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Our Lady’s Abingdon is to welcome boys into the Senior School from September 2009
Boys will be admitted at Year 7 (age 11) and Year 12 (the first year of the sixth form) so that the whole school will be co-educational by September 2013.
Patrick Tobin, Chairman of Governors since 2004 and former Chairman of The Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference (HMC), said:
“I have been the Head of single-sex schools and the first Catholic Independent co-educational school. I believe passionately in parental choice. We will be the first school in Abingdon to offer families the choice of Independent secondary co-education. We know that many families will be delighted to have this choice.
In particular, co-education at Our Lady’s Abingdon gives Catholic parents a choice that they do not currently possess. Abingdon has no Catholic secondary school for its boys – Maintained or Independent. Boys will now have the same entitlement as their sisters to top-quality Catholic education. We will increase our provision of bursaries to meet this need.
For many boys and girls co-education is the best education for life. We are blazing a trail that others will follow.”
Headmistress, Mrs Lynne Renwick, said:
“This is a very exciting day for us. Boys from our feeder junior schools will be able to move on to the Senior School. Brothers and sisters can be educated together, strengthening the family feel of our school. The wheel has gone full circle. When we were founded in 1860 it was to educate boys and girls. Now, as we prepare for our 150th anniversary, we can realise our founder’s dreams.”