Haberdashers' Adams

Haberdashers' Adams Grammar School regularly places in the top 50 schools throughout the country and top 20 state schools nationally based on GCSE and A-level results. The school has developed a reputation for consistently having a high number of sixth formers gain access into the Russell Group and Golden Triangle universities, including Oxford and Cambridge. A high proportion of pupils also go on to study highly competitive subjects including Maths, Law, Dentistry, Medicine and Veterinary Medicine.

Adams was rated by Ofsted as a Grade 1 outstanding school during 2013[9] and the school has also been scored as average with a Progress 8 score of -0.02 by the Department for Education.[10]

Adams operates an extra-curricular house system and is the basis of inter-house sports competitions, traditionally a source of pride for pupils of their respective houses (all named after Shropshire-born notables):

• Clive House, named after Robert Clive of India (born near Market Drayton) sports scarlet as its colours.
• Darwin House, traditionally sports royal blue and is named after Shrewsbury-born Charles Darwin, the celebrated 19th-century naturalist.
• Talbot House, the last of the three original "Salopian" houses, traditionally displays black and white (arranged in hoops, e.g. on rugby jerseys) as its sporting colours; it is named after Whitchurch-born "Old Talbot" (Sir John Talbot, later Earl of Shrewsbury) of the famous local Talbot family and one of the foremost English military commanders of the French medieval wars.
• Webb House, the newest house at Adams' founded in 1994, assumed emerald green as its distinguishing colours; it is named after Dawley-born merchant naval officer and accomplished swimmer, Captain Matthew Webb.[12]

Throughout the academic year there are many house events, revolving around the Arts, sports or academic subjects. These include the House Music Competition, Dixon Cup (drama), Smedley Cup (rugby), House 7s, House Netball and Public Speaking (now incorporated into Dixon Cup). Intra-house Geography, History, poetry and Languages competitions also take place. The newest house event is House E-Sports, a gaming competition.

Adams' GS Longford Hall site viewed from the 1st XV rugby pitch

The school owns a number of dedicated boarding houses, which play a significant role in school life being the residence of AGS' 150 or so junior and senior boarders. The present junior hall (Longford Hall) is located by the school's playing fields about a mile away. In 2017 the Haberdashers' enabled the school to purchase and re-furbish Beaumaris Court, a former care home, to become the school's new senior boarding house Beaumaris Hall. This new facility replaced the three senior boys' boarding houses which were situated in large Georgian townhouses facing the High Street.

Longford Hall was built in 1785 for Colonel Ralph Leeke, political agent to the British East India Company; the building was designed by Joseph Bonomi, who was an associate of Robert and James Adam.

AGS' Georgian-era senior boarding houses near Big School on Lower Bar (in use until September 2017)

The hall is located on top of a low rise and overlooks farmland towards the Lilleshall Monument. As with many such buildings, the first 100 feet in front of the hall comprises manicured grass, bordered by a ha-ha to prevent animals from entering; today the ha-ha is best known amongst pupils for forming a part of the school's annual house cross-country course. There are a small series of formal gardens, including a "Quad". Behind the hall is a selection of buildings around a central square including a dovecote, once part of the estate's home farm. These buildings were renovated and sensitively converted for residential use between 2001 and 2004, with the circular dovecote being a sought-after dwelling.

Upon entry into the school in year 7, boarders are assigned to dormitories; upon moving to Beaumaris Court boys are often assigned to double or, in some cases, single rooms.

In every Upper VI year there is a dedicated Boarding Captain (in addition to the four House Captains, two School Captains and a varying number of Deputy School Captains); collectively the school's captains are traditionally referred to as the front bench as they often sit in a line facing the rest of the student body at full school assemblies.

Adams CCF plays an integral role in school as a result of which, the school sends many officer candidate students to Sandhurst, Royal Air Force College Cranwell and the Britannia Royal Naval College. The CCF also plays a role in Newport civic life, parading every year on Remembrance Sunday. The CCF recruits each January from the Second Form and with cadets passing out in May of the same year.

The Corps has its own building, commonly known as "Noah's Ark", where its stores are housed and NCO meetings and some lessons take place. The Corps frequently holds Overnight Exercises where battle drills and fieldcraft are practised; these are held either at Longford Hall, Nesscliffe Training Area or ROF Swynnerton. When the Sixth Form goes on study leave, the CCF prepares for the Annual House CCF Competition, known as The Thompstone Trophy, after Lt-Col Brian Thompstone; this entails a Drill Competition, Shooting, Command Tasks, Memory Games, Forces-related Quizzes, Section Attacks, CQB and an OBS course. The Corps is inspected every two years (the Biennial Inspection) by a senior Army or RAF officer.

Both the Army and RAF sections of the CCF hold Summer Camps every year, visiting working military bases such as RAF Cranwell and MOD Barry Buddon. Cadets can also attend Adventure Training Camps held annually at Llanbedr and Windermere, Easter Camps at RAF Akrotiri, Summer Camps at Ramstein Air Base and Leadership Courses at RAF Cranwell, Nesscliffe Training Area or at Frimley Park. CCF Band members are invited to attend Music Camps at Britannia Royal Naval College and Altcar. The school also sends a small contingent of cadets to the Annual Nijmegen March. Additionally, cadets also have the opportunity of attending special events such as the 65th D-Day Landing Commemorations and the Cadet 150 Celebrations.[13]

Through the Cadet Vocational Qualifications Organisation (CVQO), the AGS CCF offers its cadets (aged 16–19) the opportunity to obtain internationally recognised BTEC First Diploma qualifications in Public Services. Each BTEC First Diploma is the equivalent of 4 GCSEs, grades C – A*.

