Ampleforth College: £36k-per-year Catholic boarding school banned from taking new pupils after 'serious' failings

By Tim Bake
Sky News
November 27, 2020

https://bit.ly/39iojoe

Ampleforth College, North Yorkshire, has been told it cannot accept new pupils

Education Secretary Gavin Williamson has written to the school's proprietor

Former Ampleforth monk Peter Turner was jailed for more than 20 years for abusing children

The school was previously criticised by an independent inquiry into child sexual abuse in 2018.

A £36,000-a-year Catholic boarding school has been banned from admitting new students following "serious" failings on safeguarding and leadership standards.

Ampleforth College, which was previously criticised by an independent inquiry into child sexual abuse in 2018, was found to have "prioritised the monks and their own reputation over the protection of children".

The Department for Education (DfE) sent a letter to the North Yorkshire school's proprietor on Friday as part of an enforcement action.

Education Secretary Gavin Williamson told the school to stop accepting new pupils to "safeguard the education and well-being of children".

The letter raised concerns from multiple inspection reports dating from 2016 onwards, and said the institution had failed to meet safeguarding and leadership standards.

Ampleforth - which is attached to a Catholic Abbey - claims to be "the world's foremost co-educational Catholic boarding and day school for students aged 11 to 18".

Fees for a full boarding pupil cost £36,486 per year, while for a day-only student the price is £25,374.

The letter to the school said: "The SoS [Secretary of State] also had regard to the fact that that the school is failing to meet the ISS [Independent School Standards], including standards relating to safeguarding and leadership and management, and in his view, these failings are considered to be very serious."

While the letter did say the school had "some willingness" to improve since 2018 - including adding new leadership - Mr Williamson ruled the college's progress had been "too slow" and "insufficient".

The letter said: "The school failed to meet the ISS for more than a year before new leadership was brought in. In the year since then, the school has still not done enough to consistently meet the ISS, and in some respects the school appears to have relapsed."

A spokeswoman for Ampleforth College said: "Ampleforth College notes the Department for Education's publication this afternoon of the intent to serve notice of an Enforcement Action.

"We will be appealing this on the basis that we believe, and have been advised, that it is unjustified and based on incorrect information.

"Given the very considerable steps forward that have been taken by the school to learn from the mistakes of the past and to put in place a robust safeguarding regime, a new senior leadership team, and a new governance structure that has effectively separated the Abbey from the College, we cannot understand why this decision has been taken, and we cannot understand why it has been published, given the appeals process is still open to us.

"As far as we are concerned, we will continue to educate our students to the very high standards they are used to in a safe and supportive environment.

"We have lodged a complaint to Ofsted and await the outcome of that complaint."

In February, former Ampleforth College monk Peter Turner, 80 - who continued to abuse young boys after confessing to having sexual contact with a pupil - was jailed for more than 20 years.