Boarding School - Royal Alexandra and Albert School

As I tell the story of this extraordinary School and Charity, it should become obvious why The Most Reverend Dr Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, is here to celebrate the 250th anniversary with us. Archbishop. The Chairman of the Foundation, Graham Williams, and I am most grateful that you have chosen to spend Pentecost Sunday with us and, earlier on, with the congregation of St Andrew's Gatton.

This is a Royal School. We have both Her Majesty the Queen as Patron and Her Royal Highness the Duchess of Gloucester as President. We are one of only three schools to have this dual privilege. I am thus very pleased to be able to welcome the Lord Lieutenant, Mrs Sarah / Timothy Goad, the Queen's representative in the County of Surrey.

Also here today are:
The High Sherriff: Mrs Sally Varah,
Chairman of Surrey County Council: Mrs Angela Fraser,
The Mayor of Reigate and Banstead: Mrs Dorothy Ross-Tomlin,
Member of Parliament for Reigate and Banstead, Mr Crispin Blunt,
His Excellency the Ambassador of the Slovak Republic Mr Juraj Lervan
The Chairman of the Surrey County Council Select Committee for Schools and Learning, Mrs Margaret Hicks
The Surrey County Council Executive Member for Children and Young People, Mr Andrew Crisp

Not to mention Members of the Board of Management of the Charitable Foundation, Governors, many special guests particularly from a number of charitable trusts, former members of staff, Old Scholars, parents and finally, but certainly not least, the pupils and the teaching and non-teaching staff who make this School what it is today.

You are all most welcome.

On May 10th 1758 there was a meeting in the George Tavern, Ironmonger Lane, in the City of London and the minute book - and we have the minutes of that meeting - records that 14 people were present. They agreed that they had gathered enough promises of money that they should now call in those promises and use the money to rent a house to create an orphanage.

Now I think they must have had a previous meeting at which they discussed the idea of founding an orphanage and decided to ask people for promises of money. But this meeting marks the founding moment of the Charity which set up the orphanage which they decided to call the Orphan Working School. "Working" meant that all the boys and girls were taught a trade so that they could support themselves in adult life and when each orphan left, at the age of 14, they were found an apprenticeship or else, for the lucky ones they were returned to a surviving relative or family member.

On the screens you can see a portrait of the Reverend Doctor Edward Pickard. This portrait was commissioned soon after 1758 to commemorate the man who was the main initiator of the project which has become, today, the Royal Alexandra and Albert School.

His painting hangs in the Boardroom looking on at the meetings we have there. We owe him a huge debt of gratitude - him and those other charitably minded gentlemen. And on this 250th anniversary of that original meeting, I think I owe you, Reverend Edward Pickard, a report on what has happened to the Orphan Working School that your enthusiasm and effort started.

So here, Doctor Pickard, and everyone else, is my report on what has happened over the last 250 years.

The start was pretty slow. It took almost two years to get together enough money, find a suitable house, buy beds and bed linen and recruit a Master, Henry Freeman and a Mistress, his wife Sarah, who took the job of Housekeeper.

Over the next hundred years the Orphan Working School that you founded, Doctor Pickard, moved from its original site in Hoxton to the City Road and then to Maitland Park - each time the Trustees sold off the old site which had become valuable, bought new land and built larger. The Trustees were clever men who managed the money well. And I am pleased to assure you that the same is true today. I cannot claim to understand everything that the Finance and General Purposes Committee does, but they and the Bursar certainly make the money go a long way.

Just over a hundred years after the Orphan Working School opened,
a second orphanage opened for younger children, which was called the Alexandra Orphanage. By the way, I note from the records that the then Archbishop of Canterbury contributed most generously to the Building Fund. Charles Longley Head of Harrow School.

The two orphanages later amalgamated and the decision was taken to call the whole combined orphanage the Alexandra Orphanage and eventually the Royal Alexandra School.

Now Doctor Pickard: A century or so after you and your fellow benefactors founded the Orphan Working School, a group of similarly charitable gentlemen, led by Mr William Morley Junior, raised the money to establish an Orphanage in Camberley. Her Majesty Queen Victoria graciously consented to the institution being a National Memorial to her late Consort and, hence, the Royal Albert Orphan Asylum opened in 1864, later becoming, the Royal Albert School.

