Our School

St. Nicholas is a Church of England Voluntary Controlled Primary School catering for children from 4+ to 11 years.

Until September 2006, the school was situated in the village of Rawreth, between the towns of Rayleigh and Wickford, adjacent to St. Nicholas Church, with which the school enjoys close links.

The school was opened in June 1873 with 17 pupils and was known as Rawreth School. It consisted of a single school room, later used as a hall, and had separate entrances and playgrounds for boys and girls. Before an infant classroom was built in 1896 as many as 80 children were taught in the one school room, with infants sitting in raised tiers in one third of the room!

In 1939 electricity was installed and an additional classroom was built in the 1950’s.
During the summer of 1997, the main building was extended to provide improved administration offices, improved staff facilities and a new and enlarged library area.
In September 1999 the school governors changed the name to St. Nicholas CofE Primary to reflect the links with the church.

In January 2000 with 96 children on roll the school was arranged into four classes using the hall as a temporary class base.

During that same year with the increasing number of children on roll and with a lack of space and modern facilities continuing to be a problem, the LEA put forward a proposal to the School Governors to relocate the school to a new purpose built school on part of the old Park School site approximately 1 mile down the road.

However, because this was a long term solution, in the spring of 2000, it was agreed that the toilet area by the back door should be remodelled to become a small room for group work. The children decided to name it “The Studio.”

The new school project started to take positive shape during the 2004-2005 academic year. Staff, pupils and Governors were all involved in every stage of the process from design through to packing and unpacking and the school finally opened its new doors to children on 11th September 2006.

Every year there are many achievements, far too many to list individually but they always include the continuing dedication of the children, staff, parents/carers and governors. The following illustrates some of our diverse achievements since the start of the year: We successfully recruited a new headteacher following the retirement of our previous headteacherThe core values of respect, responsibility and integrity were adopted by the school and underpin our ethosWe have maintained high attendance figuresWe have achieved good end of Key Stage resultsOur children are known to be positive ambassadors of the school and flourish in many curricular areasWe have introduced targeted provision for all learners, especially more able, gifted and talented learners. This is informed by new provision mapping systemsIndividual targets for reading, writing and maths have been introduced for every child Our children participate in extra-curricular visits, perform and raise money for less fortunate peopleWe passed our FMSIS inspection on the first attemptOur School Council took part in a well received inter-school conferenceOur school won the swimming galaOur school won the Small School District Sports for the second year runningWe are introducing a redesigned curriculumWe have linked with a school in Canada, a school in Uganda and a school in Southwark and are reaping the rewards that these links bring to the lives of our children.We have gained International Schools Intermediate Status, and the Foundation Status of Eco SchoolsWe have gained our Healthy Schools Award