The Perse School

The Perse School

The school crest
Motto	Latin: Qui facit per alium facit per se He who does things for others does them for himself
Established	1615
Type	Independent day school
Religion	Nondenominational Christian
Head	Mr Edward Elliott
Senior Deputy Head	Mr Daniel Cross
Chairman of the Governing Body	Sir David Wright
Founder	Dr Stephen Perse
Location	Hills Road Cambridge Cambridgeshire CB2 8QF England Coordinates: 52°10′51″N 0°08′19″E / 52.180833°N 00.138611°E
DfE number	873/6010
DfE URN	110923 Tables
Staff	138 teaching, 117 support staff, 26 peripatetics[1]
Students	1061 (771 boys, 350 girls)[2]
Gender	Coeducational
Ages	11–18
Houses	8
Colours	Purple and Black
Publication	OP News Magazine
Alumni	Old Perseans
Rival	The Leys School
Website	www.perse.co.uk

Head of The Perse School

The Perse Upper School is an independent secondary co-educational day school in Cambridge, England.

History

The Perse is the oldest surviving secondary school in Cambridge. The school was founded in 1615 by Stephen Perse, a Fellow of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. It was first established in what became Free School Lane, to provide for 100 free scholars from all backgrounds. The original site is now the Whipple Museum of the History of Science. In 1881 a girls' school (Perse Girls) was founded and this is now part of the Stephen Perse Foundation. Although they have the same name, The Perse and The Stephen Perse Foundation are separate entities, and both now take boys and girls.

During the early 20th century, the experimental teaching methods of Headmaster W.H.D. Rouse (1902–28), notably the Direct Method of teaching foreign languages, attracted international attention.. Henry Caldwell Cook also innovated The Play Way method of teaching English literature, with pupils literally staging and acting out texts as everyday practice in a purpose-built Mummery, which was a classroom cum theatre.

The Perse received government funding as early as Rouse’s time. From 1945-1976 it was a Direct Grant school offering free places to some 40% of pupils.^[3] Following the abolition of the Assisted Places Scheme, The Perse no longer received any state funding and became independent. In 2015 the school offered around £1 million per annum in means-tested bursaries, enabling around 120 pupils to attend. It has partnerships with 17 local state primary schools, including a student mentoring partnership with Colville and King’s Hedges primary schools, the Fitzwilliam Museum and the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.^[4]

The Perse is celebrating its 400th anniversary in the academic year 2015/16, and has marked the milestone with a programme of free lectures, run in association with the Cambridge News and open to the general public. Speakers included Professor Chris Bishop, of Microsoft Research, and Dr Rowan Williams, Master of Magdalene College and former Archbishop of Canterbury.^[5]

The School is a founder member of the Strategic Alliance of Global Educators (SAGE).^[6]

The Perse Foundation

There are also preparatory and pre-preparatory schools related to The Perse School. Boys and girls aged 3 to 7 attend 'The Pelican' pre-preparatory school, located on Glebe Road, Cambridge. The Perse Preparatory School is located on Trumpington Road, Cambridge, and is for boys and girls aged 7 – 11.

Motto

The school motto is Qui facit per alium facit per se, usually taken to mean "He who does things for others does them for himself". This is an example of a rebus motto, the Latin sentence ending in a word play on the founder's name "per se" and his benefaction. A blue plaque dedicated to the school's founder, Dr Stephen Perse, can be found in Free School Lane, Cambridge.^[7]

Competitions, Olympiads and Scholarships

Pupils regularly compete and score highly in academic competitions and Olympiads, in addition to winning awards including Arkwright Engineering Scholarships^[8][9] and Nuffield Research Placements (previously Nuffield Science Bursaries).^[10][11] Students have won scholarships for summer placements at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel^[12][13] and research institutes in Heidelberg, Germany.^[14][15]

British competition results include:

