The Dulwich Society

Although Dulwich's enviable ambience, created by its wealth of trees and open spaces, its park, art gallery and pavement cafés make it a good reason to live here, anxious parents are drawn because of the unrivalled choice of its educational facilities. This is the biggest factor in the escalating cost of local houses and it has had a 'knock-on' effect in neighbouring East Dulwich. It has also led to a growth industry in nurseries, pre-prep, and junior schools and this has led to the christening of Dulwich as 'Nappy Valley'.

The recent news that the expertise of Dulwich education is being planted elsewhere (following successes in Thailand and China) should therefore come as no surprise. I refer of course to the projected opening of a City Academy in East London by Dulwich College in a partnership between the private sector and the government. Dulwich College is providing £2 million through a so-far anonymous donor, and the Government is funding the £18 million required to establish the new school.

This is not the first time that Dulwich schools have co-operated with the state sector. JAGS received its first publicly funded pupils from the London County Council in 1896 and after the passing of the 1944 Education Act which introduced nationwide secondary education; Dulwich College offered 90% of its places to LCC scholars. This offer was accepted and what was called 'The Dulwich Experiment' lasted until 1978 when political dogma dictated the withdrawal of local authority places from independent schools.

The undoubted success of the Dulwich model deserves to be replicated. It is based on a long tradition of educational expertise. In the late nineteenth century, schools like Dulwich embraced the model created by Thomas Arnold at Rugby some half-century earlier. The concept of prefects, the house system, and school uniform all sprang from Arnold. To these, the mood of the times, with its emphasis on muscular-Christianity led to the expansion of school games and gymnasiums. Over the years of course Dulwich has built up its own traditions and its whole system runs very successfully. These are some of the methods that the Education Minister hopes to introduce into the 200 such city academies of which the Dulwich planting was the first to be announced.

There is every reason to believe that this new experiment will succeed, provided the other key aspects of the Dulwich model - punctuality, attendance, respect, and accountability are also expected and achieved. After all, the primary school sector has raised its profile to such an extent that parents are bewildered that its success has not so far been duplicated in the state secondary sector.