Forest Hill School
Encyclopedia
Forest Hill School is a comprehensive boys school located on Dacres Road, Forest Hill
in the London Borough of Lewisham
. It opened in 1956. The school has very close ties with the girls' secondary, Sydenham School
, which is located close by. The school is in federation with Sydenham and Sedgehill schools.
In 2005 the school was given Performing Arts status for its Drama, Dance, Music and Art courses and currently has a silver artsmark from the English Arts Council.. The school is now often oversubscribed and the catchment area has recently been reduced by around 200 yards. The school also has a prestigious Investor in People
award.
, Indoor/Outdoor Cricket
, Table Tennis
, Indoor Basketball
and Indoor/outdoor Football
. In the Sports Hall there is a professional arena.
Once pupils are in Year 10, they are allowed to choose what sports they do, as part of Games, as long as they are in the double science GCSE groups. This includes all the sports mentioned above, plus swimming, sailing
, canoeing
and rock climbing
. Certain students are also allowed to do gym
and weight training
. The school has a Sportsmark
.
. The houses compete to win the most points to win the best sporting house award, and another award is given to the house who was the most supportive (noise, banners, house colours for shirts) that day.
Originally there were six houses, but two were later dropped: Browning and Newton. When there were six houses Browning's house colour was red, Drake's dark blue, Reynold's light blue and Newton's Purple
These houses are:
Pupils are recognised by the house they are in and by the code such as R9F (Reynolds, year 9, F (French MFL) form) or S11E (Shackleton, Year 11, E form group).
The letters stand for:
Students who come to the school cannot choose which language they learn, as they are put in tutor groups randomly.
which takes care of student issues and passes them on to the senior management and the headteacher. The school council works similar to the way that the form groups work, as two school councilors are chosen from each tutor group and in Year 9 a selected amount of them may become trainee prefects throughout year 10, this gives them a better chance to become prefects and house captains in Year 11.
and The FA Charter Standard Schools Program. The facility features a large air conditioned sports hall with basketball nets, indoor cricket, indoor football markings and goals and a scoreboard. The other part of the gym includes a fitness suite, cafè, space for trampolining and table tennis, new changing room facilities with showers and also two of the old three gyms. The sports centre opened on top of Gym 3, but was also expanded towards Bampton Road on the other side of the school.
and a Mac computer room. There is also a fully functional dance studio complete with sprung floors, mirrors, and a 600 watt speaker system, all of which enable the school to carry out its performing arts specialism.
according to the 2004/05 prospectus. The regulator commented on the school in general and also on the pupil/staff relationship saying that it was "very close". They also said "Pupils are known, valued, cared for and supported very efficiently in order that they can achieve well."
Forest Hill, London
Forest Hill is a district of south London, England, located in the London Borough of Lewisham. It situated between Dulwich and Sydenham. The area has enjoyed extensive investment since plans to extend the East London Line to Forest Hill were unveiled in 2004....
in the London Borough of Lewisham
London Borough of Lewisham
The London Borough of Lewisham is a London borough in south-east London, England and forms part of Inner London. The principal settlement of the borough is Lewisham...
. It opened in 1956. The school has very close ties with the girls' secondary, Sydenham School
Sydenham School
Sydenham School is a comprehensive girls' school located on Dartmouth Road in Sydenham, London.-History:...
, which is located close by. The school is in federation with Sydenham and Sedgehill schools.
In 2005 the school was given Performing Arts status for its Drama, Dance, Music and Art courses and currently has a silver artsmark from the English Arts Council.. The school is now often oversubscribed and the catchment area has recently been reduced by around 200 yards. The school also has a prestigious Investor in People
Investors in People
Launched in 1991 Investors in People is a business improvement tool administered by UK Commission for Employment and Skills and supported by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills ....
award.
Sport
The school's sporting facilities include the new sports hall which opened in 2006, and came to a cost of £4.5 million. There are various clubs in the school for a range of sports which include TrampoliningTrampolining
Trampolining is a competitive Olympic sport in which gymnasts perform acrobatics while bouncing on a trampoline. These can include simple jumps in the pike, tuck or straddle position to more complex combinations of forward or backward somersaults and twists....
, Indoor/Outdoor 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...
, Table Tennis
Table tennis
Table tennis, also known as ping-pong, is a sport in which two or four players hit a lightweight, hollow ball back and forth using table tennis rackets. The game takes place on a hard table divided by a net...
, Indoor Basketball
Basketball
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...
and Indoor/outdoor Football
Football (soccer)
Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a sport played between two teams of eleven players with a spherical ball...
. In the Sports Hall there is a professional arena.
Once pupils are in Year 10, they are allowed to choose what sports they do, as part of Games, as long as they are in the double science GCSE groups. This includes all the sports mentioned above, plus swimming, sailing
Sailing
Sailing is the propulsion of a vehicle and the control of its movement with large foils called sails. By changing the rigging, rudder, and sometimes the keel or centre board, a sailor manages the force of the wind on the sails in order to move the boat relative to its surrounding medium and...
, canoeing
Canoeing
Canoeing is an outdoor activity that involves a special kind of canoe.Open canoes may be 'poled' , sailed, 'lined and tracked' or even 'gunnel-bobbed'....
and rock climbing
Rock climbing
Rock climbing also lightly called 'The Gravity Game', is a sport in which participants climb up, down or across natural rock formations or artificial rock walls. The goal is to reach the summit of a formation or the endpoint of a pre-defined route without falling...
