With its 130 year proud history Harrogate Ladies’ College is renowned throughout Yorkshire and beyond for its success in educating the women of tomorrow.

But as a modern and forward-thinking school, it takes its responsibility for all aspects of a child’s development very seriously and health and happiness is at the root of it all.

The health and well-being of pupils underpins the philosophy of Harrogate Ladies’ College. The school has an established well-being programme which includes a designated Mental Health Lead, a Head of Wellness, trained Wellness Champions and ambassadors, an elected Wellness Prefect and a purpose-built Wellness Centre.

The school devotes energy and effort into educating pupils about the importance of self-care and providing emotional support for friends and peers. It dedicates specific weeks of the year into lessons about understanding the importance of good mental health with initiatives such as ‘Tea and Talk’ sessions, opportunities to mentor younger pupils, and encourages pupils to enjoy creative sessions such as Art Club, spiritual enhancement through yoga and mindfulness and outdoor activities such as sport and gardening.

Harrogate Ladies' College wants its pupils to be happy and well-adjusted. Submitted picture

Helping girls Flourish

The school has developed an innovative ‘Flourish’ programme which embeds wellness and health across all aspects of school life. This includes an app which pupils are encouraged to use daily or several times a week to record how they are feeling.

This helps the school offer a wrap-around approach to each individual child. It gathers data about how the pupil is feeling as a snapshot of their emotional well-being and is unique to each individual. Trained staff can then decide if an intervention to support the pupil is required.

But this is also about building resilience. Principal Sylvia Betts explains: “It is important to look at pupils as a whole person – their emotional state and wellbeing will have an impact on performance.

The school has set up a health and wellbeing programme – called Flourish. Submitted picture

“We are trying to encourage the pupils to reflect on how they feel and give them the language and the opportunity to communicate that.”

She said it wasn’t just a way to monitor how someone was feeling – it’s okay to have a bad day, or just feel unhappy – but the approach is to make it easier to uncover and talk about any more serious underlying well-being issues and to develop not only an understanding of them but to develop coping mechanisms and help girls to express how they feel and give them opportunities to do so.

The “Team Around the Child” ethos in the school means that weekly meetings are held with staff from across the school where the well-being of every single child is looked at – which helps ensure no child slips through the net as far as identifying potential issues and supporting the child is concerned.

Extra support

WiSE@HLC (Women in Science and Engineering @Harrogate Ladies’ College) is a bespoke programme to encourage pupils to embrace science opportunities. Submitted picture

The school runs a number of extra-curricular clubs such as Baking Club and Art Club which are designed to improve pupils’ creativity and support their mental health. The culture of kindness and wellbeing is a regular focus during school assembles, form groups and PHSE lessons. Pupils undertake Wellness training to become Champions to promote positive mental health practices, encourage honest and open conversations about understanding mental health and share strategies to stay well, even in adverse times. The concept is to provide support and guidance across different year groups and creates an atmosphere of acceptance, tolerance and understanding for all pupils. It underpins the whole school approach to well-being. This extends to school staff, who are encouraged to understand their own well-being and mental health as part of school life. They offer peer support and have access to external counselling and staff wellness initiatives.

The dedicated Wellness Centre allows pupils access to trained health professionals as well as a pupil counsellor. As well as being on hand to deal with the medical and healthcare needs of pupils, the Wellness Centre team are also there for parents to work with them to provide a place to learn and develop strategies to look after their physical, mental and social wellbeing.

Find out more

Harrogate Ladies’ College is a finalist in the Independent School of the Year 2023 Awards in the Outstanding New Initiative category.

The school launched WiSE@HLC (Women in Science and Engineering @Harrogate Ladies’ College), which is a bespoke programme to encourage pupils to embrace Science opportunities, develop critical thinking in Science and Technology and rewards self-motivation in Science subjects, last year.

Prospective parents and pupils are invited to come and find out more about opportunities here, about the WiSE programme and the health and well-being ethos.

Harrogate Ladies’ College is open to day pupils and boarders. As a boarding school it is open longer than most and some day pupils can find themselves having breakfast right through to supper with their fellow boarders if they wish. Flexible boarding is also an option, whereby pupils may stay at school during the week, or even just the odd night.(insert link https://www.hlc.org.uk/boarding/weekly-and-flexi-boarding/)

The school is holding an open day on September 29 and a taster day on October 7 .

And to find out more about the benefits of attending an all-girls’ school click here

Health and wellbeing paramount for this Independent School in Yorkshire – open day and taster day announced