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Our View
This all-through school in Berkshire may look like a Victorian grand dame, but behind the magnificent exterior is a diverse, international and thoroughly modern prep and senior school where pupils receive a happy mix of traditional English private school with a global modern outlook. It’s part of the international schools group Inspired and there are also Reddams in Australia and South Africa.
Where?
The 125-acre grounds complete with tree-lined drive, parkland and lake certainly have the wow factor – so much so, an episode of The Crown was filmed here. The interiors of the magnificent, Grade I-listed mansion house feature wood panelling, an open fire and the biggest head’s office we’ve seen with wonderful views over the grounds. All the classrooms have recently been redecorated with fresh paint, matching new furniture and a smart plaid wool carpet now runs throughout the building. A capacious chapel serves as an exam hall as well as hosting the annual Christmas carol concert (future plans are afoot to convert it into a sixth form centre) and there are acres of playing fields, a shooting range, neighbouring Bearwood Lakes Golf Course which pupils have access to and a state-of-the-art new sports hall opening in summer 2026.
Most children are local and the school runs a network of bus routes with more being laid on soon. For international students, Heathrow is a handy 30 minutes away.
Head
Rick Cross joined Reddam in 2021 from Bedales where he held three deputy head roles; before that he was a history and politics teacher at Alleyn’s and assistant head and director of digital learning at The Perse. An ultra-marathon runner, Mr Cross has boundless energy and has already achieved a lot during his five years here, redesigning the school’s senior leadership team to create more bandwidth for pastoral care, boosting pupil numbers across all age groups from six months to 18 and introducing an AI curriculum from reception upwards. What he’s most proud of, though, is the phenomenal value-added that has seen pupils achieving on average more than one grade improvement in every subject.
Admissions
Reddam is non-selective, but it does use testing to get a rounded profile of prospective pupils' ability in verbal, non-verbal, quantitative and spatial reasoning. They also look at references and reports from an applicant’s current school. The main entry points are Years 7, 9 and 12.
Academics and destinations
Learning is tailored to the individual here, with academic progress tracked through its ‘cycle testing’ programme, which it describes as ‘low stakes assessing’ that sees pupils learn, test, learn, test, and so on. Every pupil from Year 4 onwards sits a cycle test during the first period on a Monday morning in a subject that rotates each week, with results available to them and their parents through an online portal. Come Year 9, they sit these twice a week. Popular with everyone, pupils like the way it gets them used to revising and sitting exams, and parents like the fact that the tests enable them to track their child’s progress in every subject with real data. CRAFT (correction, review, and acting on feedback) lessons follow tests to embed learning and pupils are stretched with what the school calls its CHEX programme, ‘Challenge and Extension for All’, which sees them trying more challenging questions once they’ve grasped the basics. English as an Additional Language is offered in one-to-one or group settings and academic support is available for those with SEN.
In line with the school’s attitude to bespoke education, pupils can choose to do eight, nine or 10 GCSEs. Everyone takes maths, English language and literature and two or three sciences with options including computer science, French or Spanish, history, geography, PE, art and design, drama, media studies, music and business studies. From next year, Year 10s will also be able to do a new Elevate programme which comprises three options plus an HPQ (Higher Project Qualification).
Many pupils do four A-levels and, and as well as the traditional subjects on offer, they can take psychology, economics, music, BTec in sport and CTecs in business studies, digital media and applied science. Most do an EPQ. They’re well set up for flying the nest to university with a sixth form centre in the basement that feels very grown up with its own pool table, sofas and large study room (the planned redevelopment of the chapel will see the sixth form centre super-sized). Plenty of UCAS guidance from the head of the sixth form and deputy head (the Year 13s we met raved about them) help students win places at top-notch institutions, including Oxford, Durham and Imperial. A handful also head off to overseas universities in Japan, Germany and the US.
Co-curricular
Among the traditional sports – rugby, football and cricket for boys, hockey, netball and cricket for girls – pupils can swim in the school pool, shoot in the indoor shooting range and do clay-pigeon shooting as well as play golf at the adjoining Bearwood Lakes Golf Course. Music is offered with one-to-one lessons in whichever instrument a pupil wants to play. A modern, 350-seat theatre hosts the annual panto, which is adapted for different age groups with the sixth formers doing a tongue-in-cheek version. There are also plays throughout the year (currently in rehearsal is
Peter Pan with a twist) and a Christmas musical (this year it was
Anything Goes). Optional LAMDA lessons take place in the chapel and a new dance studio hosts the finals of the ISA dance competition. The art department has a dark room and pottery facilities; pupils in Years 7 to 9 recently completed a sculpture project and their huge, metalwork, animal-themed creations are displayed around the school grounds.
CCF is a big part of school life – Reddam House won the Rifles Cadet Cup Competition in 2025. Years 7 and 8 go on an Outward Bound trip in Yorkshire and the seniors often take part in the Three Peaks Challenge. Clubs include scuba diving, bread-making and debating
Boarding
Most of the 100 boarders are international students, with over 28 different nationalities at the school. There are three boarding houses: for boys in Years 7 to 10; for girls in Years 7 to 10; and a mixed house for Years 11 to 13 with single-sex areas. The Loft on the top floor of the main building has 12 covetable, new, ensuite rooms, kitchen facilities and a cinema. Dedicated boarding staff live in and there’s a nice family atmosphere with full, weekly and ad hoc days all options, though most boarders are full-timers. From Year 9, pupils also have the option of doing a term to a year at other Reddam House schools overseas; there are currently pupils in Sydney and Spain.
School community
The core values of responsibility, integrity, respect, courage, kindness and ambition pulse through the school’s veins. We love the inspiring Antoine de Saint-Exupéry quote it lives by: ‘If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea,’ and expect a diverse cohort bound together by an egalitarian outlook. There are ‘multiforms’ rather than uniforms, individuality is celebrated, and socialising promoted with a no mobile phones policy throughout the school, even for sixth formers who are only allowed to use theirs when they’re in the sixth form centre. Counsellors and nurses are on site and the tutor system is supported by heads of years, schools (junior, middle and senior), boarding parents and a safeguarding team.
And finally....
A lake with a boat house and a shooting range in the woods are just two things that will prick up the ears of children on an open day at Reddam House. The holistic, one-stop education, progressive attitude to academics and value-added score that puts the school in the top 10 per cent in the UK all sell it to the parents.