The Holyport College Foundation
Holyport College was founded in 2014 as a state boarding free school. Its educational champion and partner is nearby Eton College.
As a state school, our government funding only just covers the core educational provision of our students - it doesn’t fund the inspiration, the co-curricular or the boarding. For many of our students their boarding school education is life changing; for some it is life saving. Holyport’s vision is not just about delivering the national curriculum but ensuring our students flourish in every way and enrich the world around them. To do this well we need your help to invest in our College, our students and our ambition.
This brochure highlights three areas where we need your support:
• Co-curricular & enrichment
• Facilities
• Bursaries
This booklet has a section on each area in turn, focussing on where we would direct donations, how much might be needed and the impact we can have. The final section explains how you can support us.
Holyport College has always committed to provide the broadest possible education and builds into its timetable many opportunities for co-curricular activities covering almost everything from real tennis to crochet. However, it is impossible to meet this ambition from our limited government funding alone. Running a high quality program for both our boarding and our day students, in an economic climate where costs are increasing faster than income, needs your financial support.
Many state boarding schools charge their non-resident students significant fees to support the extended day. Holyport College has chosen not to do so to ensure that all students from all backgrounds can take part. However, we are now asking all our parents and supporters to make a donation - whatever you can - to support and improve Holyport College’ s co-curricular provision. A regular gift of £10 a week would enable the College to run an additional specialist sporting, musical, performing arts or skills-based program to increase the choice and quality in the co-curricular program.
Sports Facilities:
While there is much evidence that Holyport College provides an exceptional and inspirational education there is also a clear need for investment in facilities. Ofsted’s most recent report started by saying “Holyport College is a joyous place to learn” but downgraded the overall judgement because “The school has limited buildings, facilities and space. We need your help to invest and build facilities worthy of our wonderful students.
Holyport College aspires to provide an exceptional sporting education to its students and needs to invest in its facilities to support this. The Foundation’s first capital project was to facilitate a group of donors to build three Eton Fives Courts for the College. The courts were finished on time and budget and their daily use is a testament to the positive impact the Foundation can have on the College and its students.
The next sporting project is to light the College’s artificial sports pitch which will require about £45,000. This will allow the surface to be used in the winter months for co-curriculum and in the evenings by the boarding community. We also intend to build a competition standard netball court with basketball where the netball markings are currently painted on the car park; we expect the cost to be about £15,000.
Science Facilities:
Performing Arts Centre:
Holyport College has recently received planning permission for an ambitious Performing Arts Centre which in turn would leave space for new Design and Technology classrooms. This transformative project would enrich the education of hundreds of children and support Holyport’s vision of providing a joyous education in the broadest possible sense. It is estimated that this project will require £2.5m in funding and the Foundation will be launching a campaign to support this.
Holyport College needs to refurbish and reconfigure its Physics laboratories to provide the space and equipment to allow our students to fully benefit from the practical work our teachers want them to experience. We expect the cost to be about £20,000.
Site Expansion:
Holyport College occupies a limited site and may, in time, seek to expand the site.
As a state boarding school, the cost of a boarding education at Holyport College is only a fraction of the cost of our independent equivalents and is, in many cases, funded by parents. However, for some children this is not financially possible so, where they have the potential to benefit enormously from boarding at Holyport College, the foundation aims to provide bursaries to contribute to their boarding fees.
The Foundation and the College identify children both with exceptional need and exceptional potential to succeed. Students who have benefitted from Holyport College Bursaries describe the transformational impact on their lives and the College is very proud of what they have gone on to achieve.
Donors wishing to contribute named bursaries or bursaries for students in specific situations are welcome to discuss this with the Foundation.
The Holyport College Foundation is committed to supporting Holyport College in its mission to provide an outstanding education to its students. All funds donated to the Foundation have to be used for this purpose. Donors who give to the unrestricted fund allow the trustees to allocate funds to the area of greatest need or opportunity. Equally, if donors wish to donate to a project which is not listed, they can speak to us about how best to do this. We would be delighted to hear your ideas and to work with you to make them a reality.
Targets
The Foundation is grateful for every and any donation because we believe that collectively we can have a huge positive impact. We have therefore set the following targets for our first two years:
• By December 2025 we want to have raised £100,000 for the Foundation to fund new floodlights for the astro, a proper outdoor netball court, refurbishment of the Physics laboratories at the same time as bringing the performing arts centre closer to reality.
• By December 2026 we would like more than half of Holyport College families to be making regular contributions, however small, to the Foundation. If half our families donated an average of £10 per week this would raise £150,000 per year for co-curricular activity and transform what we could offer our students.
Contact us
If you would like to discuss further a particular donation to the Foundation please contact foundation@holyportcollege.org.uk or ring 01628 640 150 and Alastair Ingall, Headteacher, or one of the team will look forward to speaking with you.
Donate
• We encourage donors to give regularly which allows the College to plan and invest with confidence.
• Please donate generously as explained over the page!
• Thank you very much for your support.
