We recently took an accreditation visit as part of an exciting new partnership with RGS Newcastle who will take their first SpringBoarder in September.

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Ali Henderson reflects on RNCSF's key milestones and accomplishments of 2024 including supporting 500 SpringBoarders and expanding regional hubs and announces publication of the latest Annual Report.​​​​

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We have received some moving notes of gratitude from Reed's School SpringBoard alumni. It’s wonderful to see how transformative the experience was for them.​​​

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Our first Applicant Day for 2025 pupils took place at Manchester Grammar School. Here North West Regional Lead Andy Smith shares insights into our unique partnership.

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Our annual Alumni Celebration for 2024 took place at Grocers’ Hall. It was a wonderful of the transformative impact of bursaries in shaping lives, bringing together school leavers, alumni, partners and supporters to see the mark they are making in the world.

Using STEER Education tracking helps us to interrogate themes as part of our commitment to the contextualised safeguarding approaches that are taken by staff throughout our school and community partnerships.

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A huge thank you to Yarm School for hosting our latest regional training event to discuss the merits of the Broadening Educational Pathways programme.​​​​​​

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We are deeply saddened by the passing of our great colleague and dear friend, Ray Lewis CBE.

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Introducing the RNCSF Youth Advisory Panel, affirming our commitment to leveraging the rich experience of our alumni network.

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Summerfest proved once more to be a standout event in the RNCSF calendar. Our two-day residential supports final-year SpringBoarders navigate their next steps.​

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In the last decade, our partnership with Bede's School has enabled 22 care-experienced children to thrive in an environment which has a strong focus on their holistic personal and social development.​​

Our CEO’s spring update – trailing our forthcoming impact research publication and with news of continued growth in our school's network. 

At the NAVSH Conference today, Education Minister Coutinho announced that the Government will extend its’ funding for RNCSF’s “Broadening Educational Pathways” scheme.

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We are pleased and proud to announce that RNCSF will continue in partnership with Keystone Tutoring for another year. 

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The Government has published its’ response to the Independent Review into Children’s Social Care. Amongst the many important commitments within this response, is their pledge to expand the Broadening Educational Pathways scheme.

Our Annual Report & Accounts will be published next month. We are pleased to share some extracts from the upcoming report in our Winter CEO update. 

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RNCSF was honoured to help support the Friends of Royal Wanstead School (FoRWS) in holding a reunion to commemorate 50 years since the school's closure.

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To the class of 2022.

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Thank you for changing the face of aspiration. We are amazed, but not surprised by the people you have become, and can't wait to hear more in the many years to come. 

We are so proud to call you SpringBoarders.

We are delighted to confirm a new partnership to support Walhampton Prep School's ambitions to widen access through transformational bursary awards. 

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A wonderful new prep 

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We hope you can all come along for what will be a fun early evening of networking and supporting our newest alumni members as they finish their Year 13 placements, connecting with our donors and an inspiring talk from Patrick Hutchinson. ​

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We are delighted to welcome Downe House to our accredited school network. 

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The first SpringBoarder at Downe House will start this September. 

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Our annual schools day was back in real life. 

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A huge thank you to Repton School for hosting more than 80 RNCSF reps from across our RNCSF accredited schools network. We were thrilled to hear from Nathan and Esther who shared their experiences of boarding life.

RNCSF’s Programmes Director Leah Morgan and South West Regional Co-ordinator Rebecca Harris recently visited Badminton School​​.

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RNCSF's December Advisory Board meetings brought together trustees, charity partners, school leaders, and SpringBoard alumni and staff at our new EdCity base in White City.

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​Thank you Brentwood School for hosting a further two Applicant Days. Headmaster Michael Bond shares insights and his reflections on the partnership.​​​​

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Our two-day residential brought together 65 SpringBoarders past and present to spend time in the stunning grounds of Charterhouse, building a sense of community, harnessing teambuilding and life skills.

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The RNCSF’s Schools Day  brings together the RNCSF leads in each of our accredited schools with our community partners and select alumni to share perspectives relevant to supporting pupils to thrive in their bursary placements and beyond.

James Darley has been helping SpringBoard alumni navigate graduate recruitment and the careers market. We are excited to share his expertise with attendees of our upcoming Schools Day.

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Lord Lexden highlighted the transformative potential of boarding and independent day school places for children in care in the House of Lords debate yesterday

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Each year, NAVSH hosts a two-day conference that brings together Virtual School Heads and teams from across the country. Members of the RNCSF team exhibited at this year’s conference in Birmingham.

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A huge Thank You for all your support in 2023

With the Christmas holidays approaching at the end of another busy term, I hope you enjoy reading some highlights of our work in my regular update below.

"If 7% of all children benefit from private school opportunities, then these same doors should be open to children in care.” 

David Laws, Nadhim Zahawi and Josh Macalister.

Cheadle Hulme School in Greater Manchester has long held a commitment to prioritising its’ full-fee assistance places for children in care.

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RNCSF has a long tradition of runners taking part in this world famous event and we are incredibly proud of the 5 runners who will be representing and fundraising for us this year.

RNCSF are looking for expressions of interest from evaluation partners to help us measure the impact of our exciting new attachment and trauma informed practice in schools project.

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Director of Programmes Sandra White shares RNCSF’s experiences supporting schools’ DEI strategies.

