THE ABBEY SCHOOL, READING

Registered charity 309115 · accounts filings on the Charity Commission register · Wikidata: Q7712108 · Wikipedia · also known as THE ABBEY SCHOOL

The provision of education to girls aged 3-18.

Objects

THE OBJECTS FOR WHICH THE SCHOOL IS ESTABLISHED ARE: 4.1 TO CARRY ON A SCHOOL (BOTH FOR DAY STUDENTS AND BOARDERS) PROVIDING OR IMPARTING AND DEVELOPING A LIBERAL, PRACTICAL AND GENERAL EDUCATION FOR GIRLS AND BOYS OF ALL CLASSES, TO INCLUDE RELIGIOUS EDUCATION IN THE DOCTRINES AND DUTIES OF CHRISTIANITY AS TAUGHT BY THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND; AND 4.2 TO ESTABLISH, CONTROL AND MAINTAIN A BOARDING-HOUSE OR BOARDING-HOUSES IN CONNECTION WITH THE SCHOOL TO BOARDERS.

Area of benefit: NOT DEFINED

The charity’s charitable objects and area of benefit, quoted from its governing document as held on the Charity Commission register.

Causes: Education/training · website · Get email alerts

Registered contact address: Reading, South East, England (from the postcode on the register)

Financial health, per its FY2025 accounts

The accounts state that the charity reported a net deficit of £640,621 for the year ended 31 August 2025, reversing a surplus from the previous year. Despite net current liabilities of £1,773,177, the trustees confirm the school has sufficient resources to continue operating for the foreseeable future, supported by a strong asset base and positive cash flow from operations.

Automated summary of the FY2025 accounts; the evidenced findings below carry the verbatim passages.

What the accounts disclose

Accounts audited by James Cowper Kreston Audit. Discloses 5 of 6 completeness components.

In its annual return the charity told the Commission it is also regulated by: Ofsted (Office For Standards In Education). This is the charity’s own declaration; it is not a rating and has not been verified by the Commission or by this site.

Policies the charity declares

In its annual return the charity told the Commission that it has the policies listed below. This is self-declared: it is not verified by the Commission or by this site, and it is not evidence of how a policy works in practice.

• Bullying and harassment policy and procedures
• Complaints handling
• Complaints policy and procedures
• Conflicting interests
• Financial reserves policy and procedures
• Internal charity financial controls policy and procedures
• Internal risk management policy and procedures
• Investing charity funds policy and procedures
• Investment
• Paying staff
• Risk management
• Safeguarding policy and procedures
• Safeguarding vulnerable beneficiaries
• Serious incident reporting policy and procedures
• Social media policy and procedures
• Trustee conflicts of interest policy and procedures
• Trustee expenses policy and procedures
• Volunteer management

From the charity’s annual return (Part A, self-declared)

Answers and figures the charity gave in Part A of its annual return to the Charity Commission. They are self-declared: not verified by the Commission or by this site. Only positive answers and figures are listed; items not listed are simply not shown.

Source: this charity’s annual returns on the Charity Commission register.

In the news

Recent coverage mentioning this charity by name (automated match; headlines belong to their publishers).

• The Abbey School, Reading hosts ‘100 Years of Women at the Bar’ judiciary.uk · 04/05/2023
• The Abbey School, Reading getreading.co.uk · 23/01/2018

Corporate structure

• Registered company of the charity Companies House 00133676
• Trading subsidiary: ABBEY COMMERCIAL ENTERPRISES LIMITED Companies House 06334617

Leadership, per the charity’s website

• Dr Sarah Tullis — Head (source)
• Mrs Nadine Doble — Head of Finance and Resources (source)
• Mr George Morton — Deputy Head and DSL, Senior School (source)
• Dr Colin Pearson — Deputy Head, Senior School (source)
• Ms Anna Brunskill — Assistant Head, Senior School (source)
• Mrs Charlotte Hart — Assistant Head – Director of Sixth Form (source)
• Mrs Nathalie Williams — Director of Upper School (source)
• Ms Elisse Power — Director of Lower School (source)

Listed on the charity’s own website when we last crawled it; roles may have changed. Pay-band disclosures above are anonymous statutory disclosures and are not attributed to any named individual.

Company officers (Companies House)

Current officers of the charity’s own company per the Companies House register, cross-checked against the Charity Commission trustee list by name. A director not on the trustee list is usually a timing or naming difference between the two registers — check both records before drawing conclusions.

• JACOBS, Adam Douglas — director, appointed 02/12/2025on trustee list
• BURROWS, Nicholas Charles — director, appointed 23/09/2024on trustee list
• BROWN, Richard — director, appointed 23/09/2024on trustee list
• MACLENNAN, Hector — director, appointed 23/09/2024on trustee list
• JOLLY, Joanna Kumari — director, appointed 11/07/2022on trustee list
• PEACH, Andrew — director, appointed 22/03/2021on trustee list
• KEMP, Harriet, Dr — director, appointed 22/03/2021on trustee list
• FIELD, Robyn Lucy — director, appointed 29/06/2020on trustee list
• BUTLER, Julie Irene — director, appointed 18/03/2019on trustee list
• SINGER, Colin Geoffrey — director, appointed 03/12/2018on trustee list
• HARRISON, Elizabeth Ann — director, appointed 23/03/2015on trustee list
• DIMMICK, Simon Mark — director, appointed 07/12/2009not on trustee list

Official officers record.

Property (HM Land Registry)

10 registered titles in England and Wales held by the charity’s company or corporate body (10 freehold); recorded price paid £280k. All charity-held property. Contains HM Land Registry data © Crown copyright, OGL v3.0.

Public profiles (found on the charity’s own website): facebook (4,309 followers) · instagram (4,388 followers)

Structured financials (annual return, FY ending 31/08/2025)

Reported reserves equal ~9.2 months of spending — above the median for charities its size (median 4.6 months; benchmarks).

Per its annual return, largest income source: Charitable activities (98% of income) — components as reported reconcile to the return’s total income; not from the accounts narrative.

Per its annual return, cost of raising funds: 0.2% of total income — below the median for charities its size (3.7%) (benchmarks).

Trustees · trustee networks

• ELIZABETH ANN HARRISONchair
• Adam Jacobs
• Andrew Peach
• Colin Singer
• Dr Harriet Kemp
• Hector Maclennan
• Joanna Kumari Jolly
• Julie Butler
• Nicholas Burrows
• Richard Brown
• Robyn Field
• SIMON MARK DIMMICK LLB

Trustee list from the Charity Commission register (current, not historical).

Operates in: Reading

Income and spending

Common questions

Known funders

Grants to this charity found in funders’ own accounts filings.

Grants marked “Unverified read” were flagged by automated checks as possibly misread from the funder’s filed accounts. They are listed, but left out of the totals, counts and funder relationships this site computes.

Government & lottery funding

Grants to this charity published as open data by government and lottery funders (360Giving).

Funders of similar charities

Funders whose accounts show grants to charities similar to this one (and no recorded grant to this charity) — a starting list for fundraisers.

Charities like this

Semantically similar by activities and financial character, from our analysed corpus. Compare with BETHANY SCHOOL.

• BETHANY SCHOOL income £8.8m
• THE READ SCHOOL, DRAX income £4.1m
• OUR LADY OF SION SCHOOL, WORTHING income £4.0m
• RYDE SCHOOL income £12.5m
• READING BLUE COAT SCHOOL income £19.4m
• ABBEY PRE-SCHOOL income £148k

Side by side with its peers

Each row is that charity’s latest analysed filing; every value is quote-backed on its own page.