On 14th July 1949 the Royal Alexandra and Albert School Act received Royal Assent, amalgamating the Royal Alexandra School with the Royal Albert School.

So for two hundred years, Doctor Pickard, your charitable Foundation flourished, amalgamating with one and then another orphanage to create the Royal Alexandra and Albert School. And by 1958, after two hundred years, it was well settled in Gatton Park with five hundred and fifty children and all of those children were here on totally free places. A few Foundationers boarded here but were educated at Reigate Grammar School, when it was a direct grant School - a State School - Michael Poole. Also Doug Deilhan joined Alexandra in 1933 and Ray Davies who started teaching at the Albert in 1944.

Over the next few years the Charitable Foundation experienced problems. Donations from private individuals began to dry up and without them the Foundation was unable to support the cost of running the boarding houses - and they had to be kept open all the year round as the Foundationers were here because, in the words of the Royal Alexandra and Albert School Act, "their circumstances made it desirable that they should go to a boarding School".

Faced with a financial crisis, I am happy to tell you, Doctor Pickard, that your Board of Management took the inspired decision to admit fee-paying boarders who also had a need to board. These were children whose parents - usually their fathers - were in the Armed Forces. The Ministry of Defence paid (and still pays) almost all the cost of boarding for these children and the School was able to keep going, but with reduced numbers of Foundationers on free places provided by the Charitable Foundation. From there it was a natural step to admit children whose parents paid the boarding fees themselves.

Interestingly, at that time there were two similar Orphan Schools in the London area, the Royal Wanstead School and Reedham School. Both experienced financial difficulties and both eventually closed but became Charitable Trusts which today help to finance Foundationers at this School.

So what has become of the Orphan Working School after two hundred and fifty years?

I am sure that the first thing that the Reverend Pickard would wish to know is that the number of Foundationers on free or almost free places financed by the Charitable Foundation sank to a low of thirty five a few years ago but it has now risen to fifty and the Board of Management - your Board of Management, Doctor Pickard - has ambitions to raise that number to eighty by 2012. This will require significant fundraising and they have most ambitious plans.

But what of the pupils, both Foundationers and others - the boarders, day boarders and day pupils? Well they now number seven hundred and sixty, which is the largest that the School has ever been. I would not like to explain the current government's policies for schools to the Reverend Pickard - I suspect he might not believe me - but I am sure it would please him to know is that there is a Government Pathfinder Project to encourage Local Authorities to place vulnerable children in boarding schools, to give some stability to their lives and to give them some chance of getting decent educational qualifications. Local Authorities continuing the work of the Orphan Working School.

I am sure, furthermore, that the Reverend Pickard would be delighted to know that for the last three years this School has been in the top five percent of schools in England for the educational results achieved by its pupils.

I am equally sure he would be very pleased to know of one initiative that pupils at this School run. Malawi is poor country that is ravaged by AIDS and where the state education system has simply collapsed. Pupils at this School have taken what I can only describe as parental responsibility for four children, Mary, Wilson, Aubrey and Norman. These young people are orphans. Pupils at this School have agreed that they will raise the funds to finance their places at The Open Arms Infant Home in Blantyre and to pay their fees at the Ladybird International School. For me this is completing the circle: Pupils at the Orphan Working School raising funds to finance four orphans in Malawi. There will be a retiring collection as we leave the Chapel to allow us to contribute to this very worthy cause before we move down to the marquee for a drink and then lunch.

The Reverend Pickard would, I am sure, have been curious to know why the Ambassador of the Slovak Republic is here today. And I imagine that a number of other people are asking the same question. Actually the Reverend Pickard would have wanted to know where the Slovak Republic is? And I would have to tell him that the Austro-Hungarian Empire has changed quite a lot recently! Born in January 1993 when Czechoslovakia divided, the Slovak Republic is a small country of just five and a half million citizens and has recently joined the European Union. Small countries can have big ambitions. The Slovak Government wishes to offer its young people the opportunity to experience the culture of other countries and to learn their languages, is financing some sixty sixteen year olds to spend a year in boarding schools in England as from next September. I believe this to be a far-sighted project and am very pleased to be able to announce that this School will be welcoming two boarders from the Slovak Republic in September.