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Kindly hosted by Manchester Grammar School, we took a moment last term to gather local authority representatives and regional boarding staff together to learn more about the Broadening Educational Pathways Programme, 

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A huge thank you to our corporate partner Credit Suisse for hosting us in London for a two-day Hackathon, focusing on the impact that RNCSF has been having over the past ten years.

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This Sunday, some wonderful, resilient and dedicated people are running the London Marathon on behalf of Royal National Children’s SpringBoard Foundation. The seven runners are Liam, Itziar, Thom, Sam, Gareth, Chris

and Joe.

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Find out more here:

In May, our Director of Schools, Sarah Butterworth visited Shrewsbury School. She toured its magnificent buildings, exceptional grounds, and world-class facilities high up on a bank, looking out over the school rowing teams on the river below.

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Read Sarah's blog here:

We are delighted to announce that Bryanston School has joined our accredited school network. 

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We look forward to placing the first SpringBoarders under their widening access transformational bursary award scheme from next year.

Last week, our CEO, Ali and Director of Schools, Sarah, headed Northeast to visit one of RNCSF's pioneering schools, Barnard Castle. 

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Housemaster of Senior Boy's Boarding House, York, Matthew Gooch, gave Ali and Sarah a tour of the school's expansive grounds and buildings. 

Warwick school hosted the RNCSF team on a visit last week. 

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It was great to hear about the power of a transformational bursary award partnership and to meet Ibz who - as a Senior Prefect and Deputy Head of House - had had a huge effect on the community.

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Our work to ensure many more children in care can access the benefits of a boarding or independent education features amongst the many important recommendations in the final report of the Independent Review of Children's Social Care.

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Neil O'Brien MP mentions RNCSF's work during a Public Bill Committee meeting on improving children's social care, highlighting the transformative impact of the DfE-funded Broadening Educational Pathways Programme.​

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RNCSF’s first alumni social event brought together  SpringBoarders who left school between 2014-2019 for a memorable evening of games, drinks, and meaningful conversation, celebrating the power of community.

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​During our Applicant Day at Bootham School, we spoke to talk to headmaster Deneal Smith about his experience and why we are excited about this new partnership.​​​​

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UWC Atlantic College alumnus and Advisory Board Panellist, Muhammad Sagar Ali was selected to to represent Brunel University London in the Global Leader Experience (GLE) in Kuala Lumpur.

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The Broadening Educational Pathways scheme launched by the DfE in 2020 extended the scope of our school partnerships to also secure better access for children in care to placements at independent day schools.

At Schools Day, AATIP experts and colleagues within our school settings will join forces to share an introduction and overview of how unmet attachment needs and trauma can present themselves in a school context.

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The entire RNCSF community of pupils, alumni, staff, schools and partner organisations are devastated by the loss of one of our founding visionaries – Ray Lewis, CEO of Eastside Young Leaders Academy.....

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In the last decade, the partnership between Worksop College and RNCSF has supported SpringBoarders in accessing a great education. Read more to hear about our School's Team recent visit. 

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​We are proud to be supported by our Royal Patron, HRH The Princess Royal, she has recently written a Foreword to a book drawing attention to the long history of independent schools’ support for young people. 

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"Many of our SpringBoarders have been young people from London boroughs who have really thrived in the very different environment of rural East Anglia."

Zoe Fisher, Principal, Wymondham College​​​

Hosted by Buckingham Palace, we were delighted to extend an invitation to two members of our hardworking team to attend the annual garden party.

We are hiring a Looked After and Vulnerable Children Programme Manager

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RNCSF are looking for expressions of interest from training providers of attachment and trauma informed practise to be part of our exciting new project:

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Hosted by Westminster School and in the presence of our Royal Patron, HRH The Princess Royal, more than 150 young people and schools staff from across our network came together on Tuesday afternoon to celebrate Royal National Children’s SpringBoard Foundation’s (RNCSF) work. 

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Our Partnership with STEER (the emotional wellbeing tracking platform) has, for over five years, provided us with crucial insights into how young people respond and navigate their boarding school placements. 

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We are delighted that Dragon school have joined our accredited schools network. 

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We look forward to placing our first Springboarder with them next September. 

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We started the new term with much-needed good news stories about some extraordinary young people’s successes.

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The results of our graduating “SpringBoarder” class of 2022 give us a great reminder of the power of a boarding education, and you can read more here:

Just days before the changes in the Ministerial team at the DfE we were delighted to gain confirmation of the Government extending its’ support to our “Broadening Educational Pathways for Care-Experienced Children” scheme. 

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Read more in Ali's Summer Term CEO Update

After more than ten years of leadership – from his part in creating The SpringBoard Bursary Foundation through the merger with RNCF to today – this week we say farewell to Robert Swannell CBE who passes on the baton as RNCSF’s Chair to Nick Owen CBE.

RNCSF's Director of Schools, Sarah Butterworth, visited Yarm school, a co-educational day school in North Yorkshire with pupils aged 3 to 18.

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In September, Yarm welcomes a SpringBoarder as part of a pilot funded by the Department of Education.

We really enjoyed our visit to Wellington College before half term. 

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The SpringBoarders at Wellington all spoke of their transformative journeys and the staff about the 'wit and wisdom' that each SpringBoarder brings. 

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