part of the county of Suffolk. It survived until 1974 when it was rejoined with East Suffolk. Its county town was Bury St Edmunds....
County Council. The contemporary County Upper School crest has four birds around a cross surmounted by the Saxon Crown of St Edmund, the last King of East Anglia. The blue sweaters with an all gold crest worn by today’s pupils echo the colours of Edward the Confessor and are used by the school sports teams and on the school flag.
Facilities
The original girls' grammar school building, opened in 1964, provides the main teaching and administrative area. There are additional specialist facilities, built in the 1970s, to support the teaching of science, art, design technology. New facilities for humanities were built in the 1990s. In 2004 the school's kitchens were refitted, and a new block containing a secondary eating area was created alongside a gym, above this two classrooms were constructed, which are now the Sixth FormSixth form
In the education systems of England, Wales, and Northern Ireland, and of Commonwealth West Indian countries such as Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, Belize, Jamaica and Malta, the sixth form is the final two years of secondary education, where students, usually sixteen to eighteen years of age,...
common rooms.
A new library opened in October 2007, and a completely refurbished Performing Arts Centre opened Easter 2007 which contains facilities for Dance, Drama and Music. This was dedicated to the memory of Michael Woodhouse, a wheelchair bound student, who unexpectedly died during Easter 2007. Work on new facilities for Food Technology
Food technology
Food technology, is a branch of food science which deals with the actual production processes to make foods.-Early history of food technology:...
and Art
Art
Art is the product or process of deliberately arranging items in a way that influences and affects one or more of the senses, emotions, and intellect....
were completed in Summer 2008 which forms part of a Visual Arts Centre, a Business Studies Centre was completed during Summer 2010 and the Science Block was refurbished in Summer 2011.
Staff
Since September 2005, the school has been led by Mrs Vicky Neale, following the retirement of Adrian Williams, who obtained an CBECBE
CBE and C.B.E. are abbreviations for "Commander of the Order of the British Empire", a grade in the Order of the British Empire.Other uses include:* Chemical and Biochemical Engineering...
for Services to Education after many years at the school. As of 2011, there are around 80 teaching staff. The most recent workforce statistics from the Department for Education indicates the Academy's pupil-teacher ratio of 14.4:1 is lower than both the Suffolk LEA average of 16:1 in Secondary Schools and 15.7:1 for England as a whole.
Ofsted Inspections
The 2011 Education Act proposed that schools assessed as being Grade 1 "Outstanding" on their last inspection will not be subject to routine inspection unless concerns are raised with Ofsted about their performance. As with similar schools Ofsted wrote to County Upper School on 28 March 2011 with an "Interim Assessment" stating that based upon pupils' academic performance, very low rates of absence and having taken into account the results of survey visits carried out since the last routine inspection. they considered that the Outstanding performance had been sustained. Ofsted stated they would continue to undertake annual assessments of County Upper Schools' performance.In February 2008 County Upper School had obtained the distinction of being designated 'Outstanding' by Ofsted
Ofsted
The Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills is the non-ministerial government department of Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Schools In England ....
for the third successive time. It placed the school amongst the top four rated in the East of England and it was the only school in Essex
Essex
Essex is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East region of England, and one of the home counties. It is located to the northeast of Greater London. It borders with Cambridgeshire and Suffolk to the north, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent to the South and London to the south west...
, Suffolk or Norfolk
Norfolk
Norfolk is a low-lying county in the East of England. It has borders with Lincolnshire to the west, Cambridgeshire to the west and southwest and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the North Sea coast and to the north-west the county is bordered by The Wash. The county...
to have achieved such a long run of outstanding marks.
Academic Achievements
County Upper achieved an 86% A*-C pass rate in the Summer 2011 “A” Level examinations, an improvement of 1% on 2010, versus a national percentage of 76.2%. This, together with neighbouring St Benedict's Roman Catholic Upper School and its shared Sixth Form, was the joint best state school "A" Level result in Suffolk. 11% of County Upper passes were at A* (8.2% nationally), 31% at A*/A (27%), 86% A*-C (76.2%) with over 49% of papers in English, Mathematics, Sciences and Modern Foreign Languages.Between 2009 - 2011 nine County Upper Sixth Form students have achieved entry to Oxbridge
Oxbridge
Oxbridge is a portmanteau of the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge in England, and the term is now used to refer to them collectively, often with implications of perceived superior social status...
Colleges. and research by the Sutton Trust shows around three-quarters of students leaving Year 13 attend university after leaving County Upper with a third attending the 30 most selective universities and colleges.
The 2011 GCSE results showed similar success with a record 85% of students gaining 5 or more passes at grades A*-C across all subjects (compared with 72.1% for Suffolk and 78.8% for England overall), up from 82% in 2010, with 71% of students gaining 5 or more A*-C passes including English and Mathematics, compared with 54.4% in Suffolk and 58.3% for England nationally, and 100% of pupils gained 5 or more A*-G passes including English and maths. 34.5% of all passes were at A* or A compared with 23.2% for England as a whole and 24% of students achieved at least 8 A or A* grades.
