Today Niu Niu wants to visit the top British girls' school downe house (Tang House Girls' High School), as one of the few schools in the UK with a boarding student ratio of more than 95%, downe house (Tang House Girls' High School) is the favorite school of many families, strict admissions requirements also allow the school to ensure excellent academic results, hurry up and follow Niu Niu into this school!
1.School Introduction
Founded in 1907, Downe House is a 110-acre school in Berkshire, less than an hour's drive from Heathrow Airport, a full-boarding girls' school for girls aged 11-18, with a current school of about 570 students, of which 6% are international and 95% are boarders.
Downe House is committed to nurturing students to be kind, hardworking, and ambitious individuals who can maintain a state of confidence in all situations and are able to be free from stereotypes and genders. In addition to this, the school also wants to cultivate a global perspective in the children, so the school and 16 other schools in other countries have developed a global student exchange program to expand and enrich the girls' horizons and thinking.
2.Take a tour of the campus
First of all, we went to the reception and waited for the admissions officer. While waiting, the TV screen at the reception will introduce some basic information about the school for parents and friends to know about the school.
Led by the admissions officer, we first visited one of the three lower school dormitories, the Darwin House, where the school usually houses four girls in one room, and the housekeepers and teachers live in the same dormitory building as the children. In addition, there are study spaces, practice rooms, kitchenettes, common rooms, and leisure recreation rooms in the dormitory.
A blackboard is posted on the wall of the dormitory, and the housemaster will update the children's daily schedule on the blackboard, down to the students' daily wake-up, reading, and bedtime times.
The common room in the dormitory building is also very simple and warm, and children can gather here to watch TV, chat and enjoy the weekend time together.
Afterwards, led by the assistant warden, we visited one of the girls' dormitories. Although it is a dormitory for the lower grades, it can be seen that the space is still very spacious, not only there are basic facilities such as wardrobes, bedside tables, shelves, etc., but also a four-person table for the children who sleep together.
In the corridor of the dormitory building, many wonderful activities of the children are posted, recording the beautiful moments of campus life. On the other blackboard, each student was thoughtfully reminded of what kind of school uniform should be worn on what occasion.
Further inside is a larger common room with several indoor loveseat sofas and even a window seat where students can sit and enjoy the view of the school.
After that, we followed the admissions officer to the school's indoor multi-purpose stadium, which was temporarily requisitioned to create the effect of a small theater because the concert was to be held at the school on Saturday.
There are two transparent glass display cases in the corridor, which display the medals and trophies won by the girls in the major competitions over the years, adding a sense of honor to the school and every student.
The admissions officer took us to visit the school's swimming pool, which is a 25-meter indoor heated swimming pool that looks very advanced.
After visiting the indoor gymnasium, we went to the school cafeteria, which is different from the long tables and chairs of other schools, and the dining hall of the downe house (Tang Uk Girls' High School) has a round table and a vaulted ceiling, which looks very imposing.
Then we went to the Science Building, where the two floors of the building were allocated to Physics, Chemistry and Biology.
Further down the campus is the Arts Performance Center, which is also used as an examination room for 500 students during the school during the school during the school exam season.
The Music School has 16 practice rooms and 1 recording studio, so students can come here not only to learn but also to practice their musical instruments on a regular basis.
In the **teacher team table on the wall, you can see how much the school attaches importance to the cultivation of **art**, and the teacher team alone has as many as 40 people.
Finally, we went to the school's library, which has more than 13,000 books and periodicals, according to the admissions officer, and the school will arrange books according to the reading needs of students in different grades. The library is open Monday to Saturday from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. and every Sunday from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m.
3.Curriculum
At the GCSE stage, girls can choose from 9-11 courses to study. Downe House Girls' College offers courses in English, Mathematics, Science (Biology, Chemistry, Physics), Computer Communication Technology, Geography, History, Religious Studies, PSHE, and Physical Education. Girls can also choose two or three courses to study from Art, Design Technology, Drama, **. In terms of languages, children can choose one or two subjects from Chinese, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Greek and Latin.
At A-level, the school offers subjects such as Art and Art Design, Greek, Art History, Psychology, Drama and Theatre Studies, Italian, Politics, Economics, Latin, Religious Studies, English, Mathematics, Russian, Biology, French, Mathematics, Spanish, Geography, Chemistry, German, Physical Education, Chinese, History and Physics, and students can focus on 3-4 courses.
4.Boarding life
Downe House Girls' School plans a variety of extracurricular activities for children on weekends, including trips to the theater, cinema, museums, Windsor Castle, wildlife park, trampoline, skydiving, ice skating and go-karting.
The Palmer Centre is the school's health centre, with a team of 9** and 2 administrators on duty 24 hours a day, and a professional doctor every Thursday morning, so parents don't have to worry too much about their child's health at school.
5.Academic performance
Downe House Girls' School has achieved quite good academic results, with 64% of students achieving A*-A and 84% of students achieving A*-B in their A-Level exams in 2023. In the latest GCSE exams, 81% of students achieved a score of 9-7 (equivalent to A*-A under the previous grading system).
In 2023, more than 90% of students were admitted to their first-choice universities, 72% to Russell Group universities, and 38% to the top 50 schools in the QS World Rankings. Of this year's graduates, 13 per cent chose to study medicine, 27 per cent in politics, economics, policy and management, and 23 per cent in creative and performing arts.