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Ampleforth College

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Ampleforth College
Location
Map
Ampleforth
,
North Yorkshire
,
YO62 4ER

England
Information
TypeIndependent school
Roman Catholic.
Motto[Dieu le ward] Error: {{Lang}}: text has italic markup (help)
(French for God the protector)
Established1802
HeadmasterThe Reverend Gabriel Everitt OSB, MA, DPhil (Oxon)
Colour(s)Red and Black
Websitehttp://www.college.ampleforth.org.uk

Ampleforth College in North Yorkshire, England, is the largest Roman Catholic co-educational boarding independent school in the United Kingdom.[citation needed] It opened in 1802 and is run by the Benedictine monks and lay staff[1] of Ampleforth Abbey. The current headmaster is Father Gabriel Everitt OSB.

Ampleforth Abbey

Situation

The school is situated in a valley with sports pitches, wooded areas and lakes. There are three lakes remaining of the original five constructed by the Fairfax Family centuries ago. The middle lake is stocked with trout (mainly brown and rainbow, although the occasional blue back has been seen).

Education

The school's primary concern is to provide pupils with not just academic sporting and other achievements, but also "a spiritual compass for life": moral principles to give guidance in a secular world;[2] within a context where the "Benedictine ethos permeates pupils’ experience".[3]

The Good Schools Guide called the school an "Unfailingly civilised and understanding top co-educational boarding Catholic school that has suffered from time to time as a result of its long liberal tradition." The Guide adds also that there is "A refreshing openness and honesty about the place these days."[4]

It is notable that its academic admissions policy isn't as exacting as that exercised by some other English public schools. As a result, the school is typically between 150 - 200 in the annual league tables of public examination results, although it was ranked 6th nationally in the 2004 "value added" table.

It maintains a strong scholarship set, with about 5% of pupils gaining the offer of a place at Oxford or Cambridge, although it aims to increase this number to 8%;[5] over 90% go on to university.

School life

Though originally only a boys' school the college is now fully co-educational. In 2009 an OFSTED Social Care report said that the overall quality of care was outstanding.[6]

Religious life

The monks at the Abbey belong to the Community of St Laurence (a House of the English Benedictine Congregation), who trace their origins back nearly 1000 years to medieval Westminster. Although there are more than 90 monks in Ampleforth, only about 10 are in contact with the students, with another 2 in St. Martin's Ampleforth. As a result of the school's association with the monks, religion is central to the life of the school. All pupils are expected to take religious education all the way through school. Mass is attended by all pupils twice a week, once on a weekday in the house, and once on Sunday in the Abbey Church. In addition, each house has prayers each morning and evening.

The school has a boys choir, the Schola Cantorum, which sings at High Mass on Sunday and also at a choral Mass on Friday nights during term time. The choir has made various recordings, broadcasts and tours throughout the world. There is also now a girls choir, Schola Puellarum, which was recently noted in both newspaper and magazine. They sing a service every Thursday, and they sing on Holy Days of Obligation in high mass on Sunday. They recently went on a tour to Dublin, and sang in many of the well-known churches there.

Houses

The school is arranged into ten houses, with students living in the separate houses, eating together as a house and playing sport together as a house in inter-house competitions. Each House is named after a British saint:

  • St Aidan's (Girls) Housemistress: Dr. Victoria Fogg
  • St Bede's (Girls) Housemistress: Mr Brendan & Victoria Anglim
  • St Cuthbert's (Boys) Housemaster: Mr David Willis
  • St Dunstan's (Boys) Housemaster: (awaiting appointment)
  • St Edward-Wilfrid's (Boys), originally two houses, Housemaster: Mr Adrian Smerdon
  • St Hugh's (Boys) Housemaster: Mr Hugh Codrington
  • St John's (Boys), Housemaster: Dr David Moses Phd
  • St Oswald's (Boys) Housemaster: (awaiting appointment)
  • St Margaret's (Girls) Housemistress: Mrs Gaelle McGovern
  • St Thomas' (Boys) Housemaster: Mr Paul Brenan

Some of the houses are paired into buildings named after people who have been instrumental in the school's history:

  • Hume House - St Cuthbert's and St Edward-Wilfrid's - Named after Cardinal Basil Hume (although originally Saint Edward's house on one side and Saint Wilfrid's house on the other)
  • Nevill House - St Dunstan's and St Oswald's
  • Bolton House - formerly St Edward's and St Wilfrid's before their merger in 2001
  • Fairfax House - St Margaret's and St Hugh's

St Martin's Ampleforth is the Prep School for Ampleforth, situated a few miles across the valley in Gilling Castle.

