Roman Catholic
Roman or Romans most often refers to:
* Rome, the capital city of Italy
*Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD
* Roman people, the people of ancient Rome
*'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a let ...
secondary school
A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper seconda ...
Bolton
Bolton (, locally ) is a large town in Greater Manchester in North West England, formerly a part of Lancashire. A former mill town, Bolton has been a production centre for textiles since Flemish weavers settled in the area in the 14th ...
in
Greater Manchester
Greater Manchester is a metropolitan county and combined authority area in North West England, with a population of 2.8 million; comprising ten metropolitan boroughs: Manchester, Salford, Bolton, Bury, Oldham, Rochdale, Stockport, Tam ...
,
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 ...
.
History
Thornleigh College was originally a boys school founded in 1925 by the
Salesians of Don Bosco
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, image_size = 150px
, caption = Coat of arms
, abbreviation = SDB
, formation =
, founder = John Bosco
, founding_location = Valdocco, Turi ...
at the request of the Clergy of Bolton. The school uniform (blazer) was brown with the school badge picked out in yellow on the breast pocket.
It became a
direct grant grammar school
A direct grant grammar school was a type of selective secondary school in the United Kingdom that existed between 1945 and 1976. One quarter of the places in these schools were directly funded by central government, while the remainder attracted ...
catering for a wide area in
Lancashire
Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a historic county, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significantly.
The non-metropolitan county of Lancas ...
. In 1980, following the reorganisation of
Catholic
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
schools in Bolton to a comprehensive system, Thornleigh joined with St Anne's High School, to form a six form entry Voluntary Aided Mixed Comprehensive School with a Sixth Form Centre to serve the needs of all Catholic Sixth Form pupils. Catholic Secondary Schools in Bolton reorganised again in 1986, and Thornleigh combined with St Cuthbert's school, which had been founded in 1963, to form a new seven form entry Voluntary Aided Mixed Comprehensive School with a Sixth Form centre which continues to serve the whole of the borough. The school is under the Trusteeship of the
Salesians of Don Bosco
, image = File:Stemma big.png
, image_size = 150px
, caption = Coat of arms
, abbreviation = SDB
, formation =
, founder = John Bosco
, founding_location = Valdocco, Turi ...
. The school now celebrates Don Bosco day on 31 January as was the tradition since the founding of the school.
For ten years from 1980 Thornleigh was a split site school. £4 million of investment in new buildings in the years 1986 to 1989 enabled the whole school to consolidate at Sharples Park from September 1990. A new building for the Sixth Form was opened in 1987 and an £800,000 extension was added to it in 1995. A five class room extension for 11-16 pupils plus a new two storey dining room, costing £1.1 million in total, were added during 2000. In 2005, Thornleigh received a
Sports College
Sports Colleges are senior secondary schools which promote sports alongside secondary education.
United Kingdom
Sports Colleges were introduced in 1997 as part of the Specialist Schools Programme in the United Kingdom. The programme enabled sec ...
and
Investor in People
Investors in People is a standard for people management, offering accreditation to organisations that adhere to the Investors in People Standard. From 1991 to January 2017, Investors in People was owned by the UK government. As of 1 February 20 ...
status.
On the same site is the Thornleigh Sixth Form. In total (2012), there are currently 1624 students at Thornleigh, with 375 studying at the Sixth Form.
Badge and motto
The Latin Motto "Sicut Cervus" is the
incipit
The incipit () of a text is the first few words of the text, employed as an identifying label. In a musical composition, an incipit is an initial sequence of notes, having the same purpose. The word ''incipit'' comes from Latin and means "it b ...
of
Psalm
The Book of Psalms ( or ; he, תְּהִלִּים, , lit. "praises"), also known as the Psalms, or the Psalter, is the first book of the ("Writings"), the third section of the Tanakh, and a book of the Old Testament. The title is derived f ...
42, and can be loosely translated as 'As the Hart'. The motto is that of the Hargreaves family, and the head of a hart (a male deer) was the family crest. The crest is worn on the blazers of every student.
The Hargreaves were a wealthy Bolton family who owned the house at Sharples Park which was bought by the Salesians when Thornleigh was founded in 1925. The crest and motto were kept by the school and the school took its name from the house.
Notable former pupils
*
Danny Boyle
Daniel Francis Boyle (born 20 October 1956) is an English director and producer. He is known for his work on films including '' Shallow Grave'', '' Trainspotting'' and its sequel '' T2 Trainspotting'', '' The Beach'', ''28 Days Later'', '' S ...
, film director-producer
*
Brian Finch
Brian Finch (25 July 1936 – 27 June 2007) was a British television scriptwriter and dramatist. His longest relationship was with the ITV1 soap opera, '' Coronation Street'', for which he wrote 150 scripts between 1970 and 1989. He also helped t ...
, television scriptwriter and dramatist
*
Badly Drawn Boy
Damon Michael Gough (born 2 October 1969), known by the stage name Badly Drawn Boy, is an English indie singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist.
Gough chose his stage name from a character in the show ''Sam and his Magic Ball'', which he saw ...
(born Damon Michael Gough), indie singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist
* John Grant, novelist, known for the ''
Lovejoy
''Lovejoy'' is a British television comedy-drama mystery series, based on the novels by John Grant under the pen name Jonathan Gash. The show, which ran to 71 episodes over six series, was originally broadcast on BBC1 between 10 January 19 ...
'' series
*
Edmund Hester
Edmund Dominic Hester (born 23 August 1967) is an English educator and former first-class cricketer.
Hester was born at Radcliffe in August 1967. He was educated at Thornleigh Salesian College, before going up to Brasenose College, Oxford. Wh ...
, cricketer and educator
* Paul Mason, television correspondent (Channel 4)
*
Lee Mason
Lee Mason (born 29 October 1971) and biography:
Ruth Madeley, actress
*
Jenny Ryan
Jenny Alexis Ryan (born 2 April 1982) is an English quizzer, singer and television personality, best known as one of the six chasers on the ITV game show '' The Chase''. In 2019, she competed in the ITV competition series, '' The X Factor: Cel ...
, TV Personality
*
Danny Jones
Daniel Alan David Jones''Births, Marriages & Deaths Index of England & Wales, 1984–2005'' (born 12 March 1986) is an English singer-songwriter and musician who is one of the lead vocalists and the lead guitarist for pop-rock band McFly. Jone ...
, member of the band Mcfly
* Tom Parker (singer), singer, member of The Wanted
* Helen Wood, television personality, columnist and former escort