Dulwich College - Recent Developments

Recent Developments

Although it has always been a private foundation, for some time in the middle of the 20th century (as described above) a large percentage of pupils entered on scholarships funded by local authorities in and around Greater London. Known as "the Dulwich Experiment", it created one of the most socially mixed, meritocratic and high-achieving schools in the country. The 'Direct Grant' scheme was abolished for new entrants by the Wilson/Callaghan government in the mid-1970s, and by the early 1980s the last such students had passed through the school. Perhaps for this reason, the 1980s also coincided with a period of relative academic and pastoral decline. Some maintain that the school showed a reluctance to end its attachment to the classics, and a slowness to embrace fully new information technologies and modern languages, despite the fact that the school was a pioneer in these fields from the 1960s. Some long-serving masters, themselves schooled in the early post-war years of military service, corporal punishment and deference, may have had difficulty in adapting to rapidly changing cultural mores and values in the latter years of the century, although Dulwich was certainly by no means unique in this respect.

The Mastership of Anthony Verity began conservatively, but steadily adopted a modernising agenda. He initiated the founding of the Dulwich College franchise schools overseas, with Phuket in South-East Asia. Verity took early retirement in 1996. His successor, Graham Able, has continued the modernising tradition and maintained a high public profile.

The school benefited from the revived 'Assisted Places' Scheme brought in by the first Thatcher administration. On the election of the Blair government in 1997, this scheme was abolished by the new Education Secretary, David Blunkett. More recently, the school seems to have found a new market educating the sons of wealthy Russian oligarchs and other international business people. Apart from its own scholarships, the school is now entirely fee-paying, but has the long term aim of increasing its means-tested bursary awards.

Alleyn's and JAGS belong to the same foundation, and the college has also founded international schools in Phuket, Seoul, Shanghai and Beijing and Suzhou. All of the franchise schools are built in the distinctive red-brick style of the London school, but with modern and oriental twists on the theme. Recently the school's franchise in Phuket ended its association with Dulwich because of disagreements over the curriculum; it was then known as "Dulwich College International School, Phuket" and now simply as "British International School, Phuket".