• First place in the Schools' Challenge general knowledge competition
• First place (winning the Trinity College prize) in the National Cipher Challenge^[16]
• First place in the Bank of England Target Two Point Zero interest rate challenge^[17]
• Invitation to the British Physics Olympiad presentation afternoon (top 4 in the country in the AS Challenge)^[18][19]
• Qualifying for the UKMT Team Maths Challenge final (winning the poster competition)^[20]
• Qualifying for the British Informatics Olympiad final (top 15 in the country)^[21][22]
• Qualifying for Round 2 (top 20 to 25 in the country) of the UK Chemistry Olympiad^[23][24]
• Scoring Gold in Round 1 of United Kingdom Linguistics Olympiad^[25]

Students have also competed in international competitions including the International Mathematical Olympiad,^[26] the Balkan Mathematical Olympiad,^[27] the European Girls' Mathematical Olympiad,^[27] the International Biology Olympiad,^[28][29] the International Rocketry Challenge,^[30][31] the European Union Contest for Young Scientists^[32] and the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair.^[33]

Sport

In 2005, the Perse under-14 hockey team became National Champions, beating Millfield. In 2006 the Perse under-16 indoor hockey team reached the National Indoor Finals, and the following year the same age group won the competition.

The Perse school U16s then won the National Indoor hockey competition again the year after that, making the U16s back to back National Indoor Champions. Two members of that Hockey Team, Adam Miller and Michael Franklin, then went on to achieve national selection and subsequently represented England in several tournaments across Europe.

In the Michaelmas Term 2005 the rugby First XV became the most successful team in 14 years.

Music

The Perse has a senior orchestra, string orchestra, full choir, chorale group, 3 wind bands, swing band and jazz band. There are also about 35 smaller groups meeting weekly for rehearsal. In 2006, the String Orchestra toured to Paris and the Senior Wind Band toured to Iceland. Each year concerts take place at the West Road Concert Hall, Emmanuel United Reformed Church and Our Lady and the English Martyrs Church.

Fees

An old prospectus lists the fees as £3 per term in 1890.^[34]

School fees

	2007 - 2008[35]	2008 - 2009[36]	2009 - 2010[37]	2010 - 2011[38]	2011 - 2012[39][40]	2012 - 2013[41]	2013 - 2014[42][43]	2014 - 2015[2][44]
Per term (£)	3,908	4,123	4,286	4,421	4,549	4,883	4,817	4,970
Per year (£)	11,724	12,369	12,858	13,263	13,647	14,649	14,451	14,910
Yearly Increase (%)	N/A	5.50	3.95	3.15	2.90	7.34	-1.35	3.18

Developments

The Perse School began accepting girls at 11+ and 13+ in September 2010 and became fully co-educational in September 2012.

Media attention

As a high-profile fee-paying school, the Perse has found itself in the media spotlight on a number of occasions.

Auschwitz theft

In 2015, two 17-year-old Perse students were caught attempting to steal items from Auschwitz. After spending a night in jail, the pair were fined and released on probation by the Polish authorities.^[45] In December 2015, Polish prosecutors announced that the boys had withdrawn their admissions of guilt, and that they now will likely face a trial.^[46]

Headmaster's blog

On his blog the headmaster, Ed Elliott, described his 'ten second challenge' in which he would give students who "commit occasional minor misdemeanours (such as forgetting a book) the opportunity to talk their way out of a punishment."^[47] The story was quickly picked up by the mainstream media^[48] who reported that pupils were "let off punishment for clever excuses".^[49]

Staff controversies

An unnamed teacher was fired for kissing two pupils, believed to be 18-year-old girls, in a Cambridge nightclub. The incident was referred to the General Teaching Council for England and Independent Safeguarding Authority.^[50]

The year before beginning work at the Perse, the school's chaplain Rev Bruce Kinsey was accused of blasphemy by local clergy and Conservative MP Ann Widdecombe after using the e-mail address god[at]dow.cam.ac.uk whilst working as chaplain at Downing College, at the University of Cambridge. In response he stated, "As a college chaplain, it's important that people are able to contact me easily. This new email address has certainly proved to be memorable to both students and staff in the college."^[51]

