Balderstone Community High School was a community school situated in Balderstone, Rochdale, Greater Manchester. Taking place upon the same grounds/buildings that Balderstone Grammar School for boys was before it. The same has now happened to the community school, in which the current school has now changed to "Balderstone Technology College", although, a lot of the teachers remained.

During the early to mid 90's, the school consisted of roughly 1200 students aged 11 to 16. And used a streamed abilities class learning system. Mainly consisting of A1, A2 etc and B1, B2 etc in year 7 (first year). After first year, class streams were more or less nameless, but were still structured on ability.

Each year was divided into several forms (ie, 7.1, 7.2 etc), which were mainly registrative and independent of classes and ability and remained the same from starting year up until year 11, which was leaving year. In year 7, a designated form tutor would take register and be responsible for a particular form all throughout that year. In year 8, a different tutor would take the same form, and remain with the form all the way through until year 11 (the form name changed every year. ie, from 7.6 in the first year to 8.6 in the second year).

The school gained some impressive facilities. Including a climbing wall and a synthetic AstroTurf pitch, for playing various sports on. And the fact it was a community school, meant that members of the public, not just students, could use these facilities. The technology department of the school was also upgraded comprehensively, tieing in with the fact the school is now a technology college.

External links

Official Website

I note the school's Ofsted report hasn't improved much in the last years, it's still under-performing with respect to other schools in the same LEA, and well below average national levels. It's a great shame they closed down the sixth-form, I have some good memories, at least some new investment should attempt to reverse the years of neglect and under-funding. There is a lot of potential in both the students and the local community, we can only blame the Labour government under Tony Blair for not only failing each and every student, but also for a national loss. Asam Bashir, University of Cambridge & Wolfson College (Caygill memorial award for best performance in Chemistry at 'A' Level, Balderstone Sixth Form).