| Established | 1907 |
|---|---|
| Type | Independent All-female |
| Headmistress | Mrs Emma McKendrick |
| Location | Berkshire, England |
| Website | Downe House |
Downe House School is an independent girls' boarding school in the English county of Berkshire.
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Downe House was founded in 1907 by Olive Willis, its first headmistress, as an all-girls' boarding school. Its first home was Downe House in the village of Downe, Kent, now part of the London Borough of Bromley, a house which had been the family home of Charles Darwin. By 1921 this was too small for the school, so Willis bought The Cloisters, Cold Ash, Berkshire, to which the school moved in 1922. It remains there.
In 2005 the school was one of fifty of the country's leading private schools which were found guilty of running an illegal price-fixing cartel, exposed by The Times, which had allowed them to drive up fees for thousands of parents.[1] Each school was required to pay a nominal penalty of £10,000 and all agreed to make ex-gratia payments totalling three million pounds into a trust designed to benefit pupils who attended the schools during the period in respect of which fee information was shared.[2]
The Good Schools Guide called the Downe House "A green and spacious school which leads its pupils into independence as they move round the campus and makes sure they experience life outside it."[3]
Downe House educates girls between the ages of eleven and eighteen, taking them from the last years of junior school through to the sixth form and A-levels. Girls can join the school at the ages of eleven, twelve, or thirteen, on leaving a primary or prep school, or at sixteen after completing GCSEs.
The school is selective, with most entrants needing to pass the Common Entrance Examination.