OUR CONTRIBUTION
A BLESSING TO THIS ISLAND
King William’s College and The Buchan School is a registered charity providing a first-class educational environment to some 500 pupils – 300 at College, 150 at Buchan and 50 in the Nursery.
Over 90% of our pupils are Island residents.
We make an important contribution to our Island’s economy, education and community, providing choice, excellence, extra capacity, innovation and an education that is distinctive and of the highest quality.
CONTRIBUTION TO LOCAL ECONOMY
The School employs just under 200 people. This includes teaching and support staff. We are therefore a large employer on the Island.
Our overall budget is in the region of £10 million. Almost all our expenditure is on Island, in the form of salaries, goods, utilities, catering and services, with only a tiny proportion being paid off Island.
We estimate that our international Boarders contribute well over a million pounds to the Island economy every year.
Through our operational and investment expenditure, our support of Island supply chain puts more than £2 million into the local economy per year.
EDUCATIONAL CONTRIBUTION & IMPACT
Our GCSE results are routinely excellent and competitive with many similar UK independent schools.
At The Buchan School we offer a tailored prep school curriculum which offers specialist subject teaching to Nursery, Pre-Prep and Prep pupils. Pupils benefit from a range of co-curricular and extracurricular activities.
At King William’s College we offer GCSEs at 16+ and, in the Sixth Form, the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme and IB Courses. The IB philosophy of skills-based learning and internationalism extends throughout the entire school. Our international students, most of
whom are boarders, hail from 16 countries, including Hong Kong, Germany, Russia, Serbia, South Africa, Spain, China and Romania. They bring a global perspective, enrich the community and are a vital pipeline to British universities. We are the only school on the Isle of Man to offer boarding and almost all our Sixth Formers go on to university.
We provide an excellent quality nursery provision which allows children on the Isle of Man to access a year-round (50-week) Nursery and offers choice and support for working parents.
WIDENING ACCESS AND FINANCIAL SUPPORT
We seek to enable as many families as possible to send their children to our school in the form of means-tested Bursaries.
We offer an extensive programme of bursary support.
Bursaries are funded through fee income.
Bursary assistance is entirely means-tested and a number of children receive support.
COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT
Through the Community, Action, Service (CAS) programme of the IB, all our Sixth Formers participate in community initiatives and compete in the Island’s Charity Challenge competition.
The School raises funds for numerous local charities. We both host events for local charities and run charity fundraising events ourselves. The Buchan has regular charity events to raise money for local, national and international charities. Recent examples are Isle listen, Joanna Simpson Foundation, Housing Matters, local food bank collection, Children in Need, Coats for Calais, MSPCA, RNLI and Manx Wildlife Trust.
The Buchan Choir and College Chapel Choir perform at services and events throughout the Island e.g. The Guild, Castletown Remembrance service, Castletown Christmas Lights switch on, entertaining local residents at the nursing home and local pensioners at the Christmas pensioners’ lunch, Festival of Trees.
Also at The Buchan, we offer Further Education support in the form of teacher training opportunities for
Edge Hill University students. We also offer work experience placements and Duke of Edinburgh community experience for pupils from Castle Rushen High School (CRHS). Lastly, we provide interview experience for students wishing to apply to University to obtain a teaching degree.
We have numerous links with other schools: we organise and host an annual orienteering event for local schools to use our grounds alongside our Buchaneers. We organise and host termly sports tournaments for all schools to attend and play. We participate in Island competitions and events such as the Manx Music Festival, Manx Folk awards, Junior Achievement, Cycling proficiency and numerous sporting events. At Buchan, we offer our grounds at Westhill free of charge for community use, Isle of Play, Malew Brownies, and local Historians. For CRHS we are an emergency evacuation location.
At College, we include CRHS in our CCF and support Castletown Cricket Club and Isle of Man Cricket.
HISTORY AND CULTURE
The Buchan will celebrate its 150th birthday in 2025, while College will be 200 years old in 2033.
While there are two maintained faith primaries on Island, we are the only secondary school with a Chapel, Chaplain and regular Christian services.
Our former students include one of Britain’s most respected inventors Dr John C Taylor OBE, Nobel Prize winner Sir William Henry Bragg, Major Robert Henry Cain VC who was the only Manxman to receive the Victoria Cross, former Chief Minister Howard Quayle and current Chief Minister Alfred Cannan.
USE OF FACILITIES
Our facilities are available for hire and we welcome a range of local organisations at very affordable rates. Activity groups run during school holidays and half terms. They are open to all children.
There are regular live screenings in King’s Court Theatre.
Our swimming pool is used for training by a sub aqua club, as the KWC playing fields are used by hockey clubs and Westhill indoor facilities are used by MSR as a venue for all pupils in the south to attend. Our facilities are also used for Community basketball and netball for the physical and social benefit of local adults and teens.
We offer a conference and function venue all year round.
We offer local businesses and charities an opportunity to operate in our schools. On the Buchan site these include Drama Tots, Ready Steady Dance, Active Souls, and Jenny Holman Yoga. At the KWC there is Saturday morning Code Club.
We provide a venue during school holidays for visiting study/special interest groups.
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