Wallington High School for Girls

Admissions

It is a grammar school, with Tracey O'Brien as the Headmaster since September 2023.

The school is in Woodcote Green on the A237, around a half-mile north of the A2022 crossroads, at the junction of Sandy Lane South, Woodmansterne Lane, and Woodcote Road (A237). It is near the southern edge of the borough of Sutton, and the western edge of Croydon. It is only one mile north-east of Surrey, specifically Woodmansterne.

History

Wallington High School for Girls was established in 1888 by a collective of nuns. The school building has since changed many times, and now accommodates an estimated 2310 students with 210 in each year group, as well as a Sixth Form College.

It was originally on Stanley Park Road in Carshalton, known as Wallington County Grammar School for Girls, the Wallington County School for Girls, Wallington County School, or the County School for Girls, Wallington. This site is now Woodfield primary school.

It moved to Woodcote Road in 1965, the same year it changed its administration from Surrey County Council to the borough of Sutton. In the late 1970s it had around 750 girls with 150 in the sixth form. In the 1990s it became a grant-maintained school.

Headteachers

Agnes Mark (1928–2005) from 1964 to 1980, later Head of Croydon High School from 1980 to 1990

Amy Bull CBE (1902–1982) from 1937 to 1964, President from 1960 to 1962 of the Association of Headmistresses

Dr Dorothy Atkinson

Miss Margaret Edwards

Barbara Greatorex BSc

Jane Burton BSc

Richard Booth

Tracey O'Brien

Faculty

Isabel Abraham Ross

Church

The school lies in the parish of Wallington Holy Trinity, with the nearest church being Wallington St Patrick, and lies on the boundary with Roundshaw.

Notable former pupils

A. L. Barker, author

Emily Benn, the Labour Party's youngest ever parliamentary candidate

Deborah Bosley, travel writer, partner of Richard Ingrams in the 1990s

Pauline Boty, artist and actress, 1938–66.

Karen Bridge, badminton player, competed at the 1978 Commonwealth Games

Marjorie Doggett (1921–2010), Singaporean animal rights advocate, architectural photographer and heritage conservationist.

Linda Lennon (nee Smith) CBE, Chief Executive since 2015 of the London Stadium, from 2012 to 2015 of The Royal Parks, and from 2009 to 2012 of the Parole Board for England and Wales

Shelley Newman (nee Drew), discus thrower, won bronze at the 2002 Manchester Commonwealth Games

Lucy Porter, comedian, attended the school from 1984 to 1991

Katie Pratt, artist

Rebecca Romero MBE, rower and cyclist, silver medal winner in the quadruple sculls at the 2004 Summer Olympics, and gold medal winner in the individual pursuit at the 2008 Olympics, who attended from 1991 to 1998

Isabel Abraham Ross, British teacher, suffragist and pacifist

Ruth L. Saw, Professor of Aesthetics from 1961 to 1964 at Birkbeck College, and President from 1969 to 1970 of the British Society of Aesthetics, and from 1965 to 1966 of the Aristotelian Society