North Halifax Grammar School


The North Halifax Grammar School is a state grammar school, and Science college in Illingworth, Halifax, West Yorkshire, England.

11+

The school has approximately one thousand students, aged 11 to 18. NHGS works with Crossley Heath Grammar School to administer an admissions test, admitting 180 students at age 11+ each year through an entrance examination which consists of Verbal Reasoning, Mathematics and English tests. Admissions are accepted between ages 11 and 16 from other schools, with tests at an appropriate level administered. Admissions at age 16 to the Sixth Form requires high enough GCSE grades but no formal exam.

History

The Princess Mary High School had around 350 girls and was opened on 21 September 1931 by Princess Mary. It became known as the Princess Mary School in 1969 and was situated on Francis Street. There was a Service of Thanksgiving in July 1985 at the Halifax Parish Church when the school amalgamated with The Highlands School to become North Halifax High School.The buildings remained in use as part of North Halifax High School, though with some facilities used by the Percival Whitley College, until in 1987 all school pupils moved to the former Highlands School site and the buildings were taken over by the College, later becoming part of Halifax New College. The site is currently scheduled to be demolished and redeveloped.
The Halifax Technical High School was formed in 1957. This was before its Moorbottom Road premises were completed and opened in May 1959 by the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Leeds. It had around 725 boys and girls. It became the Highlands School in 1969.

Amalgamation

The North Halifax High School was formed with the 1985 amalgamation of the Highlands Grammar School and the Princess Mary School. For the first two years of its existence, the new school operated on both sites ; it was a matter of policy that both sites should have a full age range of pupils, that classes should be mixed, and that all staff as far as possible should do some teaching at both sites. In 1987, when the intake was reduced to four streams the whole school moved to the former Highlands School site. The school was grant-maintained in the early 1990s, being funded directly from the government rather than via the local authority. Around 1993/4 the school changed its name from North Halifax High School to North Halifax Grammar School. In 1999, the school became a foundation school, giving the governing body ownership of the buildings and site and expanded executive powers. After a long fundraising campaign, the school achieved Specialist Science College status in 2004, which funded the refurbishment and extension of existing laboratories and the construction of a new one. The previous headteacher, Graham Maslen, retired in September 2013.

Performance

The school consistently achieves highly, being one of 19 secondary schools to be rated outstanding in its previous three inspections, before achieving the rating of good in the last inspection. The school also receives criticism, however, as it is one of the few "highly selective" schools in England taking just the top ten per cent of students based on the results of the Eleven plus exam. Absence is low, with the Department for Education reporting the school's non-authorised absence rate as negligible.

Facilities

The North Halifax Grammar School receives comparatively little funding for the number of students attending. Some buildings are in need of renovation. However, the Graham Maslen Language block, Darwin Sixth Form Learning Center and MUGA are all recent additions to the facilities.

Sixth Form

The Sixth Form is the largest in Calderdale, currently offering a large range of academic A-levels. In 2006, 449 A2 entries were made, with a 98.7% pass rate. In 2011, the Darwin Sixth Form Learning Centre was completed and finished for use. It was designed to give the sixth form more space around the school; and houses six brand new classrooms and a much larger common-room alongside a canteen exclusively for Sixth Form students. A new common-room allowed the school to redevelop the previous space into a new Sixth Form study room with desks and several computers.

Extracurricular activities

Extracurricular activities include rugby league, a cricket team. In the Upper School students attend Queens Sports Club, Diamonds Gymnastics Club, North Bridge Leisure Centre and Holmfield Mill for Physical Education.
In Sixth Form, students are offered the chance to take part in several other extra-curricular activities, such as the Young Enterprise Company Programme. Other activities specifically for Sixth Form are Reading Matters, a programme in which students help out by reading with primary school students at the local Whitehill Community Academy and The Duke of Edinburgh's Award Scheme.

Current events

In 2012, a Young Enterprise company from the school, "cloud-nine", won the Cisco Human Networking award for the United Kingdom.

Notable former pupils