Fearnhill School

Fearnhill School is a comprehensive school located in Letchworth, Hertfordshire, England.

Admissions

It is a specialist school and a Maths and Computing College. It educates over 1,000 students and is one of a minority of high schools with a sixth form. The school is part of the Letchworth Sixth Form Consortium with The Highfield School.

It is situated in the west of Letchworth, just north of the railway line to Baldock and Cambridge. It is on the Icknield Way. 

History

The school's origins lie in Letchworth Grammar School, which moved to the site in the early 1970s.

Academic standards

The school is notable for leading the way in personal finance education. The GCSE results announced in August 2005 were the best since 2001. 59% of the students achieved A*-C grades. In 2009, it received GCSE results slightly under the England average, and A-level results well under average. Ofsted graded it as failing in 2011.

Sport

Fearnhill has very successful athletics teams. In April 2008, 2009 and 2010 the school won the combined boys' and girls' North Herts schools' athletics finals. This follows on from being the overall winners at the North Herts Schools' District Athletics Championships in June 2005 & 2006.

Alumni

• Dave Kitson, Premier League footballer
• Victoria Pendleton, Olympic and world champion track cyclist
• Simon West, film director
• Claire Rushbrook, TV actress
• Nicky Hunt, Double Commonwealth Gold medallist for Archery 2010
• Ruth Goodman (historian), Social historian and TV personality

Letchworth Grammar School

• Prof William Bonfield CBE, Professor of Medical Materials from 2000-5 at the University of Cambridge, who founded the Journal of Materials Science: Materials in Medicine
• Prof Meir M. Lehman, known for Lehman's laws of software evolution, and Professor of Computing Science from 1972-84 at Imperial College London
• John Ransford, Chief Executive since 2009 of the Local Government Association, and of North Yorkshire County Council from 1994-9
• Richard Wiggs, founder of the Anti-Concorde Project

Former teachers

• Richard Parry, Director of Education since 1998 for Swansea Council (Head of Maths from 1983-8)
• Ian Roberts, England Athletics Team Coach (Head of Physical Education from 1995 - 2003)
• Chris Husbands, Director, Institute of Education since 2011 (head of Humanities 1988-1990)