House System
QEH operates a house system whereby students are allocated to one of four houses and engage in house activities including academic competitions (such as literature or foreign language readings), sports competitions, house drama, house choir, house music ensemble, and many others.
Each house is named after one of the school's notable patrons. The four houses are Bird's, named after William Bird; Carr's, named after school founder John Carr; Hartnell's, named after Samuel Hartnell; Ramsey's, named after Lady Mary Ramsey. Hartnell was also a benefactor of the nearby school Clifton College a fact reflected in them also having a house named Hartnell's.
Each house has its own colour, and that colour is worn on the school tie for all students up to year 11. Sixth Form students who are house captains also wear house colours on their ties. The colours for the houses are:
- Bird's (yellow)
- Carr's (blue)
- Hartnell's (green)
- Ramsey's (red)
Students who excel at helping their house in some manner or other (usually sporting) are awarded "house colours" consisting of a rectangular badge in the colour of their house.
The organisation of each house is carried out by a designated House Master, and two sixth-form students, the Captain and Vice Captain of the house, who are picked by the House Master in conjunction with senior members of staff.
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Famous quotes containing the words house and/or system:
“In America a woman loses her independence for ever in the bonds of matrimony. While there is less constraint on girls there than anywhere else, a wife submits to stricter obligations. For the former, her father’s house is a home of freedom and pleasure; for the latter, her husband’s is almost a cloister.”
—Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–1859)
“To care for the quarrels of the past, to identify oneself passionately with a cause that became, politically speaking, a losing cause with the birth of the modern world, is to experience a kind of straining against reality, a rebellious nonconformity that, again, is rare in America, where children are instructed in the virtues of the system they live under, as though history had achieved a happy ending in American civics.”
—Mary McCarthy (1912–1989)