Richard Lander School

An excellent school where students and staff are respected with a good level of learning and attainment - enjoyed it a lot!

I’m an ex student from this horrific school! As long as you do the work and wear appropriately lengthened skirts they don’t care, the teachers won’t speak to you unless your wearing to much makeup or chewing gum. If you ask so called “teachers” for help about bullying then we’re told they have a crush on us and go back to lesson. Would give 0 stars if I could.

Having had two boys attend this school, they both had a terrible experience. The building and facilities are good but the head teacher was once described to me by an assistant head at a different school as “a psychopath”. He had left his leadership team due to the heads behaviour.

They say a fish rots from the head down and this head is rotten. He is everything that a head shouldn’t be… if I could describe him to anyone….. imagine a personality cross between Patrick Bateman and Sadiq khan with the look of an aging ruddy faced camp gameshow host/morning TV presenter with a host of super injunctions.

He seems to have an issue with dealing with men and he has hired a clique of women to hide behind when he goes over the top in a rage and gets up in the face of year 11 lads and offers them to have fights “man to man”. When the parents hold him to account for his behaviour he scurries off to his office and sends one of the women out to make excuses for him.

It’s clear he has Daddy issues and displays misandrist attitudes toward the boys trying to tell them there’s a patriarchy and that they should be ashamed for being young men.
There is a general intolerance of boys and this school does not cater for any children that are anything other than robotic.

The school has staffing issues constantly and a large proportion of the teachers do almost a
anything to not be in the school at any opportunity.

I think you can tell a lot about a school if you see how they handled lockdown. Needless to say…. The head provided zero leadership or support to parents, the online lessons were sporadic and substandard. Communication was terrible and they wanted to stay locked down for as long as they could possibly get away with.

Richard Lander School, folks, is an absolute rollercoaster of absurdity that defies all logic. You won't believe the nonsense I've witnessed within these walls, but here goes:

The school's new water system is outlandish. It dispenses water with floating lemons and mint leaves, and ever since I started drinking it, I've been having nightmares about Rick Astley. I mean, really? Lemons, mint, and "Never Gonna Give You Up" on repeat in my dreams? It's like a bad acid trip.

Apparently, the school is secretly run by Tesco's pharmacy division. I've seen pharmacists in lab coats conducting experiments in the chemistry lab, and they keep offering to sell me discounted ibuprofen between classes. What's that got to do with education? Beats me.

Now, brace yourself for this revelation: the canteen is allegedly run by none other than Jeffery Bezos. I kid you not. The menu includes "Amazonian" delicacies like drone-delivered hamburgers and Prime-speed pizza. And guess what? The school has its own "Amazon Rainforest" in the courtyard.

Things get even crazier in the basement. I stumbled upon an electrician trying to program a virus to take over the world using a potato as a computer. Yes, a potato! I didn't stick around to ask questions because, honestly, who programs viruses with vegetables?

And last but not least, the PE kit. Rumor has it that it's made from dolphin skin. I have no idea why, but I'm not even sure it's legal. Maybe the school thinks it will make us swim faster? It's so bonkers..

In summary, Richard Lander School is a riotous carnival of confusion. If you're looking for a hilariously surreal educational experience that makes no sense whatsoever, this place is the absolute pinnacle of nonsense. Just remember to wear your dolphin-skin PE kit, and keep an eye out for flying hamburgers and potato-powered world-domination schemes!

This school is shit. Mr mcdonagh is a bellend. They can’t run a school for shit. Should knock it down to save the children

When i was in primary school i was never good at maths and after going here I came out worse.

When I first started year 7 they placed me in set 3, within a matter of days i got knocked down to set 6 as soon as they realised I struggled with the subject. When youre put in set 6 the teachers literally just give up on you. Those who struggle and actually need support are always overshadowed by loud, rowdy and rude students whose behaviour never gets corrected as thats how the teachers expect the mental capacity of set 6 students to be.

When Id talk to my friends who were in sets above me I was shocked by the amount of the maths curriculum that the teachers couldn't be bothered to teach us. Other than bar charts and such we had never done anything properly to do with graphs (atleast that i can remember as most of the class was just the teacher spewing out behaviours and attempting to scald students) I also never really learnt proper algebra amd other topics but it wasn't like I was ever going to learn how to, as i said, set 6 classes were an absolute trash heap and my parents couldn't afford a tutor for me (howd you think i ended up in richard lander in the first place lol). In the end I resorted to asking my friend to teach me some of the maths but even then i was extremely overwhelmed as i couldnt understand most of it and ended up breaking down.

