New school launches in Shrewsbury
The early years education landscape in Shrewsbury saw its biggest development in at least a generation last week as an entirely new school launched in the town.
Shrewsbury Prepatoria welcomed its first pupils into Reception and Year One when it opened its doors on Monday September 3rd. Having initially launched in 2013 as a nursery and pre-school for children from birth to five, Shrewsbury Prepatoria has enjoyed sustained growth ever since winning numerous national awards, as well as high praise from Ofsted which has rated its existing provision as ‘Outstanding’.
The expansion to full Independent School status comes as a direct result of parent demand as founder and Principal, Jane Smalley explains:
“Shrewsbury Prepatoria has always focused on delivering a truly unique Early Years education experience and our parents place high value on this. However, once their children were ready to move on, it was clear that there wasn’t any local provision that matched and continued this ethos. I decided the only solution was, therefore, to make it happen myself.”
With an entirely new curriculum written specifically for children from 4 to 7 years of age, Jane sought the go-ahead to launch the new school and received full support and endorsement from both the Department for Education and Ofsted earlier this year. Since then, the focus for her and her team has been to get the facilities, which are located alongside the pre-school at Park Plaza in the north of the town, ready to welcome the new pupils. Jane continues:
“What was an ambitious vision just a few months ago is now reality and I’m delighted to be welcoming our new pupils.
“A significant amount of time, thought and financial investment has gone into launching the school and we’ve ensured that pupils and staff alike have had hands-on involvement in designing how the facilities should be laid out.”
The expansion of Shrewsbury Prepatoria has also created new jobs with a dedicated qualified teacher and two additional members of staff having joined the team.
The school’s unique curriculum combines the very best principals of Reggio Emilia, (on which the existing values of the Prepatoria are based) Montessori and the Scandinavian model. In stark contrast to the state sector and most independent schools, The Prepatoria School will be the only school in the UK to open for 48 weeks of the year. This will allow teaching to take place at a steadier pace and with a truly child centred approach, as well as offering far greater flexibility also for busy families too. Jane concludes:
“I felt, as did many of our existing parents, that the National Curriculum simply didn’t meet the learning and developmental needs of very young children. By taking the very best elements of proven educational approaches and spreading the teaching over a longer time frame we are able to tailor teaching approaches and the curriculum to the way in which young children learn best. Importantly, this approach to education fits perfectly with modern family life. Busy parents can, for the first time ever, take up to ten weeks holidays at a time to suit them without fear of penalty or their child missing out.
“It’s a model that I believe will prove successful and we already have projected enrolment figures for September of next year that will see the school double in size!”
