Prep school bought by Dukes education

[thefallingleaves]

The 3 schools within the House School Group in London (Orchard house, Bassett House and Prospect House) have recently been bought by Dukes Education.

The heads say nothing will change. But realistically what implication might this have on the schools and children both short term and longer term?

I have a DS to join one of the schools in September.

Son also about to start in sept one of the schools above and I am also concerned about new ownership and what it will mean for existing heads, teachers and management and school ethos.
Just wondering what your thoughts are the @thefallingleavesfalling leaves and if anyone has experience with other Dukes education schools or attends these schools named above and if been informed anything. Thanks

Bumping as also interested in the feedback, as we were/may still look at one of those schools

Just to add they bought Radnor House in Twickenham last year and the parents who attended the info evening said it was fine. They also bought a nursery group in Twickenham & before that a Kew prep school. If anything their increased purchasing power for school basics may help fee inflation to be kept down.

I know that the Kew prep school they also bought (Broomfield house) had problems with the previous head/owner not long ago - you can google the tribunal between the head and a teacher. I don't know for sure if that was the reason for the ownership change. And the Kew Montessori was also owned by the Broomfield owner.

Knowing the above I wondered for a moment if the acquisition of the House School Group schools could also have been with a similar background - HSG having problems therefore sold the schools.

Just wanted to see if anyone who had a similar experience (DC's prep school ownership change) and what happened following that. So I know what potential changes I shouldn't be too surprised with - Head change? Staff change? Curriculum change? Ethos change? Fees change? Any policies change?

I hear that a head change can change many things in a school, so guessing that some thing could change with the owner change?

It looks like Dukes Education bought like 5 schools and 4 nurseries or so in the last 6 months so they must be going around offering a good price. Plus all West or Central London. For the owners of a one or two schools who are thinking of doing something else or succession plan if you are getting older with no plan I guess that must be a tempting offer.

We learned that Dukes is closely aligned with the St James schools (Ashford) which are controlled by the School of Economic Science.

They are the ones that preach their own unusual set of beliefs but promote is as Philosophy. Although the director of Dukes apparently denied having anything to do with it, he is one of governors of St James, and of their internal governing body.

I would look carefully into the SES and their religion If I was sending my children to one of their schools. There's quite a lot of information out there about them.

But I thought St James are off that line of thinking of many years ago? Only know through reading Mumsnet postings, so maybe someone who knows the St James schools can chip in. or @FiKMarshall maybe you can point to the lot of information you mention to read about it

Looking at the Dukes website, they claim:

"Cardiff Sixth Form College is unmatched in the world for A-level results; Fine Arts College is widely considered London’s leading Art school; and Sancton Wood achieved the best GCSE results in the UK."

Cardiff is a very high achieving international crammer in Wales and does achieve very good results and little else. Fine Arts College is only considered to be London's leading Art school only by themselves. The Sancton School claim is complete bollox, half of their GCSE entries were grade 9-7, I suspect many comps did an awful lot better.

The House school group were very nice preps but I would be concerned about them being taken over by an entity which is spouting nonsense on it's website.

dukeseducation.com/what-we-do/

@hopeiseverythingyes - if you look on the St James websites you will see the list of governors. All bar one or two at most are SES. They retain total control. Also the head teachers, and members of the IEA that control them, all of them SES.

Typically of course they are not saying that they are SES, because its a totally secretive organisation. And when they do say they were started by the SES, as they have to, they make it out to be something nice, effectively lying by the omission of leaving out what they actually are.

Also looking at the posts above, check out some of the talk elsewhere by Lyceum parents - another Dukes school. They're not looking happy, and I don't think they even know about the SES connection yet.

Thank you so much for the information - most helpful.

Any current parents at one of the ex house school group preps to share experience? Is anything changing? Or is everything the same as before?

@FiKMarshall my children go to school at St James and I think your understanding of what it is like there is very outdated. The school was founded by the SES but the Head of the Boys in Ashford is new to St James. The junior school has also appointed a new Head from NHP, who previously taught at Latymer and St Paul’s. None of the teachers who have taught my children are aware of the SES and neither are the parents, you have to really dig around to even come across it. I think there are a few older teachers there who may have once been part of it but that was a long time ago. Also what do you mean by teaching a religion? Do you mean the meditation and vegetarianism, because we love that. Do you have children at the school currently? It seems that people are very quick to judge it unfairly and it is easier to throw mud at it than at the SES, especially on forums like this. As for the the original post, one of the governors of St James does own Dukes. I think that truly independent schools are quite rare these days. I think as a parent it shouldn’t impact you too much and in some ways you may benefit from the financial security of being part of a larger group and the investment this may bring too. As long as the teachers stay happy and you don’t have a high turnover of staff with the changes at the top then I wouldn’t worry about it.

Dukes is a young company which has expanded rapidly and extensively in a short period of time. They must be racking up some serious loans. Another major educational group Alpha Plus has recently posted significant losses. It is a little concerning that education has become so wrapped up in big business. Promises can be made but, as with all big businesses, they will not be kept if profits are threatened.