Headteacher’s Welcome

Quality Learning, Quality Teaching, Quality Environment

‘Articulate, questioning, tolerant and independent young women’

Penwortham Girls’ High School enjoys a unique status, as the only non-selective, non-fee paying girls’ school in Lancashire. We welcome girls of all abilities, interests and aptitudes, and pride ourselves on our long-standing reputation for academic success. We are a successful school because we have high expectations, promote learning for its own sake and provide every opportunity for personal growth and development. Importantly, we are specialists in girls’ education, providing a nurturing, supportive and challenging environment where girls excel. 

 At our school, traditional values meet with modern, innovative approaches to learning. We are a forward-thinking school that has invested considerably in new technology, ensuring that when they leave us, our pupils are fully equipped for the future. However, equally important are the qualities we instil in the girls. We have developed an environment that supports them as individuals, enabling them to progress to the next stage of their life equipped with a sense of achievement, maturity and self-confidence.

We also want pupils to leave us with wonderful memories and our extensive range of additional opportunities, both within and outside the classroom, allows girls to develop their individual characters and talents and to fulfil their dreams and aspirations.

As every Headteacher will tell you, a prospectus can give only a brief glimpse of school life and that you cannot fully appreciate a school until you visit it during a normal day. This is particularly true of our school, where visitors always comment on the friendly and happy atmosphere. Indeed, upon my own first visit, I was immediately impressed by its warmth and concern for the individual. For this reason, I would urge you to visit us during a working day to experience, first-hand, the ethos of our school.

I am immensely proud to be the Headteacher of a school with a proud past and such a promising future. I look forward to welcoming you.

Mrs Karen Pomeroy

My name is Olivia, and I am proud to represent Penwortham Girls’ High School as the current Head Girl. I strongly believe that, as the mission statement proves, PGHS is a bridge supporting us from childhood to womanhood; teaching us not only important academic skills, but vital life skills that ensure we are ready for the future. Since starting here in year 7, I have personally felt the safe, warm, and welcoming atmosphere that you experience on a day-to-day basis. However, if problems do occur, students are provided with a wide range of ways to access support, including mental health first aiders, form tutors, the school nurse, and buddy groups – a small support bubble made up of one student from each year group meeting regularly to build a network of peer support.

Being a student at PGHS is a fulfilling experience involving not only the lessons, but the memories made outside of learning including the wide variety of trips, extra-curricular activities, and our termly literature, language, arts and STEM festivals.

The school is extremely passionate about promoting pupil voice and creates student’s that are eager to have an impact in school, locally, internationally, and nationally. Therefore, PGHS does not just achieve fantastic exam results, it achieves the mission statement of creating articulate, questioning, tolerant, and independent women for the future.

Head Girl: 

My name is Olivia and alongside being Head Girl, I am the current Student Leader for charity at Penwortham Girls’. My role in school is to encourage PGHS students to fulfil as many of the school values through charitable work. I work alongside Mr Herbert organising charity events in school including the annual Passport walk for the charity ‘SLEAP’ combatting youth homelessness, stalls on Sport’s Day for the Ukrainian refugee crisis, the McMillan coffee morning, the Halloween spooky walk, charity non-uniform days, and many more. My aim in school is to create more engagement from pupils in taking part in charity work. I believe that as young people, our generation is facing more and more crisis across the world in need of support; therefore, we should be learning and understanding now, while we are young, how we can combat these issues and how to have more empathy and compassion for those facing difficulty.

Deputy Head Girl: 

Hello, my name is Lola and I am in charge of Participation on the Student Leadership Team. Within this role I work alongside Mrs Honeyman, to make sure there is a wide range of extra-curricular opportunities and clubs for all students at PGHS, as joining clubs is a fantastic way to make new friends and grow our school community. Our current aims for the upcoming year are to collect feedback from pupils who have recently been on school trips and have participated in clubs so that we can add quotes to the website about the student’s experiences. We are also planning to have an Awards Breakfast Morning for all those who have been nominated as keen participators and have tried to get involved with the extra curricular opportunities the school has to offer.

Student Leadership Team:

Hello, my name is Maryam and I represent Environment on the Student Leadership Team. I work with Mr Ward, and our current priorities are to install recycling bins around school to reduce the amount of waste we produce. We are also hoping to create a wild meadow on the field, to attract animals and wildlife.

