Bellerbys College

Bellerbys College is a series of four sixth form colleges for international students based in the UK, and owned by Study Group International who also operate language schools under the name Embassy. Bellerbys College is coeducational, and teaches students from over 60 different countries.

Programmes

Bellerbys College offers A Level courses over 6 terms (2 years), 5 terms (1½ years) or 3 terms (1 year). The 5 term programme starts in January or April and is suited to students from countries whose academic year is not the standard September to June year.

The college also offers a foundation programme in which students choose from one of 7 subject streams: Business, Finance and Management, Law and International Relations, Engineering and Computer Science, Management Computing Systems, Science and Pharmacy, Art and Design and Humanities. The Bellerbys College foundation programme is recognised by more than 50 UK universities including Bristol, Nottingham, Leeds, and Lancaster. The Bellerbys College foundation programme is taught and examined to the same standards as A Levels, where applicable, and enables students to prepare for entry into a specific field of study at university while also improving their English and study skills.

In 2009 Bellerbys College introduced a new programme at level 4 of the Framework for Higher Education Qualifications leading to direct entry to year 2 of an undergraduate programme at a UK university. The Diploma in Business and Management is validated by the University of Sussex and offered at the London and Brighton campuses of Bellerbys College.

Results and Awards

In 2011, the four colleges in London, Oxford, Brighton and Cambridge more than doubled the national average of A* and A grade A Levels with 60% of pupils achieving the two highest grades, and over half of the year’s finishing cohort graduated to the top ten UK universities (according to the Sunday Times University Guide 2011).

Bellerbys has earned 13 Good Schools Guide Awards since 2009 and has won 26 overall.

Bellerbys Cambridge has won:

• 2011 Girls taking Mathematics at CIE IGCSE At an English School
• 2011 Girls taking Physics at CIE IGCSE At an English School
• 2009 Boys taking Mathematics at A level At an English School

Bellerbys Brighton has won:

• 2011 Boys taking Business Studies:Single at CIE IGCSE At an English School
• 2011 Boys taking Chinese at GCSE Short Course At an English School
• 2011 Boys taking Russian at GCSE Short Course At an English School
• 2011 Girls taking Russian at GCSE Short Course At an English School
• 2010 Boys taking Mathematics at A level At an English Independent School
• 2010 Girls taking Mathematics at A level At an English School
• 2009 Girls taking Mathematics (Pure) at A level At an English Independent School
• 2009 Girls taking Russian at A level At an English School

Bellerbys London has won:

• 2010 Girls taking Accounting/Finance at A level At an English School
• 2009 Girls taking Accounting/Finance at A level At an English Independent School

In 2010, students that completed their maths A Level studies at Bellerbys Brighton achieved the highest average score of any English independent school.

Location

The colleges are located in Cambridge, at Queens Campus 52°11′44″N 0°07′28″E and Manor Campus 52°13′29″N 0°07′50″E, as well as Oxford 51°45′15″N 1°15′28″W, Brighton 50°49′56″N 0°08′27″W and Greenwich 51°28′56″N 0°01′19″W.

History

Bellerbys College dates back to Davies’s College, founded in London in 1927. Davies’s College was originally set up to prepare students for entrance to Oxford and Cambridge, the Armed Services and the Civil Service. A second branch of Davies’s College was founded in Hove in 1959. Davies’s Tutorial College in Hove as it was then called was based in premises at 44 Cromwell Road in Hove. The college was a tutorial college providing A-levels and A-Level re-sits mainly for British students.

In 1980 Mr Robin Bellerby became principal of Davies College in Hove and the college expanded to occupy neighbouring premises on Cromwell Road. At this time the college expanded its recruitment overseas and the college made links with the Jordanian government, leading to over 30 students from Jordan coming each year to study A Levels on government scholarships. Other students at the college came from Malaysia and Hong Kong.

Later the college was renamed Bellerbys College after the principal became the new owner. In 1991 the college was bought by a group of British businessmen who invested money in recruitment overseas and developed the foundation programme, a one year bridging course enabling international students to enter UK universities at first-year undergraduate level.

The original Davies’s College in London, which was located at 25 Old Gloucester Street, Queen Square, Bloomsbury, London, continued to operate independently of the college in Brighton until its closure in 1998.

In 1994 the business together with the Embassy schools became British Study Group, later Study Group International, later to become owned by the Daily Mail Group before being sold on to the Australian Champ group.

In 1996 Bellerbys opened a campus in the north of Cambridge and the following year took over a school in Wadhurst, East Sussex, expanding to cater to growing demand for British education overseas. Then in 1998 a London centre opened on the campus of the Roehampton Institute, University of Surrey (later Roehampton University). The college was based in Downshire House, a grade II Listed building in Roehampton, for four years until moving to custom-built premises in Greenwich which it today shares with Study Group sister company Embassy CES. Bellerbys Cambridge added its Queens Campus in 1999 and an Oxford campus opened on Broad Street in 2002.

In August 2011, four Russian college students who raped an 18-year-old woman were jailed for a total of 35 years. The attack took place on 23 January 2011 in Bounty House, Greenwich, where the defendants were living at the time.

Staff

College principals in 2010 were: Brighton – Mr Nigel Addison; Cambridge – Mr John Rushton; London – Mr Andy Quin; Oxford – Ms Julia Southby

Scholarships

The college offers scholarships for A-level study to international students with excellent grades in their home countries. In some countries, the scholarship could be as high as £15,000.

Accreditation

Bellerbys College is accredited by the British Accreditation Council (BAC) for Independent Further and Higher Education and is on the UK Register of Independent Schools. In 2006 the college in Cambridge won 5 Good Schools Guide Awards for A Level results and in the last two years the colleges have won a further 12 awards in 2008 and 2009 combined.

External links

• Bellerbys College official site
• Bellerbys College Representative in Singapore