We were pleased to welcome London-based educational consultants, Talk Education, to The Downs Malvern recently. It's safe to say that we have enjoyed a lot of exciting developments over the past academic year, and as it had been a little while since their previous visit, it was a wonderful opportunity to highlight all that we have been up to! We are delighted to share their up-to-date and full review below...
Our View
Chatting with the headmaster in his study, we could not help but be distracted by the almost fictionally idyllic surroundings here. The furthest view is of the stunning Malvern Hills, the backdrop is green space and trees and, in the foreground, children shriek, laugh and race all over Brock Meadow - soon to be newly kitted out with den-building equipment and encircled by the school’s very own light railway. If you could draw a picture of childhood – this might well be it.
Where?
In the pretty Herefordshire village of Colwall, the school sits on a 55-acre campus tucked along the western slopes of the Malvern Hills. The main buildings line a quiet residential street, which leads down to a cul-de-sac filled with more facilities and add-ons that is exclusively owned by the school – so there’s no passing traffic spoiling the peace.
The pre-prep and prep are located on either side of the quiet Brockhill Road – ideal, as it gives the youngest children some dedicated space of their own (and a pretty snazzy outdoor adventure play area to boot) while still allowing them to benefit completely from the facilities of the whole site.
Head
Andy Nuttall arrived at The Downs in May 2022, fresh from his position as deputy head at Windlesham and having previously taught at Cheam School and The Banda School in Nairobi.
With a young family, a role like this isn’t just a job for the head – it needed a whole family buy-in as Mr Nuttall’s children would also become pupils and his wife Polly (a teacher by trade) would need to eat, sleep and breathe The Downs and live on site as well. But it’s exactly that which he loved about The Downs – it was everything they wanted in a school and pretty much the perfect time for a fresh vision.
He's a very likeable man, very comfortable in company and with just the right balance of fatherly kindness and a steely eye for detail and the impact of everything he and his staff do. Mr Nuttall is a major fan of the great outdoors and of maximising the benefit of the school’s beautiful setting. He brought chickens and quails with him from Windlesham (which were an immediate hit) and they have quickly been joined by pigs and sheep which are not only a source of great enjoyment but also teach the pupils about responsibility and the importance of respecting animals that are raised for the table.
With polytunnels arriving imminently, there’s a growing ‘smallholding vibe’ in the air – a wonderfully low-key and positive exploitation of their surroundings, totally designed around the impact on the pupils. After all, the head tells us, his greatest joy is seeing the children’s ‘unfettered enjoyment of their environment and each other’.
In appointing Mr Nuttall, the school most definitely lucked out by securing the ‘value-added’ personified by his wife Polly. ‘All over it’ from day one according to parents, she is the school’s community engagement officer and is already extending the existing community toddler group at the school with plans for shared learning opportunities with two local primaries. Crucially though, she ensures that each and every member of the community knows they are valued, personally sending birthday cards to each child from the head.
Admissions
‘Gently selective’ is the term used by the headmaster - prep pupils will need to show two full reports from a previous school. But it’s as much about finding the right fit as anything else, and potential joiners can have as many taster days (or overnights) as they need in order to be sure – the head’s own children were reluctant to leave after just the one. The admission process, (greatly aided by the considerable skills of the longstanding registrar who gives every single family the five-star treatment) is nicely relaxed, and children can join at any point during the academic year provided there’s a space.
Academics and senior school destinations
Classes hover at around 12-15 pupils and lessons are as hands-on as possible (even the youngest children get practical lessons in the science labs). IT is properly embedded into the curriculum (parental workshops explain how IT, coding, phonics and pre-prep maths are taught) and prep children benefit from specialist teachers for almost every subject, although their form tutor remains key in overseeing both pastoral and academic spheres.
Year 8 pupils have their own devices (their prep is set on Microsoft Teams); and everyone else gets to use iPads and laptops in class while parents can view reports and information on an online portal. Mr Nuttall has instigated a number of new individual and group interventions (some just an extra lesson or two here and there) to ensure that no child ever falls between the cracks. Learning support here isn’t only for those who might need a bit of help to keep up, it’s also about building confidence in a child’s own ability or stretching the more capable.
CE has become less relevant now, with many senior schools doing their own pre-testing. Mr Nuttall also believes that it is more constructive and less stressful to assess children in a more gradual way, helping parents to make the right decisions about future schools earlier on and reducing the pressure to perform on one day. So, while pupils still follow the formal CE route in core subjects, humanities teaching for the seniors has become a more project-based process, encouraging pupils to develop study and revision skills, scholarly thought processes and revelling in academic enrichment. He has even started to award prizes for the most thought-provoking questions asked of a visiting speaker, incentivising and inspiring children to stretch their ways of thinking.
