History

Founded in 1928

Ethel Joy Wragg, the founder of Sherrardswood, was a practical, down-to-earth person as well as a visionary. In the 1920s she spent a great deal of time visiting the "new era" schools of the day, generally known as progressive schools.

Following a holiday pottery course in 1928 at one such school, she found herself working there as a part-time teacher, looking after a group of eleven-year-olds. She went on to become one of the school's owners — and it was on a camping trip with her fellow proprietors, Miss Backett and Miss Grimshaw, that she felt a calling to start a new school of her own in Welwyn Garden City, then a brand-new town still in the early stages of its development.

Miss Wragg obtained the names and addresses of local parents of young children and wrote to them, setting out her intention to start an independent, co-educational school and inviting them to a meeting. Forty people attended. They appointed a chairman to guide the discussion, and several parents promised to send their children as soon as the school was ready. She could not yet give a firm date, but promised it would open sometime in September.

The High School

That September, the school opened at 13 Elmwood, Welwyn Garden City, with three boarding pupils. It was called The High School: as there was as yet no secondary school in the town, the name was chosen to signal its intention to grow into a senior school with a preparatory section.

After only a month at Elmwood, a planning committee ruled that a school could no longer continue in a private house, and that a proper building would have to be found. Miss Wragg consulted an architect — who proved enthusiastic about the project — and a site was chosen at Digswell Road and Sherrards Road. Work began within a week, and in September 1929 around sixty children started at the new school.

A tradition that continues

We mark the anniversary of the school's founding each year at our Birthday Assembly on 28 September. In 2026, Sherrardswood turns 98 — — almost a century of believing that every child does best when they are truly known.