News & Diary
Winchester Weekly – 27th August 2025
Welcome to the new academic year – and for those who are new, welcome to Winchester!
We were delighted with this year’s A-Level and GCSE results, which came on top of an outstanding year for university offers. At GCSE, half of all grades awarded were 9s, with 93% of grades at 9-7 and 80% at 9-8, maintaining last year’s exceptional record.
A-Level results were equally impressive: 42% of all grades awarded were A*s, while 91% earned A*-B grades and 74% A*-As. Special congratulations go to the 25 pupils who secured 4 or more A*s.
Pupils are now heading off to an impressive range of universities across the globe, including highly competitive universities such as Harvard and highly competitive courses such as Economics at Yale. Our Oxbridge cohort will be reading a wide range of subjects including Computer Science, English, Classics and Maths and, of course, the full range of courses taken by the whole cohort is exciting and varied. We offer warmest congratulations to the Class of 2025 on their well-deserved success.
School life gets up and running very quickly so I take this opportunity to remind you of the Parent Seminar on Sunday evening, 31st August. Professor Andrew Martin will be speaking in School on ‘Supporting Your Child’s Motivation, Engagement and Learning’. The talk will start at 7pm but please do join us for drinks from 6pm. In order to manage numbers and the venue, please book your place on TryBooking by close of business on Thursday, 28th August. Professor Martin’s presentation will not be recorded but it will be livestreamed that evening (link below).
You might also consult your calendars for the exciting lecture series we have planned for the coming year. The first talk will take place on the evening of Friday, 5th September when we welcome one of India’s leading public commentators and the foremost living historian of modern India, Ramachandra Guha. Please book your place for this and other upcoming lectures via TryBooking.
With kind regards,
Ms Elizabeth Stone
Dear parents,
I hope you have enjoyed a restorative summer break.
As we look forward to the new school year, I write with a reminder regarding applications for leave of absence and a change in the process for requesting these.
With a firm and consistent approach across the school, we aim to keep ad hoc leave to a minimum. We understand that in exceptional circumstances a pupil may need to be away from school for a short period, but we ask that such absence be avoided as far as possible. We wish to limit disruption for individual pupils and to the wider school community. In some cases, absence will need to be marked as unauthorised to ensure fairness across the pupil body.
Please refer to the Attendance Policy below for more details, which can also be found on the school website. Applications for leave of absence should be made in writing to the Second Master and include the following details: pupil name, year group and boarding house, date(s)/time(s) requested, reason for the leave request.
Please note dental or medical appointments should be made during school holidays or after the school day except in cases of emergency when the Housemaster and Matron should be informed.
We are grateful for parents’ support and thank you for your understanding and look forward to welcoming your child back to Winchester.
Mr Iain Smith
Parents are very welcome to join us for College events. Upcoming events, including the Autumn Lecture Series (link below) are typically highlighted in the Winchester Weekly newsletter.
As mentioned by the Headmaster, this Sunday, 31st August, the College welcomes Professor Andrew Martin, an Honorary Research Fellow in the Department of Education at the University of Oxford and a Registered Psychologist. He is recognised for his work on student motivation, engagement, learning, and achievement.
In this talk, Professor Martin will explore how to maintain motivation in the middle years, and the differences in boys and girls.
As a reminder, and for the benefit of new parents, the College photography platform, Piwigo, is available via the link below.
Photos are taken by school photographers, Camilla Winter-Moore and Jim Pascoe.
You will find the parent log in details in the covering email to this newsletter.
During the summer, the school website has had a refresh. Please do take a look.
