Mary Hare School is a residential

co-educational Mixed-sex education, also known as mixed-gender education, co-education, or coeducation (abbreviated to co-ed or coed), is a system of education where males and females are educated together. Whereas single-sex education was more common up to t ...

Non-Maintained special school for

deaf Deafness has varying definitions in cultural and medical contexts. In medical contexts, the meaning of deafness is hearing loss that precludes a person from understanding spoken language, an audiological condition. In this context it is written ...

pupils in Newbury, Berkshire,

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. It consists of around 230 pupils from Reception (age 4) to Year 13 (age 19).

History

It was established by Mary Adelaide Hare in 1916 as ''Dene Hollow School for the Deaf'' in Burgess Hill,

West Sussex West Sussex is a county in South East England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the shire districts of Adur, Arun, Chichester, Horsham, and Mid Sussex, and the boroughs of Crawley and Worthing. Covering an ...

. After Mary Hare's death on 5 November 1945, it was redesignated as ''Mary Hare Grammar School for the Deaf'' on 1 January 1946. Mary Hare School is no longer a Grammar School. The school bought Arlington Manor and surrounding estates in 1947, and moved from its old site in Burgess Hill to the refurbished premises in 1949. Several building projects have since followed, expanding the school to its current size, including a classroom block, school hall, boarding house for boys, staff flats (now boarding house for year seven pupils), new updated swimming pool, science block, sixth form campus, arts and design centre, Arlington Arts Centre which includes a theatre seating 250, music therapy centre, and recording studio. A boarding house for year 11 pupils, called Murray House, was completed in 2012. The swimming pool appeal was started in 2014 with completed renovation in eight months of the swimming pool in March 2017, with the replacement of the old rusted away roof. The school teaches a variety of subjects at GCSE and

A level The A-Level (Advanced Level) is a subject-based qualification conferred as part of the General Certificate of Education, as well as a school leaving qualification offered by the educational bodies in the United Kingdom and the educational au ...

. Many students go onto university and other further education. The communication policy is

oral The word oral may refer to: Relating to the mouth * Relating to the mouth, the first portion of the alimentary canal that primarily receives food and liquid **Oral administration of medicines ** Oral examination (also known as an oral exam or or ...

, which means that students are immersed in English language and therefore

sign language Sign languages (also known as signed languages) are languages that use the visual-manual modality to convey meaning, instead of spoken words. Sign languages are expressed through manual articulation in combination with non-manual markers. Sign l ...

is not used in the classroom. Some students may use sign language outside of class. (The "speech competition", a compulsory contest within the school to encourage speech and discourage signing, was abolished in the 1980s). The school itself is now a small part of a company by the name of ''Mary Hare Limited'', consisting of ''Mary Hare Secondary'' and ''Mary Hare Sixth Form''. Other divisions are ''Mary Hare Primary'' (formerly Mill Hall School, Cuckfield, West Sussex), ''Arlington Labs'' (earmould manufacturers), ''Mary Hare Training Services'' (post graduate courses in deaf education, audiology, and hearing aid dispensing), ''Mary Hare Foundation'' (fund raising), ''Arlington Arts Centre'' (theatre, music, conferences), and ''Mary Hare Hearing Centres'' (hearing aid shops). The current school principal is Robin Askew. In 2017 a fundraising appeal was launched to build a new Primary School at the Arlington Manor school site. The Mary Hare Foundation raised £4 million towards the project, and in 2021 they had the groundbreaking event and building commenced. The building project was completed in August 2022 when the keys were officially handed from the contractors to Mary Hare, and in September 2022 the new Primary School opened for the first time. The whole school (Primary, Secondary and Sixth Form) is now situated all on one site.

References

External links

http://www.maryharehistory.org.ukhttps://www.maryhare.org.uk
{{authority control Educational institutions established in 1916 Special schools in West Berkshire District Private schools in West Berkshire District 1916 establishments in England Chieveley