Rugby School, Warwickshire

Students: 810

Founded: 1567

Day and Boarding from 13 to 18 years old

Coeducational

Famous Alumnus: William Webb Ellis

Rugby School is a day and mostly boarding co-educational independent school in Rugby, Warwickshire, England. Founded in 1567 as a free grammar school for local boys, it is one of the oldest independent schools in Britain.

Rugby recently withdrew from the league tables, arguing that they don’t give a true picture of a school’s success. Academically, things are flourishing. Last year, senior mathematicians achieved the best results in the school’s history in the Maths Olympiad, with 35 gold, 38 silver and 34 bronze; 10 students triumphed in the Cambridge Chemistry Challenge, a world-class test for the UK’s lower sixth students; and three students achieved medals in Oxford University’s Physics Challenge. Crude categorisations such as league tables don’t gel with Rugby’s motto: The Whole Person is the Whole Point. ‘Our pupils are achieving the best academic results in the school’s history, but at Rugby, there is a whole lot more to experience, achieve and share,’ says the school.

Rugby has a tradition of innovation – it was, for instance, the first school in the country to teach science as part of the school curriculum in the 1850s – and this continues apace. Pupils like being based in a town, close to shops and cafés. One told us: ‘You get a sense of the real world. We aren’t in a bubble.’

Learn more about Rugby School by visiting their website here.