The vast majority of Hamptonians go on to leading universities in the UK, USA or Europe.
Nearly every Upper Sixth pupil gains a place at a Russell Group or equivalent university, and many read their chosen subject at a global top-10 institution, including Oxford and Cambridge.
Oxbridge applicants receive support through departmental extension classes and general sessions on the UCAS form and interviews. They also have several mock interviews with staff and with teachers at LEH or Surbiton High School. Many of our staff are Oxbridge graduates themselves and are well placed to offer advice and academic support.
The Hampton Extended Learning Programme (HELP) is open to Hamptonians from the Second Year upwards.
Pupils undertake extended essays on an area of personal interest, or creative projects such as artwork, models, musical compositions and videos. Each pupil is guided one-to-one by a teacher supervisor, developing skills that will serve them as they move up the School.
Recent topics have included artificial intelligence, financial fair play in football, black holes, neurology, the Battle of Stalingrad, moral obligation to obey the law and the war poets.
For Sixth Formers, HELP offers additional stretch and challenge, with the chance to produce an extended piece of work in a subject they already study or one that particularly interests them. The process builds the research, analysis, independent learning and time-management skills so highly valued by top universities.
Pupils across all year groups can take part in national challenges and competitions that stretch their academic potential.
In Maths, pupils from First Year upwards enter UK Mathematics Trust challenges, while Sixth Form extension sessions prepare pupils for the British Maths Olympiad and university admissions tests. Our chemists regularly excel in the Cambridge Chemistry Challenge and the Chemistry Olympiad, and our physicists and biologists compete in their own Olympiads.
Sixth Form linguists regularly debate in French, Spanish and German. Our Germanists have reached the final of the Goethe-Institut Debating competition, and our Francophiles have won the prestigious Joutes Oratoires Lycéennes twice in recent years. Pupils also enter the UK Linguistics Olympiad, which tests their ability to decode a language they have never studied.
In the Greenpower Challenge, an annual international sustainable motorsport competition, a team of Sixth Form engineers design, build, test and race a single-seat electric car, managing every stage from research to race-day repairs.
The Arts Award, managed by Trinity College London in association with Arts Council England, lets young people research, plan, complete and review a creative project of their own choosing while developing leadership skills.
Pupils build a portfolio to evidence their work, and projects can be highly flexible, from performing arts such as music or drama, to visual arts, creative writing or multimedia such as film, photography or web design. The award is a Level 2 qualification, equivalent to a GCSE or IGCSE higher-level grade.
It is an excellent opportunity for boys to pursue a passion, be creative and gain an extra qualification, free from the limits of a syllabus.
The Young Reporters programme is run in collaboration with Newsquest Media Group and involves schools across London and the South East.
The initiative enables teenagers to gain industry experience, hone their writing skills and develop the discipline of meeting deadlines.
Pupils who sign up to the scheme will be expected to complete eight different journalism assignments in a range of categories across the year. Their articles will be published online and those who complete all of the assignments by the deadlines will be awarded Certificates of Recognition. Prizes will also be awarded for the best writing within different categories.
Boys who join Young Reporters will have a chance to experience what it is like to be a journalist, and to have their articles, on the local issues that interest them, published for a real audience.
For the First and Second Years, Think! sessions are held once a week during lunchtime. These sessions are centred on the boys displaying marked academic ability.
Boys are encouraged and motivated to take part in intellectually stimulating activities in an environment that will teach them how to think more independently and allow them to stretch themselves academically.
Every week there is a different approach and a different topic, covering all academic subjects. Skills covered include memory techniques, which have helped boys to tackle revision in a more productive manner. Literacy skills are worked on through ‘dingbats’, impossible stories, close reading, lateral thinking and critical thinking; some mathematical problem-solving is also covered.
Some of the activities are based on the Bloom’s Taxonomy, which is a model for conceptualising higher level of thinking skills for gifted learners. However, the focus of the Think! Sessions lies on the three higher level of the taxonomy (analysis-evaluation-synthesis), enabling all pupils to develop their cognitive processes.
