Weekend House Activities – these include trips to the cinema, bowling, Dover and Canterbury visits, Bluewater shopping trips and House dinners (Christmas and end of year).

Academic Trips – range from science expeditions, theatre trips and  photography days out to maths workshops, cultural food trips and national competitions like The Maths Challenge and Young Consumer Competition.

Recent science trips have been to Dungeness Power Station, Shepherd Neame Brewery in Faversham and CERN in Switzerland! English and Drama trips are often organised to Canterbury’s Marlowe and Gulbenkian Theatres, as well as the West End.

Foreign Exchanges are organised to Spain, Germany and France as part of the Modern Foreign Languages curriculum while public services trips have included the Houses of Parliament.

Ceremonial Duties – selected Junior students are invited every year to the Chelsea Hospital Founder’s Day, while senior students provide a Guard of Honour for the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior in London’s Westminster Abbey.  Please go to the Ceremonial page for more details .

Sports Trips – students who are part of a sports team will have the opportunity to attend away matches, regional and national competitions and meet visiting sporting legends – last year hockey students were coached by Bronze medallist Georgie Twigg and School Prefects met eight Rugby Lions as part of the Waterloo200 commemorations.

International Rugby Tours take place every three years and our students also compete in regional and national competitions like the Kent County Trampoline Championships and the IAPs Athletics national finals.

Outdoor Leadership and Combined Cadet Force (CCF) – Every student takes the Bronze Duke of Edinburgh’s Award in Year 9, learning a new skill, volunteering and completing an expedition where they spend a week away engaged in camp craft and navigation training, kayaking, sailing, climbing, abseiling and two days of hiking/camping.  The school can fully equip 100 students for adventure training and overnight camping (everything except boots!)  Students are also encouraged to continue onto the Silver and Gold Awards.

Our school routinely achieves the most Duke of Edinburgh’s Awards in the local area and hosts the area awards ceremony with presentations by the Lord Lieutenant or a high ranking military officer.

Combined Cadet Force

We have one of the largest School Combined Cadet Force in the country, giving more than 330 pupils the chance to try their hand at soldiering. They experience the excitement and challenges of the great outdoors, testing their team building and leadership skills in ways which simply aren’t possible at home or in the classroom.

Working to the CCF syllabus, the Cadets train for two hours every week. This culminates in an annual Brigade-organised summer camp where alongside six other schools they experience a thrilling range of activities from live ranges, laser firing and platoon attacks to windsurfing and paintballing.

Adventure training

All students from Year 7 to Year 13 are able to take part in outdoor education/adventure training during term-time and holidays; and all students embark on a progressive programme of outdoor activities enabling them to learn vital leadership and team building skills, overcoming challenges, confronting fears and developing important life skills.

These trips and activities also provide an opportunity for staff to interact with the students outside of the classroom and learn new skills for themselves. For many students, this is their first experience of outdoor education – and it whets their appetite for more as they enjoy walking, sailing, kayaking, windsurfing, raft building/racing, high ropes course, trapeze, tree climbing, gorge walking, mountain biking, climbing, abseiling, and more.

2019 - India Expedition

Students spent 21 days travelling through the South of India exploring and experiencing the wonderful scenery and culture that India has to offer.