Sport

Sport is a large part of school life, with pupils participating in a wide variety of sports including rugby, shooting, tennis, cricket and football. As well as many rugby and cricket pitches set in the 2000 acres (8 km²) of the valley, the school runs the St Alban's Centre (SAC), a sports centre with a large hall (also used for school assemblies and official ceremonies), a 25-metre swimming pool, three squash courts, and a fitness suite. SAC is also open to the general public for a fee.

The school has a coloured sporting history, mostly regarding arch rivals Sedbergh School and Stonyhurst College both of whom play Ampleforth in about twenty (boys and girls) sports annually. The highlight of the sporting year however, is the annual rugby matches between Sedbergh and Ampleforth. Sedbergh in recent years proving to be superior, not having lost a 1st XV game against "the old enemy" since 1998.

Ampleforth has produced some top class sportsmen, especially in Rugby, such as Lawrence Dallaglio, Simon and Guy Easterby.

Ampleforth Abbey and College.

Sexual abuse

See also: Sexual abuse
Ampleforth and the Valley from the air.

Several monks and three members of the lay teaching staff molested children in their care over several decades. In 2005 Father Piers Grant-Ferris admitted 20 incidents of child abuse. This was not an isolated incident. The Yorkshire Post reported in 2005; "Pupils at a leading Roman Catholic school suffered decades of abuse from at least six paedophiles following a decision by former Abbot Basil Hume not to call in police at the beginning of the scandal." [7]

Press coverage

The school has periodically experienced a drugs problem.[8] A 2003 TV documentary made by director Dan Barraclough highlighted large-scale breaking of the school rules on smoking and some abuse of alcohol.[9]

In September 2005, Ampleforth was one of fifty of the country's leading private schools (including Tonbridge, Charterhouse, Eton, Radley Gresham's, Harrow, Haileybury, Lancing, Marlborough, Rugby, Sedbergh School, Shrewsbury, Stowe, Wellington, Winchester and Worth) which were found by the Office of Fair Trading to be operating a fee-fixing cartel in breach of the Competition Act of 1998. All of the schools were ordered to abandon this practice, pay a nominal penalty of £10,000 and make ex-gratia payments totalling three million pounds into a trust designed to benefit pupils who attended the schools during the period in respect of which fee information was shared.[10][11]

Daughter abbeys

In 1955, at the invitation of prominent Roman Catholic laypersons in Saint Louis, Missouri, a group of Benedictines from Ampleforth established the Priory of Saints Mary and Louis and the corresponding Saint Louis Priory School in Saint Louis. The Priory became independent from Ampleforth in 1973, and was elevated to abbey status, becoming the Saint Louis Abbey in 1989.

Notable Old Amplefordians

Religion

Politics, law and business

Arts and entertainment

Military

Philosophy and academe

Science and medicine

Sport

Other

References

  1. ^ "Ampleforth College: Our Mission". College.ampleforth.org.uk. Retrieved 15 February 2011.
  2. ^ "Ampleforth College: An Introduction from the Headmaster". College.ampleforth.org.uk. Retrieved 15 February 2011.
  3. ^ "Ampleforth College: School Development Plan Explored Further". College.ampleforth.org.uk. Retrieved 15 February 2011.
  4. ^ "Ampleforth College, York - The Good School Guide". Goodschoolsguide.co.uk. Retrieved 15 February 2011.
  5. ^ Ampleforth College - School Development Plan 2006-2007
  6. ^ http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/oxcare_reports/download/(id)/217654/(as)/SC007916_SC.pdf
  7. ^ Ampleforth child abuse scandal hushed up by Basil Hume, The Yorkshire Post, 18 November 2005.
  8. ^ Drugs inquiry opens at top Catholic school, Yorkshire Post, 8 July 2005.
  9. ^ How Television smoked out the secret life of Ampleforth, Yorkshire Post, 23 April 2003.
  10. ^ The Office of Fair Trading: OFT names further trustees as part of the independent schools settlement
  11. ^ Independent schools face huge fines over cartel to fix fees - Times Online
  12. ^ The Catholic Who's who and Yearbook edited by Francis Cowley Burnand, Published by Burns & Oates., 1940, page 39
  13. ^ The Ampleforth Journal, by Ampleforth Abbey (York, England), published by Ampleforth Abbey, Item notes: 14 (1908-1909), p233
  14. ^ The Ampleforth Journal, by Ampleforth Abbey (York, England), Page 234, Item notes: 14 (1908-1909)

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