The name Hertswood Lower School has special significance for anyone who grew up in Borehamwood in the early 2000s. It wasn’t the entire school. It was only half of it. Depending on the year and the schedule, students in Years 7, 8, and occasionally 9 would walk between two campuses, one at Cowley Hill and the other at Thrift Farm Lane, which are about 400 meters apart. Even now, there is a feeling that the split had a greater influence on a generation of students’ personalities than the curriculum ever did.
Compromise gave rise to the school itself. In order to replace Borehamwood’s previous three-tier system with a more straightforward one, five local schools were combined in 2000: Lyndhurst, Furzehill, and Holmshill middle schools, as well as Hawksmoor and Hillside upper schools. This type of administrative decision appears neat on paper but is somewhat disorganized in reality. The lower and upper sites originated because the new institution retained two of the old footprints.
| Information | Detail |
|---|---|
| Former Name | Hertswood School (Lower Site) |
| Parent Institution | Hertswood Academy |
| Original Location | Thrift Farm Lane, Borehamwood, Hertfordshire |
| Current Location | Cowley Hill, Borehamwood, WD6 5LG |
| Established | September 2000 |
| Type | Coeducational secondary academy |
| Age Range | 11 to 18 |
| Headteacher | Peter Gillett |
| Student Enrolment | Approximately 1,222 |
| Houses | Cavendish, Darwin, Nuffield, Somerville |
| Academy Status Granted | January 2013 |
| Site Closure | 2019 (merged into single Cowley Hill campus) |
| Department for Education URN | 138747 |
| Latest Ofsted Inspection | February 2025 — Good |
The younger years were managed at the lower site on Thrift Farm Lane. The worn pavement near the gates, the somewhat worn-out prefabs at the back, and the staff cars jammed into areas that weren’t really intended for them were just a few of the small details that made it stand out when you passed it during school hours. Instructors carried folders in their arms as they moved between the two campuses. Pupils followed suit, sometimes showing up to class a little breathless. It worked. It was successful. However, it was never refined.
There were prosperous and challenging years. The academy was deemed “inadequate” by an Ofsted inspection in 2017, citing issues with welfare, behavior, and personal growth. This decision stung the community and, depending on who you spoke to, was either harsh or long overdue. In 2018, a monitoring visit observed that the leadership was at last bringing things back into order. The school had recovered to a Good rating overall by the time of the most recent inspection in February 2025, which is the kind of recovery that doesn’t happen by accident.
The conclusion of the lower site was well-planned and subtly poignant. The academy declared in 2013 that it would move all of its operations onto Cowley Hill, with the sale of Thrift Farm Lane serving as a major source of funding for the new construction. In 2015, construction got underway. The new building opened to students in September 2019 after a few delays, which are almost always the case with public projects this size. Homes now stand where classrooms once stood after the old lower site was demolished.
It’s difficult to ignore how infrequently former students bring up the new buildings without first bringing up the old ones. The state-of-the-art ICT, the open learning areas, and the gleaming restaurant are all impressive.
However, if you ask anyone who was there prior to 2019, they will talk about the chilly mornings, the walks between locations, and the friends they made while they waited for a teacher to open a portacabin door. You get the impression that what actually closed in 2019 wasn’t a building when you watch this happen from the outside. It was a unique aspect of being a student in Borehamwood; it was a little chaotic, a little inconvenient, and difficult to forget.