35% of students also achieved an A*-C pass rate in the GCSE subjects required to gain them the new English Baccalaureate qualification, (English, Mathematics, 2 Sciences, History/Geography and a Modern Foreign Language) meeting the planned 2012 35% government target. This attainment was up from 26% in 2010 against an average of 13.6% in Suffolk for 2011 (unchanged from 2010) and 16.5% across England.
Science College
County Upper is a designated Science CollegeScience College
Science Colleges were introduced in 2002 as part of the now defunct Specialist Schools Programme in the United Kingdom. The system enabled secondary schools to specialise in certain fields, in this case, science and mathematics...
with a Gifted and Talented focus. An Ofsted subject inspection in May 2009 judged the overall effectiveness of science to be outstanding with no areas for improvement.
The school is the Suffolk partner school in the East of England Science Learning Centre promoting professional development amongst science education and learning professionals.
County Upper runs a Science and Engineering outreach programme including visits to universities and other science centres as well as workshops for gifted and talented students from feeder Middle Schools in West Suffolk. Year 9 Science students also participate in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) days run by the Smallpeice Trust promoting engineering careers for young people and lower school students participate in the new Go4Set STEM residential courses run by the Engineering Development Trust.
In summer 2010 the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust (SSAT) designated County Upper as a Consultant School in recognition of its assistance in helping other schools in Suffolk raise standards and achievement.
Language College
Following its 2008 OfstedOfsted
The Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills is the non-ministerial government department of Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Schools In England ....
inspection County Upper was invited to apply for a second specialism. With effect from 1 February 2009 the school was designated as a Language College
Language College
Language Colleges were introduced in 1995 as part of the Specialist Schools Programme in the United Kingdom. The system enables secondary schools to specialise in certain fields, in this case, modern foreign languages...
with a Gifted and Talented focus.
The school offers French, German, Japanese, and Spanish for all pupils with Italian in the Sixth Form. It runs an overseas exchange programme to Kyoto
Kyoto
is a city in the central part of the island of Honshū, Japan. It has a population close to 1.5 million. Formerly the imperial capital of Japan, it is now the capital of Kyoto Prefecture, as well as a major part of the Osaka-Kobe-Kyoto metropolitan area.-History:...
in Japan, the Ancona
Ancona
Ancona is a city and a seaport in the Marche region, in central Italy, with a population of 101,909 . Ancona is the capital of the province of Ancona and of the region....
region of Italy, Guadalajara, Spain
Guadalajara, Spain
Guadalajara is a city and municipality in the autonomous community of Castile-La Mancha, Spain, and in the natural region of La Alcarria. It is the capital of the province of Guadalajara. It is located roughly 60 km northeast of Madrid on the Henares River, and has a population of 83,789...
and the Rhineland
Rhineland
Historically, the Rhinelands refers to a loosely-defined region embracing the land on either bank of the River Rhine in central Europe....
area of Germany. The Japanese programme involves annual language and scientific exchanges, summer camps and extensive cultural activities between Japan and Bury St Edmunds.
The school runs a Modern Foreign Language outreach programme with its feeder Middle Schools in West Suffolk where Gifted and Talented pupils take part in workshops and activity days hosted at County Upper during the course of the academic year.
Sports & Physical Activities
The school sports facilities include a sports hall, gymnasium, a mini-sports hall, a fitness suite, a PE lab, six tennis and netball courts, two full-sized soccer pitches, cricket nets and a floodlit all-weather hockey/five-a-side soccer pitch all on site.County Upper School won the Suffolk Sport "Secondary School of the Year" Award sponsored by Ipswich Town FC Community Trust in 2011, won the St Edmundsbury "School of the Year Award" for sport in both 2008 and 2011, is partner school of both Sport England
Sport England
Sport England is the brand name for the English Sports Council and is a non-departmental public body under the Department for Culture, Media and Sport...
and the Youth Sport Trust
Youth Sport Trust
The Youth Sport Trust is a British charitable trust which aims to support the education and development of young people through physical education....
via the Sportsmark
Sportsmark
Sportsmark is Sport England's accreditation scheme for secondary schools. The scheme recognises a school's out of hours sports provision.Sportsmark awards are given to secondary schools for provision for sport and physical education. They are currently being reviewed along with Activemark awards...
Scheme and offers a wide variety of sport and team games. It has achieved Football Association Charter Standard Secondary Development School status in recognition for the quality of its coaching. The school works with the East Of England coach for British cycling and also fields an equestrian team.
School teams are the Suffolk U15 cricket
Cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of 11 players on an oval-shaped field, at the centre of which is a rectangular 22-yard long pitch. One team bats, trying to score as many runs as possible while the other team bowls and fields, trying to dismiss the batsmen and thus limit the...
and U16 netball
Netball
Netball is a ball sport played between two teams of seven players. Its development, derived from early versions of basketball, began in England in the 1890s. By 1960 international playing rules had been standardised for the game, and the International Federation of Netball and Women's Basketball ...
champions for the 2010-11 season and the U17 rounders
Rounders
Rounders is a game played between two teams of either gender. The game originated in England where it was played in Tudor times. Rounders is a striking and fielding team game that involves hitting a small, hard, leather-cased ball with a round wooden, plastic or metal bat. The players score by...
team reached the semi-finals of the English National Schools Championships in July 2011.
