Yesodey Hatorah Senior Girls School
Voluntary-aided Charedi girls’ secondary, Egerton Road, Stamford Hill (URN 133599); first Haredi school with state funding (2005); Pinter family, not a single Hasidic court; Ofsted Inadequate 2018, Good 2024
| Yesodey Hatorah Senior Girls School | |
|---|---|
| Type | Voluntary aided secondary school (girls) |
| Logo | |
| Founded | Campus from 1942; this maintained school opened 1 September 2005[1] |
| Founder(s) | Rabbi Shmelke Pinter / Rachel and Abraham Pinter (girls’ senior as VA) |
| Dissolved | |
| Registration ID | URN 133599; DfE 204/4318; UKPRN 10015077 |
| Status | Open; Ofsted overall Good (May 2024); quality of education Outstanding |
| Headquarters | Egerton Road, Stamford Hill, London N16 6UB |
| Location | Hackney |
| Area served | Stamford Hill Charedi community (exclusive intake) |
| Services | State-funded Orthodox Jewish girls’ secondary education (11–16) |
| Registration | England (maintained) |
| Key people | Rabbi Chaim Pinter (principal); Rabbi Binyomin Dunner (chair of governors); Sonia Mossberg and Rachel Klein (co-headteachers, 2024) |
| Website | http://yesodeyhatorah.org |
| Remarks | Capacity 400; roll c. 358–384. Appropriate authority: governing body. Not the independent Yesodey Hatorah Girls School (URN 146748, 153 Stamford Hill). |
Yesodey Hatorah Senior Girls School is a voluntary-aided Orthodox Jewish secondary school for girls aged 11–16 at Egerton Road, Stamford Hill, London N16 6UB. It is the senior girls’ department of the Yesodey Hatorah system founded in 1942. It entered the maintained sector on 1 September 2005 — the first Charedi school in Britain with voluntary-aided status and a new building opened with Tony Blair present. GIAS: Jewish religious character; Hackney local authority; non-selective; no sixth form. Website yesodeyhatorah.org; telephone 020 8826 5500. Capacity 400; about 384 pupils.[1][2]
Ofsted 2024: intake “exclusively from the Charedi community in Stamford Hill.” The principal is responsible for ethos and values. Most teachers work part-time.[2]
Which dynasty?
None. Yesodey Hatorah is a Pinter-family, pan-Charedi campus. Rabbi Shmelke (Samuel) Pinter built the schools after the war; Rachel Pinter ran the girls’ side; Abraham Pinter (d. 2020, COVID-19) won VA status and was the public face of Stamford Hill to Hackney and Whitehall. Rabbi Chaim Pinter is now principal of this VA school and proprietor of the independent girls’ primary. Chair of governors (2021–24 inspections): Rabbi Binyomin Dunner.
The school takes girls from Satmar-majority Stamford Hill and from Belz, Vizhnitz, Bobov and other courts that do not run a comparable VA girls’ secondary. It is not Satmar’s Beis Rochel and not a Ger or Vizhnitz seminary.
Ofsted
| Date | Outcome |
|---|---|
| 2006 | Outstanding (widely cited) |
| 10 September 2014 | Good |
| 6 and 14–15 March 2018 | Inadequate / special measures |
| 2018–21 | Monitoring visits |
| 19–20 October 2021 | Requires improvement |
| 8–9 May 2024 | Good (education Outstanding; behaviour Outstanding; personal development Good; leadership Good) |
The 2018 inspection put the school in special measures: redacted textbooks (Sherlock Holmes, Elizabethan history, GCSE English, Picasso, men and women on the same page); narrow history; no statutory SRE; limited library; pupils not prepared for life in modern Britain; governance and safeguarding judged inadequate.[3] In 2014 OCR found GCSE science papers with evolution questions blanked out. In 2018 the school accepted that GCSE textbooks had been censored of homosexual people and of women socialising with men.
Abraham Pinter said in 2015 that few girls go to university because “there isn’t the environment for Haredi girls to do that,” and that “the better educated girls turn out to be the most successful mothers.”[4]
By May 2024 Ofsted said the curriculum matched national breadth and ambition, girls produced “work of exceptional quality,” and they were well prepared for the next stage. The JC reported the school seventh in national progress tables the previous year. Chair Dunner said the result had been achieved “without compromising” communal values.[5]
Do not confuse
| School | URN | Type | Address | Proprietor / authority |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| This school | 133599 | VA secondary girls 11–16 | Egerton Road N16 6UB | Governing body (Hackney) |
| Yesodey Hatorah Girls School | 146748 | Independent primary girls 4–11 | 153 Stamford Hill N16 5LG | Rabbi Chaim Pinter |
| Yesodey Hatorah School | 100287 | Independent boys | 2–4 Amhurst Park N16 5AE | Yesodey Hatorah Schools / Chaim Pinter |
Yesodey Hatorah Trust (1103911) is a supporting charity (grants, buildings), not the instrument of government for this VA school.
See also
- Abraham Pinter
- Chaim Pinter
- Yesodey Hatorah Girls School
- Yesodey Hatorah Trust
- Jewish Schools in the UK
External links
- https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/4767667/jewish/Rabbi-Avrohom-Pinter-70-London.htm
- Get Information about Schools
- Ofsted URN 133599
- School website
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Get Information about Schools, Yesodey Hatorah Senior Girls School, URN 133599.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Ofsted, Inspection of Yesodey Hatorah Senior Girls School, 8–9 May 2024.
- ↑ Ofsted, Yesodey Hatorah Senior Girls School, 6 and 14–15 March 2018.
- ↑ Yesodey Hatorah Senior Girls' School (Wikipedia summary of contemporaneous reporting).
- ↑ Simon Rocker, Ofsted praises educational excellence of Chasidic school, The Jewish Chronicle, 1 July 2024.