In the end I got a 2 at gcse. I was horrofied but what was I supposed to do? There was nowhere i could turn to for support and I felt so embarrassed.

Today I have enrolled In truro college and I am glad to say that I retook my gcse maths test and passed. The lecturers here have one thing that the teachers at rls never had and that was passion for their subjects and students. My maths lecturer taught me how to see maths as more of a challenge than a chore and i really appreciate him for doing so. I got the happy ending. Most of the others who are dumped in set 6 of that garbage heap dont.

I'm a pretty average student, I don't make trouble, but please please please fix this school!
First off- it’s got too many people for its size. Corridors get crowded during changeover, and there's not enough staff doing what students need.
School communications are awful, there is about four people in reception?!
I wish there was more space outside they don't have a school field and so we have to use the college's. No room to run around / play ball games!
GCSE results appear to be good, reality is a lot of parents get tutors- we copy out of a text book in maths!!!

Conclusion is, really, education there would be easier done at home, pastoral staff don't exist, and you have to be extroverted/ have thick skin.

Really bad school doesnt care about mental health all they care about is makeup and skirts. Wet icl

I hate this school boring doesn’t help and doesnt care about thing like mental health and adhd all they care about it skirts and makeup, bare wet.

Absolutely awful school. The teachers and so called “support” staff don’t care about mental health let alone the senior staff. The senior staff are the worst, they belittle students and compare Students problems to other students. I left this school with multiple mental health issues - some of which are linked to my time at Richard Lander. When I told support staff and a member of the SLT that I felt depressed and like I didn’t want to be here anymore they completely ignored it and sent me promptly back to lesson telling me I was being silly. The teachers don’t really teach, only flick through a PowerPoint and get you to make notes. I have left this school but my siblings still go and get absolute hell. The headmaster called her out in the corridor for her eyelashes (she wears extensions because they fell out due to stress at school) and she has had a similar experience to me; full of anxiety, depression and stress.

The school is great , if you are a parent. Every year there’s a fight to get kids in. It’s not worth it. Trust me in this.
Some of the problems are:

- Vaping
twelve year olds openly vape in front of teachers, but as of yet nothing has been done to stop it. This is illegal , by the way.

- Uniform
The uniform is strict, I don’t mind that so much as the money making around it. Skirts , Polo shirts, jumpers must be bought from the school (expensive) The PE kit is especially disappointing. Mine wore out after a term. The socks always look dirty, Why can’t we wear normal ones? If the school are going to have a strict uniform policy, then it needs to be affordable. Also what’s the thing with no white socks?

- Mental health
If you’ve had any problems with your mental health in the past, don’t come. Theres nothing out there for the poor mental health of most of us in the school . I’ve suffered with depression recently and the school offered no help.

- SENCO
SENCO is pretty non- existent. I have dyslexia and have had problems with it. I’ve never heard from them, my parents had to chase them up, still no reply. Unless you are having tantrums in the classroom then you’re dead to them

- Outdoor space
It’s all concrete apart from a small patch on a hill. They don’t even have their own field, Instead they use the college field. It’s pretty sad, no games or running really.

-Canteen
Food is average. Cakes have hair in them, Perfume favour pizza.

- curriculum
People seem to get good GCSE results. I copy from a textbook in maths. Really nothing there you can’t do at home . The music and drama department is good though, I really like the plays they put on.

Basically, if you can don’t bother. It’s not worth the pain.

shambolic school, the LRSC TA treat you like sh**.
will not be ever recommending this school to anyone, i will be never send my kids to this school in the future

Sexist, homophobic, racist and overall offensive school. They objectify the women and my daughter said that her male pe teacher paid someone in her year to climb up a rope because she didn't have shorts on.
I do not recommend.
Do not choose this school.