Hello, my name is Grace, and I am honoured to be part of the Student Leadership Team and to have the responsibility for the Teaching and Learning Council. My role in the school, is to revisit the learning charter with Mrs Woodhouse and discuss how it can be changed to be more fun, interactive, and better for all pupils. Everyone learns differently, so if the learning charter is only suitable for a certain group of learners it will be harder for others to understand! My plans for this year are to create more interactive tasks and game sites available, to create pupil surveys on how they feel subjects can be improved and act upon requests and to have a pupil newspaper at the end of the year to highlight the year and our successes.

Hi, my name is Rebecca and I represent the Creative Minds council alongside Mrs. Cattanach. I believe that creative minds is important as it gets the students participating in the more exciting opportunities within school whilst still having the educational benefit with each activity. My aims for this year within creative minds is to plan more form competitions and activities to allow students to be even more creative!

My name is Tilly and I am a member of the Student Leadership Team, my main area of focus is Revision for All. I am working with Mrs Sweeney to promote revision techniques. One of our aims is to help the younger years find effective methods of revision so that by Year 11 they have mastered these skills.

Hi, my name is Maarya and I am the leader of the Respect Council working alongside Mrs Hall. Our aim is to make everyone feel safe and respected in our school community. We want to hear pupil’s voices and make everyone feel heard. At the moment, we are working on the period poverty project and giving away free sanitary products every Tuesday. We want pupils to not shy away from addressing these topics. We also have many other weeks coming up in school such as empathy week. If you have any ideas, concerns or questions please come and talk to me.

Hi, my name is Isla and I lead the Happy Minds Council.  My main aim is to ensure there continues to be no stigma around mental health in school, and to help every student to feel comfortable talking about it. I want our new Year 7’s to have the best support system for their wellbeing in school, and to know how they can help and support their friends if needed. I plan to promote good mental health amongst all our students alongside my Senior Leadership Team link, Mr Ramsdale.  

New Student Leadership Team: (April 2023)

We would like to proudly introduce you to our new Student Leadership Team. As Year 11 become increasingly focussed on their forthcoming examinations, students in Year 10, after a rigorous application process, now take over this responsibility.   There were many applications for the eight positions on the Student Leadership Team and sadly we cannot appoint them all. The students who took the opportunity to apply all did so with incredible maturity and reading their applications was truly humbling. 

Hello, I’m India and I work alongside Mrs Cattanach to promote the Creative Minds Council. We work with students from each year group to curate the creative events and festivals around the school. We hope to work towards encouraging creative participation from students in and out of lessons with events such as the Performing Arts Festival at the end of the year. 

Hi, I am Francesca. I am part of the Student Leadership Team and I lead the Respect Council working alongside Mrs Hall. I aim to ensure that the school is a safe and welcoming place for all by tackling issues such as respect and equality. 

Hi, I’m Mya and I work alongside Mrs Woodhouse in the Student Leadership Team on the Teaching and Learning action team. We work with Year 8 and I look forward to implementing ideas, giving students the best learning resources to achieve their full potential. It’s important for the students to be provided with best curricular in order to thrive. 

Hello, My name is Jennah and I am the representative for the participation sector. I work alongside Mrs Honeyman to promote participation within the extra-curricular commitments and encourage students to partake in as much as possible in order to get the most out of their time here at PGHS! 

Hi, My name is Vanika and I’m working with Mrs Sweeney to find new efficient ways for students to revise and make this easier. We help students by giving them different methods to revise so that they can find the best way for them. We are aware revision can be daunting and want to make it simpler for everyone. 

Hello, I am Fatima-Zahra and I am the Head of the Charity section of the Student Leadership Team. I work alongside Mr Herbert to promote and support a variety of charities and to build a greater awareness of the importance of charity and volunteer work in school. I hope to form great connections with a range of charities and as a school I hope to have a positive impact on our school and local community. I am also a member of a variety of charity organisations outside of school. I hope I can use my knowledge and experiences to build even greater respect and equality at PGHS.

I am Libby and I am working with Mr Ramsdale on the Happy Minds Council. At the moment, we are making plans to celebrate Mental Health Awareness week in May. The Student Leadership Team are also working collectively to plan for the King’s Coronation and my role within that is to plan competitions for each year group. 

Hi, I’m Maisie and I work with Mr Ward on the Environment Council. We work with Y9 promoting working together towards creating a better environment in school.