GOOD SCHOOLS GUIDE REVIEW 2022: ST CATHERINE’S SCHOOL
HEADMISTRESS Since 2000, Alice Phillips, MA (Cantab). Grammar school educated, where she recalls being seated between a dustman’s daughter and a lawyer’s daughter before heading to Cambridge to read English. Says education is her vocation and teaching is in the bones - she grew up in a boarding house at Sedbergh where her father was housemaster. She has worked in just four schools over her 35+ year career, starting at the Royal Masonic School, Rickmansworth and most recently down the road at Tormead as deputy head. Her office is formal but calm, with textiles, paintings and other pupil artworks in abundance. Cushions are emblazoned with school mottos. It’s quietly reflective of Phillips who is gently formidable (mostly in the inspiring sense) and almost regal in manner. She talks passionately about the school she’s steered for over two decades. ‘It’s the best school in the world,’ she exclaims. ‘A brilliant place full of successful, dynamic young girls who are all serial school lovers.’ Her favourite parts of the job are the final and first assembly of each academic year where she revels in ‘ships launched’ and the potential of the ‘squeaky clean new ones’. Parents describe her as ‘an impressive educator’ who ‘has her finger on every pulse’. Staff say she is ‘so wise’ and ‘no nonsense, in a really good way.’ While her standards are undoubtedly high, her expectations are grounded. Stands by school’s policy of sitting nine, not 10 GCSEs, and advises prospective parents to judge a school on the quality of onward destinations instead. ‘We’re quite happy not to be at the very top of the Christmas tree. Our emphasis is on a rounded education. We don’t over-test. We believe in having a life and for parents, having a human being at the breakfast table!’ Aware of her longevity (which at St Catherine’s is not unique by any stretch; just eight heads in the school’s history, with one in tenure for almost 40 years) she pre-empts any questions around
retirement and says that when the time comes, she will enjoy a ‘substantial rest’ in her Yorkshire Dales bolthole. A keen cook, she cites Jamie Oliver as an inspiration. Not only is he dyslexic (as is she) but ‘he will not take no for an answer and does it all with good humour.’
ENTRANCE Proudly selective. Parents say the process is meticulously well organised and staff ‘helpful and professional’. Just under half of 11+ entrants came from the prep the year we visited the figure is usually around a third. All are required to take the school’s English, maths, science and verbal reasoning entrance assessments. A taster morning is offered in the autumn term where prospective pupils experience four mini lessons and have an opportunity to talk with current girls. School looks for ‘curious girls, interested in the world, everyone around them and education’. A few places at 12+ and 13+ too, especially for boarders. For Sixth Form, a general paper, tests in A Level choices, cognitive abilities test and predicted GCSE grades - 7s expected in A Level subjects. Interview for potential sixth formers (in person or via Zoom if from overseas). Around 70 apply for the 10 -15 annual places they can afford to be very choosy.
EXIT Loses just 10 -15 girls after GCSEs – maybe due to swanky new sixth form block, ‘The 6’ and sense that Sixth Form is the ‘best bit’ at St Cat’s, according to girls we spoke to. Results are most impressive too. Over half of Sixth Formers to Russell Group universities, one in 10 overseas (including Washington, Columbia, Peking and Texas recently) and a few to Oxbridge most years (four in 2022). Diverse study paths from robotics engineering and anthropology to microbiology and linguistics. Ten medics in 2022.
St Catherine’s School GSA Day & Boarding School since 1885 | 4 - 18 years | Guildford GU5 0DF | www. stcatherines.info