The Richmond School joins DRET as The Richmond Primary Academy

We are delighted to announce that from Friday 1st March 2024, The Richmond School will join the David Ross Education Trust (DRET).

DRET is a high-performing group of 34 (now 35) schools, including the prestigious Skegness Grammar School, which has a long-established relationship with The Richmond School.

DRET will build on The Richmond School’s strengths, investing heavily in high quality training for all teaching and support staff and providing a wide range of extra-curricular opportunities for all pupils. Alongside DRET’s community-based ethos and commitment to driving ambition, the trust’s mission is to offer pupils a broad and balanced world class curriculum, supported by its highly regarded enrichment programme. 

Over the last two academic years, DRET has had 14 Ofsted inspections, with three academies securing an “outstanding” rating and the remainder all retaining their “good” rating or improving their grade.  DRET’s 22 primary schools perform consistently well academically, with phonics, multiplication checks and Year 6 SATs results significantly ahead of the national picture.

The DRET team have been working closely with The Richmond School and Headteacher Vicky Ross, and have agreed that from Friday 1st March 2024, the school will be renamed as ‘The Richmond Primary Academy’. Staff from The Richmond School will transfer across to The Richmond Primary Academy.

The new uniform will launch in September. As a welcome to current pupils and their families, every pupil will receive a branded water bottle with the new school logo. Current pupils will also be given two sweatshirts in a new teal colour and a PE shirt in their house colour, all free of charge. In line with all DRET primaries, pupils from the early years and key stage 1 will also receive a DRET book bag (also free of charge).

Richmond Primary Academy’s new uniform will consist of a teal sweatshirt, grey trousers, dresses or skirts and white polo shirts. Their school houses will continue to be named after notable Skegness lifeboat crew and PE shirts will also be in house colours – yellow, blue, red and green.

 Vicky Ross, Headteacher and now Principal at The Richmond Primary Academy, said:

 “This is such an exciting time for the school. Since my arrival in September 2022, we have been driving school improvements. On our own, this has been like riding on a pushbike. With the DRET team, I feel like I’m going to be driving improvements in a Formula 1 car! 

“The DRET team will provide the extra knowledge and support that our current, small team finds tricky. With the Trust alongside us, we will be able to achieve our goals more effectively and in a much shorter time frame – improving the experience and outcomes for all our children. DRET has a clear vision to help us deliver the high-quality educational experience and amazing extracurricular opportunities that the children need and deserve.” 

Stuart Burns, Chief Executive at DRET, said:

 “Everyone at DRET is delighted to welcome The Richmond School to our family of schools.

“I know a lot of hard work has already taken place with this partnership. We are very much looking forward to building on the school’s strengths and providing a world class education for local children, broadening their horizons with outstanding opportunities in sport and the arts.”

“We have high ambitions for all our pupils and we are absolutely dedicated to supporting young people in Skegness.”