A fusion of modern ideas with traditional values
This account begins with the schools that came before Kingsley and with the North Devon author who gave the school its name. Charles Kingsley believed that a holistic education, one that cares for the whole person, leads to happiness and to a better life. That belief runs straight through to the wellbeing-led school of today and to our mantra, Better Me, Better World.
The school we see now is built on the firm foundations of its three founding institutions. Understanding where Kingsley came from is one of the clearest ways to understand what it promises now.
The founding sequence
Kingsley School was formed in 2009 from the merger of Edgehill College and Grenville College, two long-standing North Devon schools that between them carried over three hundred years of parallel history.
Charles Kingsley
North Devon author and philanthropist, whose belief in a holistic education and lifestyle later gave the school its name and its guiding idea.
Edgehill College
Opened by the Methodist Church on the site the school occupies today, as the principal independent girls’ school in the area.
Stella Maris Convent
Founded by a religious order, later becoming Stella Maris School and educating generations of local children.
Grenville College
A boys’ school named after the Elizabethan naval commander Sir Richard Grenville, and known across the region for its early and sustained support of dyslexic pupils.
The Sisters depart Stella Maris
The school continued under new leadership.
Stella Maris and Grenville merge
Two of the founding traditions come together.
Kingsley School is formed
Grenville and Edgehill unite, in one school holding the heritage of all three foundations.
Charles Kingsley, 1819 to 1875
Charles Kingsley was an author, clergyman and philanthropist with deep roots in North Devon. He is best remembered for The Water-Babies and for Westward Ho!, the novel set on this coast that gave a nearby village its name.
His public life reached well beyond his writing. He was appointed Chaplain to Queen Victoria in 1859, tutored the future King Edward VII, and became a canon of Westminster Abbey in 1873. Through all of it he argued for an education that cares for character, health and happiness alongside academic learning. As he wrote in The Water-Babies, all you need to be happy is something to be passionate about.
Three schools, one site
Archive photographs from Edgehill, Stella Maris and Grenville, alongside the site as pupils know it today.
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A continuity that is still living
Charles Kingsley’s belief in a holistic education became the wellbeing-led approach that shapes Kingsley now, where we nurture happier, healthier, more confident young people who achieve because they flourish. Grenville’s care for pupils who learn differently, Edgehill’s standing as the area’s principal independent school, and Stella Maris’s community spirit all feed into the Kingsley Family of today.
An active and connected alumni network keeps former pupils close to the school, and their stories sit alongside those of current pupils across the Wider Curriculum.
Frequently asked questions
When was Kingsley School founded?
Kingsley School was formed in 2009, through the merger of Edgehill College and Grenville College. Between them, those schools and Stella Maris carried more than three hundred years of history.
Which schools merged to form Kingsley?
Three foundations sit behind the school. Edgehill College opened in 1884 on the site Kingsley occupies today; Stella Maris was founded in 1927 and merged with Grenville College in 1994; and Grenville College, founded in 1954, united with Edgehill in 2009 to form Kingsley School.
Who was Charles Kingsley?
Charles Kingsley (1819 to 1875) was an author, clergyman and philanthropist with deep roots in North Devon, best remembered for The Water-Babies and Westward Ho! He argued for an education that cares for character, health and happiness alongside academic learning, and the school carries his name and that belief.
Northdown Road, Bideford