News from our Voluntary & Part-Time Chaplains 

Revd David Beazley

Chaplaincy at Steyning Grammar School

Steyning Grammar School is a Co-educational Comprehensive School, now part of the Bohunt Multi-Academy Trust. With over 2,450 pupils it is the largest Comprehensive School in SE England, and the largest Church of England School in the country. The school is on four sites, two of them -7 miles apart- catering for children in years 7 and 8, and the main site in Steyning catering for years 9 to 13 (including ‘Sixth Form’). Pupils are drawn from a huge area of West Sussex, from the coast to the A272, and from beyond Storrington in the West to as far as Edburton and Fulking in the East. Many come into school on coaches. The fourth site is a boarding house in Steyning, unusual for a state school. It accommodates around 100 pupils from a variety of international backgrounds who attend the school. SGS has a staff of over 300, including more than 140 teachers.

The school has an ecumenical Chaplaincy team of around six, mostly volunteers, led by an Anglican vicar whose role in the Chichester diocese includes lead Chaplain at SGS as well as his churches. 

The Chaplaincy role -as other aspects of the school- is a considerable challenge, finding opportunities -and openness- to reach out to both pupils and staff in a pressured and not always conducive, receptive or sympathetic environment.

My own small role in the set-up is to lead a group in one of the two lower schools (years 7 and 8), a role I share with two gracious and popular Roman Catholic sisters from the Towers Convent Community (Upper Beeding) to whose buildings this part of the school moved (from its historic site in Steyning) in 2022. Our group provides a ‘quiet place’ in which children - varying in number from one to around twelve- can come to chat around a Christian theme. Over this academic year around 25 pupils have attended at some time. With timetable constraints and other factors reducing the lunch break to barely 35 minutes, during which youngsters need to have lunch and often have other demands on their time, it is a rather pressured situation. (With the travel factor it is not possible to have after school meetings.)

I would value our prayers for the whole challenge of Chaplaincy in a modern and largely secular (despite its ‘CofE’ label) school environment. The spiritual needs of both staff and pupils are very great, but not always acknowledged, and it is hard for youngsters to ‘swim against the stream’ in order to attend Chaplaincy-arranged opportunities. As will other schools it is not easy to express Christian faith or to respond to opportunities to enquire or to meet together to share needs and pray.  Nevertheless it is a privilege and (usually!) a joy, and I would ask for our prayers for youngsters to have the curiosity -and the courage- to come along, and for myself and the two Catholic sisters to bring ideas that will be engaging! I am sure the same requests would come from others involved in this work 

Thankyou!
David