St Mary's School, Colchester

St Mary's School
Address
91 Lexden Road Colchester , Essex , CO3 3RB United Kingdom
Coordinates	51°53′18″N 0°52′42″E
Information
Type	Private day school
Motto	Latin: Scientia et veritas (Knowledge and truth)
Established	1908
Founder	May and Lillian Billson
Local authority	Essex
Headmistress	Nicola Griffiths
Gender	Girls
Age	2 to 16
Enrolment	400~
Houses	Abbeygate Headgate Balkerngate Schergate
Publication	St Mary’s Spotlight
Website	http://www.stmaryscolchester.org.uk/

St Mary's School is a private day school for girls in Colchester, Essex, England. St Mary's is a member of the Girls' Schools Association and the Independent Association of Preparatory Schools.

Motto and houses

The school's motto, Scientia et Veritas, translates from Latin as Knowledge and Truth.

St Mary's pupils are allocated to Houses, which are named after historical gates of Colchester:

• Abbeygate (green)
• Balkernegate (blue)
• Headgate (yellow)
• Scheregate (red)

History

St Mary's School was opened in the summer of 1908 by sisters May and Lillian Billson at 15 Lexden Road, a house in St Mary's Terrace East, with eight girls, five of whom had moved from Walton's School in Inglis Road. May taught six nine-year-old girls while Lillian taught the other two girls in the dining room. Subjects were English, History, Geography, French, Arithmetic, Geometry and Latin. In 1914 they sat their first public examination, the Junior Cambridge Exam. By 1915 the school occupied 17 Lexden Road. In 1923, the school bought new premises on Lexden Road, 'Glen Mervyn'. May and Lillian retired at Christmas 1934 and Phyllis Comrie became the new Headmistress. There was a decline in the number of pupils during the Second World War, although this trend reversed after the war. Comrie retired in 1957.

External links

• Profile on the ISC website