Woodlands School, Essex

Infobox UK school
name = Woodlands High School


size =
latitude = 51.564862
longitude = 0.456208
dms = dms
motto = The Best That I Can Be
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established =
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closed =
c_approx =
type = Comprehensive
religion =
president =
head_label = Headteacher
head = Mr Andy White
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founder =
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specialist = Arts College
street = Takely End
city = Basildon
county = Essex
country = England
postcode = SS16 5BA
LEA = Essex
ofsted = 115228
staff =
enrollment = 1507
gender = Coeducational
lower_age = 11
upper_age = 16
houses =
colours =
publication =
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website = http://www.woodlandsschool.essex.sch.uk/
website_name = www.woodlandsschool.essex.sch.uk

Woodlands School is a specialist school in performing arts. The head teacher is named as Mr. Andy White. It is a secondary school, based in Basildon, Essex. The school contains over 1500 pupils between the ages of 11 and 16, starting from year 7 and ending in year 11. This figure also includes approximately 110 staff. The school consists of an East Block (Food, Art and Maths) Middle Block (Science and Reception etc.) and a West Block (English and Languages etc.).

Woodlands offers English, Math, Science, Languages, Geography, History, Personal and Social Education, Performing Arts, Media Studies, Design Technology, Art and Physical Education.

Each year group has an assembly twice a week and finish every day at 3:45pm. Woodlands also start school at 8:50am and have 5 lessons a day.

Since 2005, the school has been working to expand its specialist performing arts status into the local community. However, lack of funding into the new Performing Arts Theatre meant that essential facilities such as disabled access and new toilets were not constructed. Community youth organisations are now working in partnership to use funding from Essex County Council's Youth Opportunities Fund and Youth Capital Fund to complete the construction of the Theatre.

Summer 2006 saw Woodlands School working with Creative Partnerships, The Basildon Arts Trust, Support Through Art, Loco Motion (Youth Group) and many other organisations to host an arts festival flagshipped by the surreal performance spectacular 'Einsteins Dreams.' The producers - Greg Klerkx and Sam Holdsworth - formed a new company called Nimble Fish after the success of Einsteins Dreams. In Spring 2006, a rape reportedly took place in the school during school hours. Several police officers taped off an external section of the East block whilst forensic investigations took place. The local newspapers reported the rape with front page coverage.

At the latest Ofsted inspection (2007), Woodlands achieved an 'outstanding' report and is ranked in the top 95% of the country's schools.Fact|date=March 2008.

Notable Alumni

*Phil Gardner, playwright and journalist