Ickenham: Education

EDUCATION.

In 1819 there was a Lancasterian school in Ickenham providing clothing and elementary education for 50 children. (fn. 1) This was almost certainly the only school in the parish until the foundation of Ickenham Church of England School in 1823 on land belonging to Thomas Truesdale Clarke, who also maintained it. (fn. 2) Ten years later this school was described as a fee-paying establishment for 10 boys and 20 girls. (fn. 3) By 1846 the children were instructed by a mistress and a schoolroom had been built. (fn. 4) A new building was erected by public subscription on part of the waste of Ickenham manor in 1866. (fn. 5) Standing on the south side of the modern Ickenham High Road close to the centre of the village, (fn. 6) it accommodated 108 children. (fn. 7) It was a church school, although not in union with the National Society. (fn. 8) In 1873 there were 37 pupils, taught by a salaried mistress who had been given a house adjoining the schoolroom. In addition to elementary subjects the girls were taught needlework. The school was maintained by subscriptions and school pence, any deficiency being met by Thomas Clarke, the owner. (fn. 9) The school was still classed as privately owned in 1907. (fn. 10)

Other 19th-century schools in the village were short-lived, since they had to compete with large schools in Ruislip and Uxbridge, attended by many Ickenham children. (fn. 11) A school for 12 girls founded in 1828, with a lending library attached, was still in existence in 1833 when it was supported by a private individual. (fn. 12) After this date, however, no more is heard of it. In 1846 there was a dame school in Ickenham attended by 14 children. (fn. 13)

By 1928 Ickenham Church School was overcrowded and the Board of Education hired the village hall to accommodate the older children. The school in the hall was styled the Ickenham Temporary Council School, and although not a church school was under the same headmaster as the old school across the road. In 1929 the site of the old church school was required for road widening and the institution was closed. The older children were transferred to a new building in Long Lane and the village hall was used for infants. Both schools ceased to be church schools and were taken over by the county council. That in Long Lane was styled the Ickenham County Council School; that in the village hall the Ickenham Temporary Council School. Both were, for the first few months of their existence, under the same headmaster. (fn. 14) In 1937 the infants in the village hall and the juniors at Long Lane were transferred to the new Breakspear Primary Junior and Infant School in Bushey Road. In 1952 the boys from the Ickenham County Council School were transferred to Abbotsfield County Secondary School in Hillingdon (fn. 15) and their school building in Long Lane given to the new Swakeleys Secondary Modern Girls School. In 1961 this school had 682 girls on the roll; Breakspear School contained 654 boys and girls. In 1952 a new infant school, the Glebe Primary Junior and Infant School off Glebe Lane, was opened. It had 263 children in 1961.

Ickenham High School for Girls was founded in 1925. Two years later the school bought the old rectory house which it still occupied in 1961. The school then had 150 pupils, mainly girls aged between 4 and 17 years, but also including a few small boys who were given preparatory education. (fn. 16)

The Douay Martyrs Secondary Modern Roman Catholic School in Long Lane, designed to accommodate 450 children, was opened in 1962. (fn. 17)