Ditcham Park School


Ditcham Park School is an English co-educational, independent school in Hampshire, located in the South Downs National Park. The school grounds include a walled garden, tennis courts and sports fields, which adjoin several farms and forests; the main section of the school is a Victorian manor house, built by Sir Reginald Blomfield in 1887. A Technology and Arts building was added in 2001, a new sports hall in 2008 and renovations of the science block made in 2012. In 2017 a new, purpose built Junior classroom block was completed. It was opened by BBC journalist, Clive Myrie on 20 September 2017. In 2018 Ditcham Dragonflies, the school nursery was opened. Contained in a purpose built setting, the nursery provides high quality provision with a focus on outdoor learning, for 2.5 to 4 year olds.
The school performs competitively locally and nationally in examination results. It does not have a sixth form, although does have a Junior School and a Nursery. The current headmaster is Mr Graham Spawforth. The school comprises a total of 385 pupils aged 2 1/2 – 16 years in the Nursery, Junior and Senior sections of the school.

Location

The school and its grounds lies on the southern spur of Oakham Hill, one of the highest points on the South Downs. It is located some 2 kilometres south-southwest of the village of Buriton and 2 kilometres northeast of the hamlet of Chalton. The premises was previously owned by Douai School and housed its Junior School until 1975.

Sport and outdoor pursuits

Ditcham Park teaches and competes in football, netball, hockey, tennis, cricket, basketball, rugby, rounders and athletics matches. The school has a Sports Hall built in honour of Martin Pryce: a teacher who died of cancer.

Ditcham Park is on the South Downs Way, which the school makes use of for its Duke of Edinburgh Award programme.
Some of the school's extracurricular activities include fencing, judo, cycling, swimming, cross-country running, and dance.

Drama, Music and Arts

The school has its own drama theatre.
The school also regularly enters the Shakespeare Schools Festival. There are a number of Senior music groups. The following list of activities are available:
Choirs, Ensembles, Concert Band, Drama Clubs, Art Clubs
The school also comprises a Technology & Arts building, containing a pottery room and a workshop.

Notable former pupils

Ditcham Park was developed beside an ancient entrenchment on the chalk lands of the South Downs on the Hampshire side of the county border. The lands are first mentioned in Domesday Book ending up in 1545 in the hands of John and Margaret Cowper. These consisted of two farms, Old Ditcham and Sunwood Farm, and large areas of wooded slopes and high down land. Richard Cowper left the estate in 1762 to his cousin John Cole.
Cole built a new house on top of the down, arranging planting including specimen trees in a small landscaped park and building a walled garden. He called it Ditcham Grove. It was probably he who added an ice-house in the Park Field just south of the house. Views to the south across Chalton Down to the coast and to the Isle of Wight were and still are magnificent. A southern approach drive swept up in curves through fields and woods, though the more spectacular approach drive was not developed until after 1885 by the Cave family. This was from the north affording a series of viewpoints of ‘borrowed' landscape of encircling hills and valleys from Petersfield in the west to Harting in the east and beyond. The easterly views encompass Lady Holt Park in Sussex, Ditcham's immediate neighbour which was part of this ‘borrowing'.
Let to the Bonham Carters for ten years in the mid-19th-century, the property of 1,600 acres was sold in 1868 to Charles Cammell who changed the name of the house to Ditcham House. He sold it in 1885 to Laurence Trent Cave who built a new house on the same site, which burnt down just after completion so was rebuilt in 1888.
Laurence Trent Cave bought the Estate in 1887 and engaged the architect Sir Reginald Blomfield to build the house and also to build St. Lawrence's Catholic Church in Petersfield. In 1940 the house was requisitioned by the Royal Navy and used as a convalescent home for sailors and served by trains stopping at Woodcroft halt. After the war it became a boys preparatory school run by Douai School Monks and then in September 1976 Ditcham Park School was founded by Paddy Holmes.

School Fees

The fee for the academic year 2017/2018 are between £2,835 and £4,753 per term. There are additional charges for transport, lunches, private tuition and extra curricular activities.