Private School News

SENIOR APPOINTMENTS AT FYLDE INDEPENDENT

One of the region’s oldest independent schools has bolstered its senior management team with two key appointments.

Rossall School, Fleetwood has appointed Anton Maree, 44, as Deputy Headmaster, the post vacated by Fergus Livingstone, who has moved to Lord Wandsworth College in Hampshire to become Headmaster.

Anton joins Rossall following seventeen years at King William’s College, Isle of Man, a senior boarding school, where for the last eight years he held the post of Head of Boarding. He joined the school in 1992 from Sandringham High School, Johannesburg and was a boarding house master, prior to his promotion to Head of Boarding.

Whilst in South Africa, Anton completed his two years national service with the South African Defence Force, where he rose to the rank of full lieutenant. He served with the SADF in South West Africa and was one of the last of his country’s forces to work with troops of the United Nations Transition Assistance Group prior to the independence of Namibia in 1989.

Born in Grahamstown in South Africa’s Eastern Cape region, Anton was educated at Queen’s College Boy’s High School, Queenstown, before attending Rhodes University in Grahamstown, where he gained a BA in English and History and was the University’s resident disc jockey. He is married to Alison and the couple have two children, Amberly, 14, and Angus, 12. The family will live on campus at the 165 -year-old Fleetwood boarding and day school.

The second key appointment is that of Gillian Pryor, 36, the former Sherborne School, Head of Maths who has joined Rossall as Director of Studies. Prior to her four years at Sherborne in Dorset, Gillian spent eight years at King’s Bruton School, Somerset, as a maths teacher and latterly as Head of Maths.

In 1994 Gillian graduated from Durham University with a BSc in Mathematics. She is a native of Rotherham in South Yorkshire and is married to husband, Mark, who has also joined Rossall as a maths teacher. She lists running and sailing as two of her favourite pursuits, and following the successful completion of this year’s ‘Race for Life’ in aid of Cancer Research UK plans to run in regional events supporting charities in the coming year.

Commenting on the appointments, Rossall School’s Headmaster, Dr Stephen Winkley said: “In Anton and Gillian we have two people with excellent credentials and a real passion for quality education. They will both play a pivotal role in the development of the School in the coming years as we improve further our academic provision and expand our boarding capabilities to cope with increased numbers of pupils wishing to board.

“Our recruitment figures for boarding are increasing year on year with UK and overseas boarders joining in healthy numbers, which augers well for the school, despite the gloomy global economic picture. The addition of two such experienced figures at this time will help us to achieve our goals as quickly as possible.”