Uffculme School

While the teachers, especially welfare teachers, were lovely and encouraging (despite being overworked), this school was the worst experience of my life. Zero support shown for students with learning disabilities, I know multiple people who had to leave due to severe lack of support. Massive bullying, violence and drug problems. It’s a very reputable school that gets good grades, but please consider before sending your child here, especially if they have learning disabilities or struggle with learning. There were very good extracurricular opportunities available, and the teacher who ran the Flexible Learning Centre is very friendly and good at dealing with students.

I get this school needs to be back at top but all it’s about is ‘attending school’ and most people don’t go to school because of bullying and scared of getting judged. The prices on meals have gone up a lot after multiple parents like myself have requested it to be lower prices that is affordable, hygiene is disgusting as my child has told me about period products everywhere in the females room. Many of my emails have been ignored and are only answered if mentioned in a parents meeting, meaning my child’s problems aren’t solved until i talk to the school in person. Also when a child is thirsty/needs to use the bathroom, it is ignored until they either are bursting or they have a ‘bottle pass’. My child cannot control their bladder or if they are thirsty. In conclusion, i regret letting my child into this secondary school and want to remove them but cannot due to work wise.

My son in Year 10 has been bullied immensely at this school, verbally and also physically. The school lie and say it never happened when I knows for a fact it did as there's evidence. They treat you worse the more you report things as clearly they don't give a care in the world about their students. The school DOES have a noticeable bullying problem, many of my friends children have been bullied severely here. The reason i've given two stars not 1 is that the education is okay, but not anything special. Certainly average in the whole scheme of things. Also the trips are completely overpriced. Overall my advice would be to stay away from Uffculme School.

Apart from individual teachers who I shall not name, this school DOES NOT care about your child. Yes, they may get good grades but their mental well-being WILL BE sacrificed. I left this school recently, had to go back to collect my results and I had a mental breakdown, it felt like a cult, you didn't realise you were being treated so badly until you left. Again, they have the Ofsted ratings but they have all their issues under the rug. They won't help your children develop, they'll just push them until they break that's the sad truth

I love it here I wish I didn’t have to go to college my grades are amazing .

these reviews are all mostly fake, if you go to any other schools you experience much worse treatment of students. It’s my home and I love it here everyone has a group and bullying is almost no existent most kids just go about their business learning is easy and fun and teachers are great I have friends who’s grades have improved a lot since coming here. All of the people writing the negatives have never been to a different school and don’t know that this school is outstanding .

I left Uffculme in 2021. Don’t get me wrong the education was great but you were only worth the effort if you were smart and picked up on things quickly. I had a very rough childhood which left me with low self esteem and later on mental health issues - these started while I was in year 9. I also had undiagnosed ADHD which was left unseen and untreated until I was 18. To them I was ‘too young’ to have difficulties or be depressed, so therefore I was given no help. There was an incident in November 2018 where I was called an “attention seeker” by the safeguarding lead and in front of the school counsellor which later had massive effects on me. I had suffered in silence due to this for ages until year 11 when I had a breakdown and ended up hospitalised and that’s when they decided that I needed support from them. Due to their lack of care and support, after I’d left and went into college I developed severe mental health issues which left me detained (sectioned in a psychiatric hospital) under the mental health act multiple times, in and out of hospitals and extremely unwell. I genuinely thought I didn’t deserve help and for anyone to care about me until I went to college and met the kindest staff members and learnt that it was normal for teachers/safeguarding leads to help you. That’s how awful their mental health support is. If you didn’t achieve good grades or live up to their unrealistic expectations that they have for every single student who have their own individual needs and experiences, it’s like they pushed you aside and shoved you into a class full of other students like you. I remember when they took pictures of classrooms full of students to put on the school website to show off the school they didn’t show the lower set classrooms, only the top sets which made a lot of students feel quite upset. I got fairly average GCSE’s but I could’ve made such a better life for myself if they’d just cared, but they didn’t. Students who didn’t have good grades didn’t get help, they got treated like nothing. That’s my opinion on the school, unless you’re smart you’re nothing to them.

Hand on my heart I cannot fault Uffculme School and all it has done for me; the facilities and extracurricular is fantastic and the support you get within the class room is fabulous. The teachers genuinely care about each individual student and will do all they can to work with that student and support them. I have come out of Uffculme with great grades, great friends and most importantly great memories.