Adams has traditionally been a rugby school, and as such requires all boys play rugby through Years Seven and Eight during the Autumn and Spring terms. Upon entry into Year Nine, pupils are presented with the option of continuing to play rugby, or switching to hockey. Cricket and athletics are the main sports disciplines undertaken during the shorter Summer term. In Year 11 and the Sixth Form, boys are often presented with the opportunity to take part in any sport of their choice, provided they can receive permission for such an activity. With the exception of those activities not provided by the school, all sporting events, and training therefore takes place at the school's Longford Hall playing fields; for this reason, few visiting sports teams ever see the Main School site. Adams operates a system of games afternoons, a system by which each individual year group is assigned a specific day of the week to attend afternoon physical activity sessions at Longford (for this purpose the VI Form is combined with Year 11).

In recent years football has been reintroduced to the school after a hiatus of almost a century.

As with many private and grammar schools, Adams organises biennial Summer Tours abroad for its senior rugby, hockey and girls netball teams. Recent tours have included rugby tours to South Africa, South America, Australia and Singapore, and a hockey and netball tour to Barbados.

• Revd Robert Charnock (1663–1696) – Dean of Magdalen College, Oxford, conspirator who planned to kill King William III
• Prof Donald Court CBE (1912-1994) – James Spence Professor of Child Health at Newcastle University (1955–72) and former President of the British Paediatric Association[15]
• William Cureton (1808-1864) – orientalist
• Prof Dave Goulson – Professor of Biology (Evolution, Behaviour and Environment) at the University of Sussex (born 1965), world-renowned expert on Bumblebees and founder of the British Bumblebee Conservation Trust
• Thomas Hollis FRS (1720–1774) – benefactor of Harvard University, political propagandist, patron of Canaletto among other artists
• Prof William Holmes – Professor of Physiology at the University of California[16]
• Very Revd Keith Jones – Dean of York
• Prof Helmut Koenigsberger – Professor of History, King's College, London, 1973–84, later Emeritus.
• Rt Revd Gerald Lander (1861-1934) – Bishop of Victoria, Hong Kong
• Sir Oliver Lodge – inventor & first principal of Birmingham University
• Stuart Meeson (born 1972 in Newport) - physicist in Electrical Impedance Tomography and Mammography
• Thomas Percy (1729 – 1811) was Bishop of Dromore, wrote Reliques of Ancient English Poetry in 1765
• Dr James E. Quibell – archaeologist and leading British Egyptologist
• Prof Maurice Stacey CBE (1907–94) – worked alongside Sir Norman Haworth to artificially synthesize Vitamin C

• Michael J. Bassett – film director and scriptwriter
• [[Henry Graham Murray] https://www.hollywoodfringe.org/users/116243] (1958-65) BAFTA-nominated director of 'Rory Bremner - who else' comedy series, and first director of Esther Rantzen's 'That's Life'
• Simon Bates – radio disc jockey
• Barrington J. Bayley (1937 – 2008) - science fiction writer
• Tom Brown – satirist
• Radzi Chinyanganya – TV presenter[17]
• Ewen Henderson – sculptor
• Norman Jones – actor
• Thomas Percy, Bishop of Dromore – poet, editor and author
• Nick Snaith – radio disc jockey (Heart Network)

• Nick Jenkins – chief executive of moonpig.com, former Glencore commodities trader.[18]

• Peter Butler (born 1951) – former Conservative MP for North East Milton Keynes from 1992–7, and current chief executive of Flying Scotsman plc
• Jeremy Corbyn (born 1949) – Labour MP for Islington North since 1983, Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Labour Party from 2015 to 2020[19]
• John, Earl Gower (1694-1754) – Lord Privy Seal 1742–54, and first senior Tory member of government since King George I's coronation in 1714
• Revd Silvester Horne (1865–1914) – MP for Ipswich, Congregationalist Minister, and father of Kenneth Horne
• Peter Price (born 1942) – Conservative MEP
• Thomas Parker, Earl of Macclesfield (1666–1732) – Lord Chancellor and Acting Regent of Great Britain

• Captain Thomas Ashburnham (1855–1924) – 6th Earl of Ashburnham
• General George Colt Langley KCB (1810–96) – General, Royal Marines
• Major-General Sir James Lumley KCB – Adjutant-General
• Matthew Smith – 17th-century spy, intriguer and writer
• Sir Charles Buckworth-Herne-Soame Bt (1864-1931)
• Major-General Francis Ventris CB – General Officer Commanding British Forces in China

• Graham Kitchener (born 1989) – rugby player for Worcester Warriors and England
• Dan Redfern (born 1990) – cricket player for Shropshire, Derbyshire and Leicestershire county cricket clubs[20][21]
• Peter Short (born 1979) – rugby player for Bath Rugby and England Saxons

• Ryan Palmer – Maths teacher and ex-Jamaican national chess champion
• Agnes Miller Parker – former Art teacher, engraver and illustrator
• Alec Peterson – former headmaster, founder of the International Baccalaureate.