Alumni

Academia

• Maurice Bloch, anthropologist^[52]
• Harold James, professor of history and international relations
• Michael Loewe, sinologist
• Edward Henry Palmer, orientalist
• G.L.S. Shackle, economist
• E. H. Warmington, classicist

Art

• Thomas P. Campbell, director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Business

• Sir David Tang, Hong Kong-based entrepreneur

Engineering

• Sir Arthur Marshall, aviation engineer
• Anthony Michell, hydraulic engineer

Film and Theatre

• Ranjit Bolt, translator and playwright
• Marius Goring, actor
• Sir Peter Hall, founder of the Royal Shakespeare Company
• Humphrey Jennings, film director
• Matthew Lloyd, theatre director, Royal Exchange, Manchester
• Colin McFarlane, actor
• Jeremy Silberston, film director

Law

• Sir Mark Potter, Appeal Court judge and President of the Family Division

Media

• Mel Calman, cartoonist
• Rodney Dale, writer and publisher
• John Gross, critic and editor
• F. R. Leavis, literary critic
• Mark Saggers, BBC sports broadcaster

Military

• Group Captain William Neil McKechnie, George Cross recipient
• Sir Ralph Lilley Turner MC, 2nd/3rd Queen Alexandra's Own Gurkha Rifles

Music

• Pete Atkin, singer/songwriter
• David Gilmour, singer and guitarist of Pink Floyd
• Spike Hughes, jazz musician and journalist
• Mistabishi, dubstep genre song writer
• Ronnie Ross, jazz musician

Politics

• Rajani Palme Dutt, leading figure in the Communist Party of Great Britain
• Julian Huppert, Liberal Democrat MP for Cambridge 2010-2015
• David Steiner, New York State Commissioner of Education
• Sir Donald Tebbit, diplomat, British High Commissioner to Australia^[53]
• Sir Quentin Thomas, civil servant, head of the British Board of Film Classification

Religion

• Revd Dr John Polkinghorne, physicist and theologian
• Bishop Jeremy Taylor, an influence on the foundation of Methodism

Science

• Associate Professor Anthony Lowe, mathematical physicist and actuary
• Brian G. Marsden, astronomer
• Ronald G. W. Norrish, Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1967
• Gustav Victor Rudolf Born, pharmacologist
• Sir George Paget Thomson, Nobel Prize in Physics in 1937

Sport

• Owen Giles, Northampton Saints rugby player^[54][55][56]

Staff

Headmasters

• George Griffith, MA - died 1686
• Frederick Heppenstall, MA - 1864 to 1874
• Dr W. H. D. Rouse, MA, LittD (Cantab) - 1902 to 1928. Formerly a fellow of Christ's College, Cambridge.
• H. A. Wootton - 1928 to 1945
• Stanley Stubbs, MA - 1945 to 1969. Formerly a housemaster at Gresham's School.
• Anthony E. Melville - 1969 to 1987.^[57] Formerly senior history master at Haileybury.^[58]
• Dr Martin Stephen - 1987 to 1994. Subsequently High Master of Manchester Grammar School from 1994 to 2004 and then St Paul's School from 2004 to 2011. Director of Education for GEMS Education UK.^[59][60] Non-Executive Chairman of the Clarendon Academies Group.^[61][62][63]
• Dr Nigel P. V. Richardson - 1994 to 2008. Headmaster of The Dragon School from 1989 to 1992. Chairman of the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference in 2007. Governor of Magdalen College School^[64] and Haileybury.^[65] AGBIS board member.^[66] Author of the biography Thring of Uppingham: Victorian Educator.^[67][68]
• Mr Edward C. Elliott, MA - 2008 onwards. Joined the school in 1997 as head of sixth form and was senior deputy head before being appointed headmaster.^[69]

Notable staff

• Frederick Crossfield Happold DSO (Cantab.)
• Glenn Kirkham, captain of the England national field hockey team, served as a sports coach at the Perse from 2005 to 2014, including as assistant director of sport and head of hockey from 2012 to 2014. Kirkham participated at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, and the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi

References

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External links

• Official website
• School Roll of Honour for the World Wars