Aylesbury Grammar School

The Geography (l) and Maths blocks by the school field

Aylesbury Grammar School is a single-sex male grammar school which educates 1,250 pupils. As a selective state school, its entry requirements are dictated by the exam taken at the age of 10-11. In September 1997 the school was awarded specialist school status in Technology, and then Languages in April 2006.

The school educates boys from the age of 11, in year 7, through to the age of 18, in year 13 (Upper VI). The school has its largest intakes at Year 7 followed by Year 12 (Lower VI). On completing GCSEs, most pupils stay on to complete their A-levels at the school's sixth-form.

History

Founded, 1598 in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire by Sir Henry Lee, Aylesbury Grammar School will celebrate 100 years on the current site in Walton Road in 2007. It is commonly referred to by its students and staff by the abbreviation 'AGS' or 'The Grammar'.

The school was previously a mixed sex school but then parted after a fire which destroyed part of the old school buildings. The girls' school became Aylesbury High School and is across the road from AGS.

The school styles itself after public schools in some ways - for example, making rugby the main sport rather than football, awarding special ties for sports performances, and appointing prefects and a Head Boy. ^{[citation needed]}

The current headmaster is Steve Harvey, however it has been announced that he will be retiring as of August 2008.

Houses

Each pupil is placed into one of six houses upon starting at the school. The six houses are:

Sanctions

The school is well known for being very demanding of its students and so has a comprehensive sanctions policy.^{[citation needed]}

For minor offences, pupils may be required to attend a short break or lunchtime detention, should they, however, fail to attend this or commit a more serious offence they may be given an after school detention. These come in two varieties, the private detention (which comes with a yellow slip) and a school detention (white slip with red wording). A private detention should in theory be given to a pupil should he misbehave to a fairly serious level, or consistently miss deadlines. The detention will be supervised by the department who gave it. A school detention is given to more serious offences, for example violence. These are held in the lecture theatre and are supervised by a senior member of staff. They are also recorded on the pupils' records. There are rumours however that some teachers give red detentions too leniently to save themselves the bother of attending their own detentions.

At AGS detentions are often referred to as "dets", so to receive a private detention with a subject teacher would be to receive a "yellow det".

For more serious offences still, bullying being one, a merit holiday (inset day) may be denied.

For persistent defiance and misbehaviour a suspension may be given. These may be internal or external.

Finally, if a pupil was to not respond to any of these punishments or was caught committing a very serious offence then a full expulsion would be implemented. However this is mainly in the hands of the County and LEA (Local Education Authority).

House trophy competitions

Each year, the school houses compete for the Brodie Trophy for sports and the Watson Trophy for all other activities (including art, music and public speaking). The awards are named for former pupils who made a great contribution to the school's life. The competitions have been taking place for over 300 years, when the 'houses' were groups of boarders living in one building.^[1] There is also a defunct trophy called 'Merit Marks', which was abolished due to imbalances in the willingness of various teachers to distribute them.

Boys are encouraged throughout the year to participate in team events, as well as some individual events. Most of the encouragement comes from their heads of house, who are in charge of 210 pupils on average (or 7 tutor groups, each consisting of 30 pupils).

At the end of each event the houses gain points for their placements in these events; and at the end of the year, these points are totalled up and a winner is declared for each trophy.

Uniform

Students are currently required, as part of uniform, to wear a white shirt, school tie (black, white and maroon diagonal striped), black trousers, black school blazer (optional in summer) and black leather shoes. In the VI form, students are permitted to wear coloured shirts. It has just been put through the school council that pupils may be allowed to wear their own suits, such as the pupils of the Sir Henry Floyd Grammar School, also in Aylesbury. It was decided not to implement any changes to the school uniform.

However for families in financial difficulties, there remains the option of purchasing second hand uniform from the school thrift shop.

Teaching System

In the first three years of the school, pupils are almost exclusively taught in their houses, or 'tutor groups' (with the exceptions of Maths, in which pupils are streamed by ability in year 8-9, and by their second Foreign Language choice in year 8-9). Tutor groups are also split up into groups of 20 for Design Technology lessons, and into groups of 20 is also used for Art and Ceramics in Years 8-9.

In Year 10 and above, the year group is reshuffled into 7 smaller sized 'forms' for teaching of the sciences, English and P.E., whilst pupils' different GCSE choices mean they may not see others from either tutor group or form. From this point onwards, the houses play no significant role other than teams for the Watson or Brodie trophies.

The teaching staff at Aylesbury Grammar School includes Dr. Carol Blyth, who has received a 'Teacher of the Decade' award^[2] as well as Dr Kevin Bond, author and Chairman of Examiners for Computing.^[3]

Notable alumni

• Jake Arnott (b. 1961) author, left school at 16
• Richard Baron (b. 1958), philosopher
• Tim Besley, economist and Member of the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee
• Angela Billingham (b. 1939-07-31), politician
• Richard Bracewell (b. circa 1970), director, producer and scriptwriter
• Rutland Boughton (1878 – 1960), composer
• Kevin Cecil, scriptwriter
• Derek Dick (Fish) (b. 1958), singer (briefly)
• John Edwards (1904 – 1959), politician
• Sean Forbes, Rough Trade Records director
• Tim Harford (b. 1973), journalist and presenter^[4]
• Peter Jukes (b. 1960), author & scriptwriter^[5]
• Richard Lee (b.1982), goalkeeper for Championship side Watford, currently second choice after veteran Estonian Mart Poom
• Kris Needs (b. 1954), journalist and author
• David Millar (b. 1977), Cyclist
• Harry Gerald Oxley, 1950, pioneer in community studies in South Africa and Australia^[6]
• Andy Riley, author and scriptwriter
• Peter Rost, politician
• Kevin Sacre, actor
• Frederick Taylor, historian
• Shailesh Vara, politician
• Alexander Vince, actor, currently attends the school
• Theodore Zeldin, author and historian^[7]

References

External links

• Aylesbury Grammar School website
• OFSTED entry and inspection report
• DfES Performance Tables

Coordinates: 51.484685° N 0.480219° W

Photos of the School

The old school site in Aylesbury town centre that hosted the school from 1598 to 1907

The main school hall, used for Upper School Assembly and drama productions, among others, was constructed in the 1950s

The Languages block (known as the Tower block until 2003) hosts Modern Foreign Language lessons, as well as Classics and various other 'overflows'

The John Mason Raven Sports Hall, opened at Easter 2003, is one of the newest constructions and has replaced the Gym as the primary sports facility. The building includes a large viewing balcony

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