Founded in 1843, and situated in one of the most attractive market towns in the country, Marlborough College is a flourishing and fully coeducational, independent boarding school for pupils aged between thirteen and eighteen. It is a remarkable school in an evocative and unique setting.
Current roll: 875 pupils (381 in the Sixth Form) | |
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Our mission is to become the first choice of parents who are seeking for their children an excellent, modern education in a coeducational environment.
This is a community where scholarship is cherished, creativity is celebrated, diversity is evidenced, and conversation - the means by which knowledge is elevated into wisdom - is paramount.
The Master's Welcome
Welcome to our website.
Marlborough College is a remarkable place: a coeducational boarding school within a magical and uplifting setting. We are guided by the ideals of scholarship and service and we are conscious of our duty to prepare young men and women both to make the most of their talents and to make a difference.
We seek to remain true to the Christian spirit of our Anglican foundation and at the same time we welcome pupils of all faiths and cultures.
The greatest strength of the school is the high quality of human relationships within it: we are fortunate in the calibre and generosity of spirit of our teachers, support staff and pupils. The community is strong, vibrant and creative.
Thank you for your interest in the College: I do hope that you will be able to sense something of the atmosphere of the school from these pages. |
The intention was that the school should have a maximum of 500 boys and that roughly one third of these should be the sons of laity, who would be charged more (initially 50 guineas a year) to subsidise the clergy children (30 guineas a year).
The College reached its target of 500 boys by 1848, but conditions were extremely Spartan and, apart from their studies, the boys were relatively neglected. Resentment built up, culminating in November 1851 with the Marlborough “Rebellion”, as a result of which pupil numbers declined and the first Master of the College, Matthew Wilkinson, resigned.
With the College now heavily in debt, its future was in jeopardy. Fortunately, the next two Masters (George Cotton 1852-58 and George Bradley 1858-70) proved to be inspiring Heads. Both came to us from Rugby School and brought with them all the reforms which had been pioneered there by Dr Arnold.
By 1870, the College's reputation both for scholarship and as a forward-looking, Christian boarding school was established. Over the best part of the next hundred years the College was seen as a school which provided a reliable stream of able young men to the professions, the armed forces, the Church and all walks of public life, both in the U.K. and abroad. | |
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Marlborough has never been frightened of change. Numerous academic initiatives have been fostered at the College (for example, Business Studies, SMP Maths, Combined Science and the teaching of Arabic and Chinese) and in 1968 Marlborough was one of the first of the traditional boys' boarding schools to admit girls into the Sixth Form.
In 1989, the College went fully co-educational with the admission of girls into the Lower School and with the establishment of the first of the all-girl boarding houses.
Today the College caters for about 870 pupils (of which just over a third are girls) and the great majority of which (98%) are boarders. These are accommodated in 14 boarding houses of which 4 are all-girls, 5 are all-boys and the remaining 5 houses have 13-18 year old boys with a number of Sixth Form girls as well. | | |