History

The History of St Luke’s

St Luke’s CE School, and its short history, is unique! We opened in September 2011 as the first Church of England Free School in the country.

In 2010 there was a severe shortage of primary school places in the London Borough of Camden, where St Luke’s Church is located. In Spring 2010, the Department for Education set out how local groups could serve their communities by setting up new state-funded schools where there was a proven need. A local group from St Luke’s Church coordinated an application to convert the extensive church halls to set up a primary school.

On 9th September 2012, the school was officially opened by the Bishop of London, the Right Reverend and Right Honourable Richard Chartres. The official opening was marked by a service and reception attended by a large cross-section of the local community, including parents, pupils and churchgoers from St Luke’s. At the service, the Bishop of London said:

“St Luke’s CE School is an illustration of the historic purpose of Church of England schools to serve the whole community. Church members who have contributed hours of voluntary effort to set up the first free school in the Diocese, have done so in the knowledge that none of their own children will be eligible to attend because of the strict admissions criterion which is based solely on how far children live from the school. This excellent school is a contribution to provision in the borough of Camden which is currently over 150 places short for children of reception class age. I found my visit inspiring.”

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.

Strictly Necessary Cookies

Strictly Necessary Cookie should be enabled at all times so that we can save your preferences for cookie settings.

If you disable this cookie, we will not be able to save your preferences. This means that every time you visit this website you will need to enable or disable cookies again.

3rd Party Cookies

This website uses Google Analytics to collect anonymous information such as the number of visitors to the site, and the most popular pages.

Keeping this cookie enabled helps us to improve our website.