. Certain students are also allowed to do gym
Gym
The word γυμνάσιον was used in Ancient Greece, that mean a locality for both physical and intellectual education of young men...
and weight training
Weight training
Weight training is a common type of strength training for developing the strength and size of skeletal muscles. It uses the weight force of gravity to oppose the force generated by muscle through concentric or eccentric contraction...
. The school has a 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...
.
Form System
Each year group at the school is divided into forms. There are usually nine forms per year, organised by house. In years 7 through to 11 the forms are sorted into houses which the students keep from year 7, the house colours are Blue, Green, Red and Yellow. In years 10 and 11 there are separate teaching groups from the forms in all subjects. The sixth form at the school does not use the house system.Houses
The four houses of Forest Hill are named after famous people of the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries, each designated a colour which determines the colour of the trim on the school blazers worn by the pupils. While the house only initially determines which form the student is in, it forms the basis of sport teams throughout each pupil's career at the school. As such, friendly rivalries exist between each house especially at the end of every school year when students from year seven, eight, nine and ten take part in a sports day at the National Athletics Stadium at the Crystal Palace National Sports CentreCrystal Palace National Sports Centre
The National Sports Centre at Crystal Palace in south London, England is a large sports centre and athletics stadium. It was opened in 1964 in Crystal Palace Park, close to the site of the former Crystal Palace, in the former parkland and also usurping part of the former grand prix circuit.It was...
. The houses compete to win the most points to win the best sporting house award, and another award is given to the house who was the most supportive (noise, banners, house colours for shirts) that day.
Originally there were six houses, but two were later dropped: Browning and Newton. When there were six houses Browning's house colour was red, Drake's dark blue, Reynold's light blue and Newton's Purple
These houses are:
- Drake (Red)
- Harvey (Yellow)
- Reynolds (Blue)
- Shackleton (Green)
Pupils are recognised by the house they are in and by the code such as R9F (Reynolds, year 9, F (French MFL) form) or S11E (Shackleton, Year 11, E form group).
The letters stand for:
- F - these groups study FrenchFrench languageFrench is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
only, as their modern foreign language. - G - these groups study GermanGerman languageGerman is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
only, as their modern foreign language. - E - this stands for extra, these groups study French only for a language (However, the 'E' groups do not exist any more (from September 2007).
- Spanish is also a language taught at Forest Hill School but the tutor groups stay with the letters F or G in their tutor group name.
Students who come to the school cannot choose which language they learn, as they are put in tutor groups randomly.
Student leadership
At the end of the Spring term, new Year 11 prefects are chosen, two from every form group. Leadership roles amongst the prefects include the Head, Deputy Heads and four House Captains for the student council. Other school prefects are divided between the roles of Duty Prefect and Form Prefect. The school also includes a school councilStudent council
Student council is a curricular or extra-curricular activity for students within elementary and secondary schools around the world. Present in most public and private K-12 school systems across the United States, Canada and Australia these bodies are alternatively entitled student council, student...
which takes care of student issues and passes them on to the senior management and the headteacher. The school council works similar to the way that the form groups work, as two school councilors are chosen from each tutor group and in Year 9 a selected amount of them may become trainee prefects throughout year 10, this gives them a better chance to become prefects and house captains in Year 11.
Sports Hall
In 2006 the school's new £4.5M state-of-the-art sports facility was opened with lottery funding and help with Sport EnglandSport 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 FA Charter Standard Schools Program. The facility features a large air conditioned sports hall with basketball nets, indoor cricket, indoor football markings and goals and a scoreboard. The other part of the gym includes a fitness suite, cafè, space for trampolining and table tennis, new changing room facilities with showers and also two of the old three gyms. The sports centre opened on top of Gym 3, but was also expanded towards Bampton Road on the other side of the school.
Main building
The school began a major redevelopment project in July 2006 which completed in January 2008. The only part of the school which remains unchanged is the current art block, which was built recently. The rest of the school was entirely demolished and rebuilt from the ground up with the three floor plan changed to a higher four story building. The new school building now features a huge atrium which doubles up into a fully functioning theatre, two fully equipped drama rooms, a separate theatre, a fully equipped music department with a Recording studioRecording studio
A recording studio is a facility for sound recording and mixing. Ideally both the recording and monitoring spaces are specially designed by an acoustician to achieve optimum acoustic properties...
and a Mac computer room. There is also a fully functional dance studio complete with sprung floors, mirrors, and a 600 watt speaker system, all of which enable the school to carry out its performing arts specialism.
Ofsted report
The school has received some very encouraging reviews from the school regulator 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 ....
according to the 2004/05 prospectus. The regulator commented on the school in general and also on the pupil/staff relationship saying that it was "very close". They also said "Pupils are known, valued, cared for and supported very efficiently in order that they can achieve well."
Notable people educated at Forest Hill School
- Brian JacksBrian JacksBrian Jacks is a British judoka who won Britain's first medal at a world championship, taking a bronze in Salt Lake City in 1967, and gained a second bronze at the 1972 Munich Olympics.-Superstars:...
(Olympic judo medalist & TV sports personality) - Marlon KingMarlon KingMarlon Francis King is a professional footballer who plays as a striker for Birmingham City. After starting his career in non-League football with Dulwich Hamlet, he played for Barnet, Gillingham, Leeds United and Nottingham Forest before moving to Watford in 2005...
(footballer) - Richard RufusRichard RufusRichard Raymond Rufus is a former English football player, who spent his entire career at Charlton Athletic.Born in nearby Lewisham, Rufus progressed through the youth system at The Valley, making his debut for the club as a teenager in 1994 at the age of 19...
(footballer) - Dan Mason (Footballer for UPFC)
- Pulse of Twist & Pulse (Street dancer)