A large number of leavers head to Malvern College which ‘happens organically because of our natural links’, says the head but he is clear that it’s not the only option and that ‘we are in the business of preparing children to thrive at the school they choose’ wherever that might be. Mr Nuttall already has excellent relationships with many senior schools from his time at Windlesham, and he’s committed to strengthening bonds with alternative local options as well. Pupils always leave with an impressive haul of scholarships too.
Co-curricular
Children have access to a fantastic array of sports facilities that belong to The Downs (two tennis courts, netball courts, a large Astro and a sizeable sports hall), but they also get full use of Malvern’s too – including the swimming pool, rackets courts and there are plans to extend the golf provision to the Malvern College facility too.
The cricket pitch boasts epic views of the Malvern Hills and girls’ cricket is something of which the head is very proud – plus there’s masses of football, rugby and hockey. The girls’ hockey team recently bagged third place at the IAPS national hockey tournament – much to the surprise of some of the big hitters who they dispatched along the way.
The Memorial Hall (which is used for whole-school assemblies) doubles up as an events space and theatre for drama. The recent production of Joseph was staggeringly brilliant and massively inclusive too, with more than 100 children taking part. Photos of past performances lining the walls, including Cats, The Lion King and Les Misérables clearly show that, dramatically speaking, The Downs has set a very high bar.
The fabulously effervescent Lesley Hunter leads the charge in bringing music to life for every single pupil at any level at The Downs – and she is soon to be operating out of a completely refurbished music school, which will be opening its brand-spanking new doors in September 2023. Individual music lessons are numerous and choirs, ensembles, concerts and opportunities to play in assembly abound, and children clearly love getting involved with the musical productions, showcasing the energy and musical passion of the staff and pupils alike.
Art is strong (lots of pupils bag creative scholarships to Malvern) and D&T opportunities run the gamut from woodwork to printing. Pottery is due to be relocated to its own space in the art block and the old pottery shed will make way for a multi-use classroom planned as a green-screen resource for drama, an additional teaching space and a match tea hub for Wednesday and Saturday fixtures.
There’s no formal Saturday school – instead, children from Year 3 participate in the school’s hobbies programme. Pupils can take up everything from pottery to gardening, coding, fencing, badminton, cross-country, mountain biking, rackets and much more. There’s also one of the coolest activities we’ve come across on offer here – the opportunity to operate and help maintain the Downs Light Railway, which winds its way around the grounds. Children can learn to drive the train, help with repairs (the perfect way to get first-hand engineering experience), work on the track and even build carriages (which led to a D&T scholarship to Bloxham for one pupil). While fun and unassessed, Mr Nuttall still insists that staff carefully plan their hobbies to include progression and outcomes of which the children can all be proud.
Boarding
There’s a small but lively boarding community of around 50 pupils, who can choose full, weekly or flexi. Boarders sleep in one house, with separate wings for boys and girls and two super, newly refurbished common rooms, a huge kitchen for whipping up snacks and a TV and games room complete with its very own popcorn machine. There’s a solid family vibe, and vertical integration is superb.
At weekends, there are plenty of trips to the cinema, art galleries and theme parks – and boarders are given boarding passes to dish out to day pupils, inviting them to join in for a fun-filled boarding weekend once a term (an idea brought in by the calm, kind and experienced boarding parents, Mr and Mrs Warlow). Boarders seem to love having activities across the school in the evenings (summertime is a joy with the biggest back garden ever) and voting for their Sunday meal is a rather lovely touch (we gather meatball baguettes regularly feature…).
School community
Pastoral care is excellent, and staff and matrons meet weekly to highlight who is doing well and who might need some extra care or intervention. Buddy systems mean that new children slip in seamlessly and there’s a wellbeing room where pupils can pop in if they need support or just a place to sit quietly. Togetherness is evident everywhere, from the boarding house to the family-style dining at lunchtime where children chat across cohorts and are served at the table by a Year 8 monitor, overseen by at least one member of staff. Houses are also another community to which every child belongs, and house points are gathered through merits and stars or as part of sporting, musical, artistic or academic challenges and competitions.
And finally....
Fresh energy from the new head and his brilliant wife have brought a new appreciation of the school’s facilities and a focus on how these can be used to impact the children’s learning and development. The head noted on his pre-appointment visit that pupils were honest, friendly, open, outdoorsy and naïve in the nicest possible way and as a father, he wanted the same for his own children and perhaps there is no greater endorsement – a charming all-rounder that robustly, yet almost stealthily, prepares children for their next step while they get on with the vital task of just being children.