I left the school after yr 8 and it wasn't great.If your in the lower sets you don't matter,you could be getting sixes on tests and just because your in a lower set you will be told to aim for a 5.Another person I know who left had a noose put around their neck by a class mate and was told to kill themselves multiple times,the school did nothing about this.A friend who had a difficult home life and had been self harming was not helped by the school aswell.The SENCO is rude and will not help anyone.one of my siblings was refused extra time on GCSEs even after being diagnosed with ADHD.Many of the kids will be smoking and vaping while in school which the teachers will know.A friend was being harassed by someone and defended himself and was punched in the face by this kid.even though it was in lesson changeover and many people saw the school only agreed to check the cameras because they didn't believe him despite his visibly bruised face.The kids there will constantly be swearing at eachover and saying slurs.There were vietnamese twins in my class and as English wasn't their first language they often didn't understand things people would say to them,kids took this to their advantage and would say racist things to them everyday.uniform is all that the school cares about.in assemblies they talk about what a great school it is,it's not.Bullying, harassment and racism are things that happen on the daily here.The best parts of the day are break lunch and leaving the school at the end of the day everything else just sucks.Music lessons are the only good lessons in my opinion,they have alot of instruments to use(drums, acoustic guitars, bass guitars and a lot of keyboards) other than the music lessons the others aren't great.There are are 2 secondary state school around here and still somehow it's the better one.if you can't afford to send your kids to a private school you should move.these schools are bad.

The school isn’t the worse, but it’s certainly not good. Considering we are not even half way into october, this academic year I have already received 14 behaviours. NONE of these are for rudeness, no effort, or backchat they are all for my skirt, the logo on my socks and the length of my socks. I have mental health issues and when i went to talk to the ‘staff’ they did not help me, they behavioured me for my socks and sent me back to class without me being able to talk to anyone. I am not bullied at this school but the amount of kids i are getting picked on is appalling. The racism, sexism, homophobia is ridiculous. The teaching is very very good but only for some people. The way they work is If your clever they care, if your not- they don’t. Please think twice about sending your child here.

I am bullied every single day. I have reported it to student report multiple times (close to 10) but all they did was say "Don't do that." like once. Other times they do nothing.

It's ridiculous.
They also care about socks. I asked a tecaher why we couldn't wear trainer socks and he said that it was "sexu4lly distracting,"....

WHO IS SEXU4LLY ATTRACTED TO ANKLES?
Who says "Omg, look at them s3xy ankles 😏"

I wouldn't reconnect sending your kid there.
I found a hair in my canteen food and it was really, really long

They just teach useless stuff and don’t care about our mental health or what job we want to do

This school has everyone fooled.
I've heard people say that it's the best school in the area. I have to admit, they have the outside world wrapped around their finger.
They celebrate mental health awareness week but if a child has a panic attack or is having a hard and mentally challenging time they say, "Your just attention seeking."

Their way of dealing with bullying is awful. They celebrate Anti-Bullying week but don't care if a child is bullied.
I am constantly bullied. I'd tell you why but I don't want too because well, I just don't.
They call me names and pick on me for things I can't control.
I was bullied for moving down a set, I get called names too and not a single lesson goes by were I don't have someone picking on me. The seating plans suck.

The canteen food has hairs in it. Gross, if you ask me. I purchased a cake a few months ago and I found a very long, brown hair on it. And it's not mine because i'm not a brunette.

They care very deeply about the colour of our socks. They even care if they're ankle socks.

If you are trying to decide if you should send your kid to RLS or another school. I recommend the other school.
The only thing good about this school is that is safe-ish. They sometimes leave doors unlocked however.

I would give no stars , so much bullying ,my boy has his bikes kicked in so many times in 3 years I've paid thousands. Told to buy decent rugby boots at lockdown, on long term sick bought nikes never worn. Allowed to swear in school, allowed to pick on and bully nothings ever said I've rung about my boy alot they tell him they've spoken to me but I can prove they never have.just him getting asked which makes bullying worse ,I'm sure teachers like kids leaving broken

Ok so I really dont recommend sending your kids to this school. They all think anyone with a mental health issue is attention seeking and should just "get on with it and go home" I WAS LITERALLY TOLD THIS AFTER I WAS FORCED TO TELL THEM ABOUT CUTTING MYSELF.
This school makes me sick and I'm not surprised if it makes people depressed and anxious just thinking about going in. Not to mention the teachers little golden boys and girl who will just go on bullying and bullying it's not ok.