The captain of Suffolk County Cricket team, Mr Justin Bishop, is a PE teacher and cricket coach for the school and Miss Heather Lymburn, also on the PE staff, is a member of the England Senior Korfball
Korfball
Korfball is a mixed gender team sport, with similarities to netball and basketball. A team consists of eight players; four female and four male. A team also includes a coach. It was founded in the Netherlands in 1902 by Nico Broekhuysen. In the Netherlands there are around 580 clubs, and over a...
Squad.
County Upper Basketball Academy
In addition to the main school sports activities County Upper also hosts a dedicated BasketballBasketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams of five players try to score points by throwing or "shooting" a ball through the top of a basketball hoop while following a set of rules...
Academy. The academy has its own Sports Director with students from across East Anglia attending the County Upper Sixth Form. Students are accommodated locally, attend the school and regularly enter regional and national-level competitions.
Music, Drama & Visual Arts
County Upper has achieved an ArtsmarkArtsmark
Artsmark is a national award scheme managed by Arts Council England. The scheme, that is open to all schools in England, recognises schools with a high level of provision in the arts.There are three levels of award:* Artsmark Gold* Artsmark Silver...
Gold award for its wide range of musical, dance and theatrical groups and events. The school is an accredited Arts Award Centre for the Trinity College London
Trinity College London
Trinity College London is an international examinations board based in London, England. TCL offers qualifications across a range of disciplines in the performing arts and arts education and English language learning and teaching...
and Arts Council England
Arts Council England
Arts Council England was formed in 1994 when the Arts Council of Great Britain was divided into three separate bodies for England, Scotland and Wales. It is a non-departmental public body of the Department of Culture, Media and Sport...
scheme and an Examinations Centre for the Associated Board of the Royal School of Music and Rockschool.
School ensembles regularly perform in public holding numerous concerts and choral events in and around Bury St Edmunds including performances at the town's new Apex Venue. There are over 20 music ensembles including 2 orchestras, several choirs, string & jazz ensembles and wind bands. There have been three Swing Band tours of Suffolk Virginia USA together with music tours of Somerset
Somerset
The ceremonial and non-metropolitan county of Somerset in South West England borders Bristol and Gloucestershire to the north, Wiltshire to the east, Dorset to the south-east, and Devon to the south-west. It is partly bounded to the north and west by the Bristol Channel and the estuary of the...
and the Channel Islands
Channel Islands
The Channel Islands are an archipelago of British Crown Dependencies in the English Channel, off the French coast of Normandy. They include two separate bailiwicks: the Bailiwick of Guernsey and the Bailiwick of Jersey...
. The bi-ennial school production takes place at the Theatre Royal, Bury St Edmunds
Theatre Royal, Bury St Edmunds
The Theatre Royal is a restored Regency theatre in Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk, England. One of eight grade 1 listed theatres in the UK, it is the only working theatre on the National Trust's portfolio of properties....
.
The school holds an annual Art Exhibition for the community displaying students' work. Paintings, textiles, pottery and visual arts installations are shown to the public each summer with some of the very best going on display in public buildings in and around Bury St Edmunds.
Awards and achievements
County Upper is recognized by Healthy Schools Suffolk and is accredited as an Investor in People. The HistoryHistory
History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...
Department participates in the Prince of Wales
Prince of Wales
Prince of Wales is a title traditionally granted to the heir apparent to the reigning monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the 15 other independent Commonwealth realms...
' Prince's Teaching Institute Schools Programme to enhance the quality and breadth of the history curriculum including visits to Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
, the Somme
Somme
Somme is a department of France, located in the north of the country and named after the Somme river. It is part of the Picardy region of France....
battlefields and Auschwitz and County Upper received an International School Award in 2007 and 2010 from the British Council
British Council
The British Council is a United Kingdom-based organisation specialising in international educational and cultural opportunities. It is registered as a charity both in England and Wales, and in Scotland...
both for its strength in foreign language teaching and its scientific and cultural links with Europe, Japan and the USA. It earned a "Distinction" designation from Education Extra for its extensive range of extra-curricular activities consisting of more than weekly 60 clubs and activities, its musical, drama & dance productions, the Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme and its frequent sports and music tours abroad to countries including Malta, Jersey, Spain, Germany, Turkey and the USA.
St Edmundsbury Borough Council awarded the school catering department a maximum 5 star rating in October 2010.
The schools' Charity Fortnight raises around £12,000 annually for three good causes; one local, one national and one international.
External links
- County Upper School Website
- County Upper School Web Page on Suffolk County Council Website
- County Upper School Prospectus 2010-11
- County Upper School Basketball Academy Website
- County Upper School Ofsted Reports
- County Upper School Overview in Department for Education website
- County Upper School in Department for Education Performance Tables
- County Upper School Profile in DirectGov website
- West Suffolk DfE Schools Performance Tables
- Suffolk County Council Education and Learning in Schools Web Pages