Heritage

Dame Allan’s Schools were founded in 1705, in the reign of Queen Anne and are two of the oldest schools in Newcastle upon Tyne . The Girls’ School is believed to be the eighth oldest independent girls' school in the country.

The Schools were founded by Dame Eleanor Allan, the daughter of a city goldsmith and the widow of a wealthy tobacco merchant, to provide a ‘proper’ education for 40 poor boys and 20 poor girls in the city parishes of St Nicholas and St John. 

From their early beginnings in the west of Newcastle, the Schools moved to College Street in the city centre. At this site the Schools had one of the first physics laboratories in Newcastle, we are incredibly proud of this and have honoured our roots with a brand new, state-of-the-art design technology suite at our present site in Fowberry Crescent, Fenham.

Over three hundred years after our foundation, we have a strong tradition of innovation in education and whilst we are immensely proud of our heritage, we are firmly focussed on the future. The education we provide today follows the pioneering Diamond Structure, we are the only school in Newcastle to offer this. This means we have a co-educational Junior School, single sex Senior Schools and a co-educational Sixth Form. We offer an enormous range of subjects inside and beyond the curriculum and our students are prepared not only for a broad spectrum of careers but also for life beyond Dame Allan’s. The Schools embrace technology, change and challenges in a way that sets an example for and motivates our students.