Girls and teachers in tears as school prepares for closure – Inside Croydon

At the Old Palace of John Whitgift, the fee-paying girls’ school, there is a sense of ‘end of term’ that has never been experienced, by pupils or staff, in its 135-year history. By CAITLIN CLIFFORD

Having been at Old Palace since Year 7, I was shocked when I was told last September that the school would close in 2025.

We were horrified that the Whitgift Foundation, the registered charity which operates our school, would be so insensitive to our feelings as to announce the plan to close Old Palace via an email to parents, not in person, not even in an email to students. .

Archbishop Whitgift: Foundation founder, whose statue stands in almshouses he founded, would be ‘ashamed’ of what happened to Old Palace School, says Caitlin Clifford

I hadn’t even seen the email before one of my friends messaged me.

And it was hardly better for the teachers. Although it was held in person, the “emergency staff meeting” was last-minute and lasted no more than 10 minutes, still showing the Foundation’s true colors as it callously announced the actual teacher layoffs.

Being in year 13, the sixth and final year of our A Levels, my year group knew that our education would not be too disrupted as we would be able to finish our time at our school – something the younger girls were from. robbed

I remember that in the next day’s lessons, each of my teachers selflessly promised to help us through to the end of our A-levels, but that they could not make the same promise for other years.

And I lost something personal before the end of the year. Having seen the list of staff leaving at the end of this year, only one of my current teachers will be there for the next and final academic year at Old Palace.

The students were completely empathetic to the predicament the teachers were in, understanding that they had their own bills to pay and their own families to provide for. Seeing our teachers treated like this, with several of them crying with us at the time, only made us angrier at the Foundation.

A short time later, Christopher Houlding (chairman of the Whitgift Foundation, who wrote the letter announcing the closure) visited the school to answer questions from staff. They told us the next day that he barely answered any of their questions, leaving them even more frustrated and angry.

He made a runner: Whitgift Foundation Chairman Christopher Houlding

For that meeting, there were parents and their daughters outside with signs, waiting for a chance to speak with Houlding, who has been avoiding parents since his announcement. But he left the school using a back exit to continue to avoid them and any sense of responsibility, “sprinting across the road, literally running away from our girls”, according to the newly formed Old Palace Parents’ Alliance.

Although I found this closure extremely unsettling, knowing that the reunions simply would not take place and that I would never have the chance to return as an alumnus to speak to the students, it was worse for those who had been at the school all their lives, from the time when they attended the pre- and preparatory schools of the Old Palace.

My friend who has been at the school for 14 years “discovered that this year wasn’t quite the final end to my secondary education as I would have hoped – the school being so quiet and school life never getting back to ‘normal'”.

She said the cancellation of farewell dinners, the annual dinners in our houses where the sixth formers say goodbye, “It also means that my final year has not been what I expected after attending those dinners in 6, but that I could not speak at one.

“However, in some ways it has helped bring the community closer together.

The last days: Old Palace Prep closes at the end of this summer term

“The closure makes it easier to leave school as we all have to leave in the immediate future, but at the same time it almost feels like it will harm the Old Palace community – not being able to have reunions with friends or teachers. in a traditional way.”

A Year 10 pupil, who has been at the school for four years, said: “Last year was difficult for me as many of my friends left school and so did the teachers. It’s super quiet now and there’s no one around. My classes have decreased in volume, some have halved. ⁠

“I lost a few teachers and it was hard because I was close to them. I was planning to stay in the sixth form but now I have to leave at the end of next year.”

Another Year 13 pupil admitted the school’s closure was “devastating” but said Old Palace was able to give two years’ notice and “offering to pay some of the school fees on the next part of the trip.. .” showed “…how private schools are treated better than state schools”.

She also praised the school for how it “made sure we were ready to go” and “prepared us for nothing but success in its duration and how it leaves us.”

It’s not just current students who are affected by the closure, but also some forced to leave before they intended.

A Year 8 student was forced out years before she expected to tell me: “I found the transition difficult at first because I was with a lot of new people. It was quite easy for me to find another school for myself, but many people found it difficult. In the beginning, I had a lot of interruptions in my education because I was learning a completely different curriculum.”

sad farewell: there are few pupils left at the Old Palace School in Croydon’s old town as it approaches the penultimate end of the school year

By the end of this sad school year, there were only three students left in Year 7, with the school corridors quieter and emptier than I had ever seen them.

And while the high school will close its doors for the last time in July 2025, the Prep School – for children aged three to 11 – is closing in just a week, despite OPPA’s best efforts.

The students agree that the school and its staff have been admirable and fabulous in trying to give us the smoothest transition from Old Palace and being there for us when we needed them. They will do mother Emily Ayckbowm, who founded the school in 1889, proud.

In contrast, the Whitgift Foundation showed it couldn’t care less about the future and feelings of displaced and affected girls and prioritized its boys’ schools over a girls’ school that undermined the private school stereotype by providing enough financial aid to allow students of all backgrounds to participate.

By such behavior the Foundation has completely ignored the charitable legacy of Archbishop John Whitgift, its founder, and should be ashamed of its decision.

• Caitlin Clifford has just completed her A Levels at the Old Palace of John Whitgift School and has been doing work experience with Inside Croydon

Read more: The Whitgift Foundation decides to close the Old Palace School in 2025
Read more: Falling rolls and rising taxes: how Old Palace was squeezed
Read more: The Charity Commission has warned of problems at the Whitgift Foundation
Read more: The foundation abandoned the new school plan after taking out a £70m loan

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