KEHS is a school synonymous with intellectual ambition.
With a mission to offer an unrivalled education to the brightest girls in the region, irrespective of their social or economic background, KEHS is a leading voice in the educational life of the UK.
- To impart the joy of learning and enquiry together with intellectual courage, with the resilience and adaptability requisite for this
- To develop integrity, resolve, self-knowledge, compassion, and respect for others
- To inspire the confidence and purpose to make a difference to our community and beyond
- We provide outstanding teaching through a forward-looking and challenging curriculum and a culture of scholarship, going beyond the confines of the exam specifications, and making connections across disciplines
- We provide proactive pastoral support which promotes the development of balanced, self-reflective and assertive pupils with a strong moral compass
- We offer an education rich in extra-curricular opportunities, which develop leadership and wider skills, as well as character and perspective
- We provide high-quality training for staff to ensure ongoing professional and institutional development, building on a long tradition of our staff nourishing the intellectual life of the school through their own interests
- We offer means-tested Assisted Places and help those outside the school with a strong outreach and community service programme
Strategically, we are looking ahead to September 2024 when a new leadership structure will come into place, including the first ever blended role of Chief Master & Principal of KEHS and KES. To complement the longer-term planning for this period of transition, we developed a set of priority actions for the academic year 2023/24 to provide continuity from our previous Strategic Plan, which ran from 2021 – 2023. These actions reflect the themes that most resonated with parents when we conducted our most recent large-scale parents’ survey in 2021: around the school’s academic standing, the rounded education encompassing not just the academic but also the co-curriculum, students being enabled to reach their full potential, and the supportive and encouraging environment.
The priority actions for 2023/24 therefore include the following:
Innovative initiatives
- The embedding of a careers education programme to serve KEHS and KES together, ensuring that all students have the same access to high-quality advice and information on the world of opportunity that awaits them
- Further joint work to prepare our students for world-class universities, encompassing extension lessons, application and interview support
- The development of a holistic approach to digital learning: as a school renowned for scholarly curiosity and innovation, we are excited to develop our provision in this sphere to equip our students with digital skills, but moreover to enable them to take an intellectual approach to their thinking around technology, both at school and beyond
- Work to build on the interdisciplinary learning opportunities promoted by the distinctive Athena Programme
- The continuation of a special focus on impactful homework in the Lower School
- Further enhancements to our outdoor pursuits programme
- The introduction of a new pastoral initiative – High Table – which will bring together every single member of the school community during the course of the year over a special lunch, and develop connections as well as conversational skills.
Continuing engagement
- A renewed focus on ensuring that pupil voice contributes to developments across all parts of school life, and closer engagement with parents.
Accessibility
- Continuation of work that got underway last year to renew our commitment to accessibility, and particularly Assisted Places, taking forward what is already being achieved by our admissions and primary school partnerships teams, and many others, in this area.
Environment and facilities
- Continuation of the masterplan project which is taking a long-term look at our desires for our campus around the academic, co-curricular and pastoral aspects of school life, accessibility, sustainability and our place in the wider Foundation, in order that our environment and facilities support our students’ learning and growth, both now and in the future.
