The Surbiton High School Podcast

In this episode, we visit the school on its Multicultural Day - a day where students share food, dances and clothes that reflect their cultural heritage.

In this episode, we sit down with Stuart Bird, Rachel Lawson (Outreach and Partnerships Team) and a selection of student volunteers to tell us about the Surbiton High School Community Bank in Kingston. We learn about how donations are collected sorted and given to people in society who need them most.

In this episode, we sit down with Principal Matthew Shoults and talk about how and why Surbiton High School became involved in the UAUK scheme, and how we feel our community benefits by being host to a dozen Ukrainian students.

In this episode, we sit down with a dozen students from Ukraine who visited us in November 2025 as part of the UAUK student visitor scheme. This saw students live with host families in our communities and attend lessons and activities at Surbiton High School for a fortnight. We hear about their experiences on this trip, including: eating British and international food, sight-seeing around London,...

In this episode, we sit down with Dionne King the Head of Learning Support (SENCO). We learn about how our specialist team works with SEN and EAL students to support their learning from Year 7 all the way through to Year 13.

In this episode, we sit down with Jonny Gall, Head of Hockey at Surbiton High School and talk about what makes our hockey offering particularly special: what is special about our staff, how do we schedule training for our students, and how have our hockey teams been performing this last season?

In this episode, we sit down with author and alumnus, Jacob North. While at Surbiton high school, Jacob was mentored by Stuart Bird our Writer in Residence and Deputy Head of English. A decade later, Jacob has his first book out, ‘Ice Apprentices’ and is working on his follow-up in the series as well as other projects. Reunited after a decade, Stuart and Jacob talk about the writing process and th...

In this episode, we sit down with Polly Rumbold, Head of Development, Alumni Relations and Whole School Events, and talk about celebrating our 141st Founders’ Day. We talk about our church service at St Mark’s Church, our hymns, the traditional iced buns and the importance of marking Founders’ Day each year.

In this episode of the podcast, we sit down with Surbiton High School’s new Principal, Matthew Shoults. We get to know a bit about his background, what brought him into teaching, his first impressions of Surbiton High School and his thoughts on what makes a worthwhile 21st century education.

In this episode, we sit down with the senior school librarian, Joe Humphreys, and we talk about one of our new charity focuses for the next few years: The Cold Feet Foundation, Nepal. The goal of this charitable endeavour is to support a school that has very little to its name. In the episode, Joe describes the lack of funding, lack of resources, and lack of suitable space for teaching & learning,...

In this episode, we sit down with Jon White, Academic Mentor, and talk about degree apprenticeship schemes – an alternate route in higher education. Jon’s career prior to coming to work for us included 25 years at a major IT company, where one of his roles was overseeing young trainees and degree apprenticeships. In this episode we talk about why some students might be more suited to this style of...

Fun fact: learning French, Spanish or German is a 100% applicable life skill if you go on a trip to Europe. So why don't we take our language skills in the classroom and put them to use on the continent! In this episode, we hear from Mme Paul and Señora Reyner about the importance of trips in the MFL department: what we offer at Surbiton, how these trips dovetail with other subjects, and we al...

In this third and final episode in our AI series, I sit down with Byron King (former VP from the Boy’s Prep, now working at Study Hall, an EdTech AI company), and we discuss our predictions for the future of education with AI. Some of these ideas are within grasp and others are a decade, if not more, away; but one thing is for sure, education is changing on the horizon and it is an exciting journe...

In this episode, I sit down with Byron King - former VP for learning and teaching at the Boys’ Prep, now working at Study Hall, an AI EdTech company. In this episode we talk about the specifics of what we have been up to from 2023 to 2024 when it comes to AI innovation in the classroom and sharing knowledge and best practice amongst all staff.

In this episode, we look back over the past 20 months (2022 to 2024) and we shine a spotlight on the early days of exploring AI solutions in the classroom. This is the first episode in a three-part series that showcases Surbiton High School’s practical research in AI.

Every two years the Music Department runs a music project called the GradeOneathon, which sees students teach teachers an instrument up to a grade one standard. This year we had 20 students teaching 20 teachers a range of instruments, including piano, cello, violin, flute, saxophone and harp. This episode was recorded on a Saturday morning amidst the teachers’ ABRSM exams. You will hear last minut...

In this episode we follow all of the prep that has gone into the mock election at Surbiton High School in summer 2024, including voter registration, voter ID, party political broadcasts, an episode of Question Time live, and of course, a secret ballot in the quad.

In this episode, Principal Rebecca Glover reflects on her seven years at Surbiton High School, including navigating the crisis management of an unexploded WW2 bomb, steering the school through the pandemic and the switch to remote learning, as well as the day-to-day and year-to-year events that make each year both challenging and special.

In this epsiode, we sit down with Head of Classics, Olivia Adams, and hear what Surbiton High School has to offer in terms of studying Latin, Ancient Greek and Classical Civilisations. In the second half of the episode, Classics teacher, Claire Speers, and two Sixth Form students share their favourite topics from their Classical Civilisations A Level course.

23rd April 2024 is Shakespeare Day! In today's episode we sit down and talk with Ms Huntley of the English Department and Mr Humphreys from the library and talk about the impact Shakespeare has had over time. This year's episode focuses in the importance of the first folio edition of Shakespeare's collected plays. 401 years ago, Shakespeare's plays were collected together for the f...

In this episode, we take you to Science Week at Surbiton High School. Arranged by the Science department, this is a week of experiments in the quad, guest speakers, the annual Science Fair and the Science House Quiz. This year, we were visited by alumnus, Charlotte Basilico, who now works at CERN, the "Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire", or European Council for Nuclear Researc...

In this episode, we sit down with Director of Sixth Form, Jon Owen, and learn about the A Level Options process at Surbiton High School, including Year 10 subject 'taster' days, one-to-one interviews, careers guidance as well as answering FAQs about the relationship between A Level options and university choices.

In today's episode, we sit down with Dave Webb, our Composer in Residence and learn about how he composes bespoke music for our school community. In this episode in particular, it talks about the special music project he was commissioned with to celebrate the school's 140th birthday.

In this episode, we sit down with Principal Rebecca Glover and celebrate the 140th birthday of our school. We discuss the history of the school, the values and how the school has grown and been shaped over time.

In this episode we talk with Year 9 Head of Year, Alex Higgins, about how we support our Year 9s in picking their GCSE options. The second half of this episode will include a re-broadcast from last year where we take you on a tour of the Year 9 GCSE options marketplace, where year 10 students who have been studying their GCSE course for a few months advise Year 9s in a marketplace format about why...