The schools were founded in the 1870s by CanonFrancis James Holland for the education of girls in London. He was born in London on 20 January 1828 and educated at Eton College and Trinity College, Cambridge. The Regent's Park School is the older of the two schools but no longer has a Junior Department. Francis Holland, Regent's Park, used to accept boys as primary school pupils but they would leave as soon as the girls moved on to secondary education.
The Sloane Square School was opened with 13 pupils on 1 March 1881 at 80 Coleshill Street, Belgravia, later renamed as 28 Eaton Terrace. Within a year, the school expanded into a further property opposite but as this arrangement proved awkward, Canon Holland purchased a site on the corner of Graham Street, now Graham Terrace where a new school building was constructed ready for occupation in October 1884.
In 2015, Vivienne Durham, the headteacher of the Regent's Park school, said in an interview "I’m not a feminist. I believe there is a glass ceiling – if we tell them there isn’t one, we are telling them a lie. Women still have to plan for a biological fact – ie motherhood".[1]The Guardian said that she was criticised for this.[2]
There are about 500 pupils at the school, and about 120 sixth-formers.[3] Most of their sports take place in Regent's Park and Paddington Recreational Grounds.
This article's list of alumni may not follow Wikipedia's verifiability policy. Please improve this article by removing names that do not have independent reliable sources showing they merit inclusion in this article AND are alumni, or by incorporating the relevant publications into the body of the article through appropriate citations.(June 2020)
