Back to the classroom for unique history of schools

Their names will be familiar to generations of people who have grown up in the towns of Kent but how well do we really know the stories behind our county’s schools?

Here’s the founding stories, famous names and quirky facts to be found in the histories of some of Kent’s best-known educational establishments.

Brockhill Park Performing Arts College, Saltwood

Many of us may fondly remember a class rabbit or guinea pig from our school days, but who can say they took lessons on an actual farm? Situated just outside Hythe, Brockhill is set in and around a Jacobean and Georgian manor house and is home to a working farm and farm shop on its campus overlooking the English Channel. The school is keen to teach its pupils where their food comes from, and this learning often leads to agricultural qualifications.

The Charles Dickens School, Broadstairs

The school is named after the writer and social critic, regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian era, who had many a link with Kent and was greatly inspired by the county. The writer first came to Broadstairs in 1837, aged 25, and returned frequently over the next two decades.

In 1850 Dickens took residence at Fort House, now known as Bleak House, and he wrote the novel David Copperfield.

Dartford Grammar School Rock legend and Rolling Stones front-man Sir Mick Jagger is Dartford’s most famous son and an old boy of Dartford Grammar School. In 2010 the star returned to give his seal of approval to a massive £900,000 facelift to the Mick Jagger Centre at the West Hill school, which featured a new foyer and dance studio with floor to ceiling mirrors.

Duke of York’s Royal Military School, Dover

In 1801 His Royal Highness Frederick Duke of York laid the foundation stone in Chelsea of what was to become The Duke of York’s Royal Military School, a school for the children of military personnel which opened in 1803. The school’s initial purpose was to educate the orphans of British servicemen killed in the Napoleonic Wars. The school relocated to its present site in Dover in 1909. It has the right to carry Colours - battle flags carried by military regiments to show where their troops should rally in battle.

Dover Grammar School for Boys

Former pupils of the Astor Avenue school are known as Old Pharosians, inspired by the Pharos, a Roman lighthouse constructed during the reign of Emperor Claudius in AD 46 on a headland overlooking the Roman port of Dubris, which still stands today within Dover Castle. The schools motto, appropriately is Fiat Lux, meaning “Let there be light”.

The King’s School, Canterbury

King’s is often described as the oldest school in England, with its history traced back to the earliest days of Christian education in the country when St Augustine likely established a school on his arrival in Canterbury in 597. Very little is known about the early history of the school, although in the centuries that followed there was a link with Canterbury Cathedral.

In 1541, this history of the school was better documented as following the dissolution of the monasteries, the school was refounded by a Royal Charter from King Henry VIII giving it the names by which it has been known since.

The Harvey Grammar School, Folkestone

The school was founded in 1674 by the family of Dr William Harvey, who was born in Folkestone and is credited as the first physician to discover the science of the circulation of blood through the body.

One of the famous doctor’s descendants, Admiral Sir

Eliab Harvey, gained great fame when at the Battle of Trafalgar he took his ship

HMS Temeraire into the thick of the action, forcing the surrender of two French vessels, Redoutable and Fougueux. He took the two opposing ships’ names for his family motto, “Redoutable et Fougueux”, and those words can be found on the Harvey’s school badge, with Temeraire proudly above them.

Kent College, Canterbury This independent school for boarding and day pupils was founded in 1885 as the Wesleyan College, Canterbury, on land made available by Edward Pillow, a local gentleman-farmer, and the foundation stone for the main building was laid in 1887.

The school’s motto is Lux tua via mea, which means “Your light is my way.”