Boarding House System

We want each summer school student to experience what it feels like to be at a UK boarding school and to experience some of the traditions we have here.

In their houses, students take part in activities, group work and team building exercises. It gives students a sense of camaraderie and loyalty during their time at the school. All the girls and boys are placed in a house whether they are studying on the Intensive General English, Academic Enrichment or Pre-IB course.

At Whitgift Summer School there are a total of six houses, all named after UK figures who have made important contributions to society. They were chosen to inspire the students and are:

• Pankhurst (after Emmeline Pankhurst who helped women win the right to vote through the suffragette movement)
• Turing (after Alan Turing who was integral to the development of theoretical computer science and the formalisation of the concepts of algorithm and computation. He was voted the greatest person of the 20^th century in a BBC 2019 series)
• Orwell (after the writer George Orwell)
• Austen (after the writer Jane Austen, most famous for writing 6 novels)
• Seacole (after the British-Jamaican nurse Mary Seacole, known for assistance to sick and wounded military personnel during the Crimean war. She was voted the greatest black Briton in 2004).
• Dickens (after Charles Dickens the English novelist, journalist, and short story writer)

The house system at Whitgift ensures that students who do not share the same room, study in the same class or take the same activities can meet and socialise in an entirely different context. This happens during the house team evening activities that take place on various evenings during the week.  Elsewhere, on a Tuesday and Thursday evening, students have dinner as a house and on the same table (tables are clearly labelled with the house name on them). This is a fantastic opportunity for them to talk to other students that they may not have had the chance to get to know.