Girls are about to join the classrooms at a public school which has been all-boys throughout its almost 80-year history.

Malsis School, at Glusburn, has also launched a £200,000 fundraising campaign to raise cash to finance a bursary scheme and to pay for new sports facilities.

September will see the first input of girls at the 120-pupil fee-paying boarding school which takes pupils from ages seven to 13. The school costs £8,500 per academic year.

New head-teacher John Elder is due to arrive in September from Beeston Hall co-educational preparatory school in Norfolk.

He says: "My wife, Hanneke, and I believe totally in co-education - especially for younger children. We are totally confident it will succeed having seen it working at beeston."

He hopes eventually to increase the school pupil-count to 180, including 60 girls.

Trevor Wilson, deputy head and director of the appeal, says the bursary scheme will be set up to help a promising student meet the cost of education at Malsis. "We have launched a £100,000 fundraising campaign to make it viable," he says. "It will be a long-term project which will allow us to offer a place to someone from age 11."

Malsis is aiming to set up a link with Sedbergh School in Cumbria so that the assisted pupil could carry on with education at an independent school if it was felt the candidate is suitable, explains Mr Wilson. "It would be wrong of us to set up the scheme and then after three years for it to end when the student reached 13," he says.

The other £100,000 is to pay for new sporting facilities which are expected to be completed this year. They will include four tennis courts, two five-a-side pitches and a three-quarter size hockey pitch.

One of the major fundraising events is planned for Saturday, July 11, when a Millennium Ball will be held in a marquee in the school grounds. Over 400 people are expected to attend, paying £50 a head or £500 for a table. Entertainment will be by Mixed Feelings, who have performed at Oxford and Cambridge balls and for the Royal Variety Club of Great britain.

Three days earlier, the marquee will be used for a lunchtime fashion show with clothes from London-based fashion house Kings Hall and a number of other local fashion organisations. Tickets are £20 including lunch.

School news, page 9

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