Boarding education is much more than just lessons from half past eight to half past three. I am glad to be able to report that our Activities Programme, which runs for almost all pupils from four to five pm as well as through the evening and at weekends gives pupils a chance to try out a huge variety of sporting, artistic and cultural activities. We are a Sports College. But this is not just a Sports College..... Our programme is a model of introducing pupils to healthy lifestyles and, we believe, giving the foundations for healthy active futures. East Surrey School Sports Partnership, which has developed from our Sports College initiative, now puts around half a million pounds per year into promoting high quality Physical Education and Sport into every local Primary, Secondary and Special School.

Orphan Working School. You will remember that "Working" meant that all the boys and girls were taught a trade so that they could support themselves in adult life. The Reverend Pickard might well wish to know if we are keeping to that part of his original mission. My response is in two parts. We run a wide range of course at GCSE including Business Studies, Travel and Tourism, and course in Countryside and Environment and Horse Care which can be considered to be preparing pupils to work when they leave School. But we also work with our local Rotary Club to give all pupils practice job interviews. For two weeks recently all Year 10 pupils have been on work experience. When I asked the two colleagues who run Year 10 how it had gone they replied that five pupils had been offered jobs by their employers and another two had been described in the employers' reports as the best work experience students they have ever had. So I do not think we are neglecting that aspect of the job, Doctor Pickard.

Let me return to where we started.

The people who attended that meeting on 10th May 1758 in the George Tavern in Ironmonger Lane in the City of London are the reason why we are here today, and I thought it might be interesting to conjure them back amongst us today. In all probability none of these names have been spoken aloud for over two hundred years:

John Tozer, who chaired the meeting
The Reverend Edward Pickard
The Reverend Andrew Kippis
James Buttall
Benjamin Forfitt
Samuel Clay
William Bruce
Thomas Wright
John Phillibrown
Edward Nicklin
William Hurford
Guilford Gibson
William Stanton
John Stackhouse Styles

All men - which, I am sure, simply reflects the way that society was structured at the time.

But I am pleased to add the name of one woman:

Mrs Susannah Blackmore

In 1758, soon after that first meeting, but before a house had been found and the orphanage opened, Mrs Susannah Blackmore died. But she must have written her will after 10th May as she left a legacy of £50 to the Orphan Working School. My guess is that, in today's money, that is worth around ten thousand pounds.

I wish to draw to your attention to certain individuals, families and trusts, who have been major supporters through two and a half centuries. The Maitlands in the eighteenth and first half of the nineteenth century. Lord Marshall of Chipstead in the latter half of the nineteenth through to his death in 1936. Generations of the Rank family throughout most of the twentieth century and I am very pleased to see The Hon Moira Rank here today, The Westons who financed two boarding houses in the 1950s and the Sunley family whose generosity provided a boarding house, the swimming pool and the tennis courts that we hope soon to replace............is here today.

Archbishop. Distinguished Guests, colleagues and pupils, we have an amazing history. And I believe we will have an equally amazing future.

Foundationer numbers will rise from fifty to eighty. Work has started on the construction of a new teaching block with two new Science Laboratories, two classrooms and a dance studio. This Summer a ground-floor extension will be built to Gloucester House. We have just obtained Planning Permission for a Tennis Centre, a floodlit all weather pitch for Hockey and floodlit courts for Netball, athletics facilities and more grass pitches. Our plans are ambitious. And expensive, so I must thank The Peter Harrison Foundation, and Mr John Ledlie, Director of the Foundation is here, for a most generous recent donation of one hundred thousand pounds towards the cost of these new Sports facilities.

At various times a lack of money has been an obstacle to the advancement of what was the Orphan Working School and it may well slow down development at some time in the future, but, Doctor Pickard, I believe there is every reason to be very confident in the future of the Orphan Working School which now lives on as the Royal Alexandra and Albert School.