Other reviews that are low are all from kids who have never been outside the south west. Uffculme is a great school obviously not perfect but there is hardly any bullying and exceptional results.

Academically there was so much pressure to keep up with the results from exams from previous years and you could tell in a lot of cases this was all that the teachers cared about. I was never taught HOW to revise, they just expect you to know. The trips I managed to go on were amazing however and they had pretty good support for students and their families struggling financially. The performing arts opportunities were by far the best bit.

I’m a former student and they don’t do anything about bullying, I was bullied quite badly there and when I told them about it, they did nothing. There was also a point where my mental health was bad and they didn’t help me with that either. The teachers don’t really care about the students themselves they just pressure about GCSEs and mocks all the time. The school isn’t as great as it seems.

I loved uffculme. I mainly liked it because of my teachers, they were always willing to support me if they could. A few people here have said that they weren’t very good support but if you asked for it I found them to be very good. I have mental health issues and a joint disability and the school were very accommodating to my needs- sometimes I needed to say what I needed by overall it was great. My tutor and head of year were amazing and advocated for me in class, with doctors and mental health professionals. I also took part in many performing arts clubs which I loved and now miss. I loved uffculme. I have only put three stars for food because I found it to be quite expensive and as someone on pupil premium it could be a little bit frustrating but was good at the end of the day. I have also put three stars for handling of bullying as I was not personally bullied at the school so don’t fully know their handling but when I was a witness to bullying, they took it very seriously.

The school doesn’t care about what the students have to say they only care about the results that they get out of you at the end it’s hard to get tour point across as they won’t listen and will just turn you down or say that tour being rude. They put a hole lot of pressure about getting great results from the moment you step into a classroom in year 7 till the moment you take your exams in year 11 I have had trouble with bully’s in the past and all they said was leave them alone and didn’t try and address the matter any more. Tbh the school is a good one for there results but not good as building your self-esteem

The teacher don’t listen to you when you say anything to them other than oh yeah well done and the teacher cannot control there classes.Most of the teacher I feel aren’t even good enough to be there as they always get correct even by the set 3 students. There was also a incident when I was in year 8 someone stole 7 phone and £20 the teachers accused the wrong person of doing it and punished an innocent individual for something they didn’t do (I am not this person). The teacher also don’t help the people who need help they help the more intelligent people in the room which isn’t a good thing and most of the teacher do the bare minimum to encourage there students to try in the subject. The teacher also do a lack of revision before exams

I enjoyed my time there but it was difficult at times to feel my voice being heard and the mental health help there is not close to up to par. I really enjoyed the music department because they are amazing there and have such a passion for creativity but some ways of dealing with problems of students needs to be done. School meals are way too expensive may I add.

They don’t care about students. They support them well academically but provide no efficient mental support and once a teacher/head of staffs member has a problem with you then they will continue to pick on you and use any excuse to send you out of lesson/exclude you that is possible. Also doesn’t help bullying and racism that goes on...

I used to go to Uffculme and I've had 2 siblings go there before me and 1 there now. We've been in a variety of sets and all have different favourite subjects, but all of us have loved it. The welfare support is particularly good, and I found they handled bullying quite efficiently. The only area I'd say they weren't great was music (but I'm pretty sure they've got a new head of music) and computer science (which may have also changed). Overall people get good grades and offer lots of academic support if you're willing to stay back or spend a lunchtime with a teacher.

I used to go to this school and I was bullied constantly the school done nothing much about it my dad was able to message the student and ask to stop and it worked but I the school could do a lot better in that part. I took part in lots of school activity’s and loved each one I am now a personal trainer and love it thanks to this school. PE was one of my favourite lessons but I think it was a bit pointless to make the children get dressed at the end of the day if their lesson was period 5 I know that I had PE on a Wednesday period 5 and I got the cullumpton bus so I almost missed it a couple times but overall this school had helped me be where I am today Keep doing what your doing uffculme school

Over the years that I have been at this school, I have gone through a few personal struggles. In every single case, I have been supported by some amazing teachers and peers.

I truly believe that this school is exceptional at what it does and, whilst it has changed slightly throughout my time here, it still remains a happy and safe environment for students and staff alike.