To provide an excellent, well-balanced, academic education within a supportive, caring community, we...

offer a broad, challenging and progressive curriculum delivered by talented, specialist teachers. The girls are encouraged to explore every area of the curriculum, not only the core academic subjects, but also in the wealth of opportunities we offer within the arts and sport. The girls love to share and celebrate each individual success, whether that is in a netball tournament, winning a poetry competition or being shortlisted for a creative writing competition. We firmly believe that learning is not all about test scores or absorbing facts in the classroom, instead we believe that happy children are more eager and engaged and thus promote independent thinking skills, within a mutually supportive environment, where each teacher truly understands each individual child in their care.

To encourage each child to give and achieve her personal best, our...

culture of learning is immediately apparent to visitors as they remark on the confidence, inquisitiveness and purposefulness of pupils. Girls are taught to 'be their best selves' and they cheerfully strive to challenge themselves in every area of the curriculum. But being their best selves also means being kind, supportive and reflective; girls are taught to be respectful, to look out for their friends and to be a good citizen and give back to their community.

To develop each child into resourceful, resilient, independent individuals who are prepared to take risks in their learning in order to challenge themselves, we...

understand that sometimes girls can have a tendency to be slightly passive in their learning; in being keen to please they can be afraid to take risks - i.e. to tackle that abstract maths problem, to put up their hand in class or to venture a controversial opinion within a debate - just in case they get things wrong. Not at St Hilda's. We have re-written the traditional 'three Rs' to foster the values that underpin a modern education and to equip girls with the skills they will need to future-proof their learning: those of resilience, resourcefulness and risk-taking. We also inspire the girls with a 'can do' attitude by teaching 'grit'. Education specialist, Professor Duckworth, has written cogently on the correlation between grit and future success and describes it as "passion and perseverance for very long-term goals". At St Hilda's this has been broken down into the more accessible and child-friendly acronym: 'get really into trying'.

To foster a caring attitude and a deep respect for others, we...

promote the British values of democracy:  the rule of law, individual liberty, mutual respect and tolerance of those of different faiths and beliefs. Children are encouraged to explore how these values are embedded within the school, and thus how they can relate to them personally. A few such examples would be the practice of each form nominating a representative for the School Council, the Code of Conduct booklet which all pupils read, reflect upon and sign; mutual respect is garnered by the practice of peer review amongst older children and all the major festivals are explored within our celebration assemblies.  Mr Kaye also introduces a 'Value of the Month' to reinforce these ethical ideals, such as courage, respect, tolerance and compassion.

To ultimately prepare pupils to take the next step in their education with enthusiasm and confidence, we...

have nurtured, understood, challenged and supported the girls through every step of the preparatory journey, so well, that when the time comes for them to move on to the next stage of their education they do so not only equipped with an impressive degree of academic skills and attainment, but also with the emotional intelligence and soft skills that come with a secure and happy foundation. The girls change and develop so much through their time at St Hilda's that we find the four year old toddler who joined us in Reception, and had so much appetite to explore and learn, is now a strong and confident adolescent, with a deep sense of self, ready to take the world by storm.