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Public school in England

Oundle School is a public school (English fee charging boarding and day school) for pupils 11–18 situated in the market town of Oundle in Northamptonshire, England. The school has been governed by the Worshipful Company of Grocers of the City of London since its foundation by Sir William Laxton in 1556. The school's alumni – known as Old Oundelians – include renowned entrepreneurs, scientists, politicians, military figures and sportspeople. Oundle has eight boys' houses, five girls' houses, two day houses, a junior house and a junior day house. Together these accommodate more than 1100 pupils, generally between the ages of 11 and 18. It is the third largest boarding school in England after Eton and Millfield. The current Headmistress is Sarah Kerr Dineen, who in 2015 became the first woman to lead the school. The school is a member of the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference and the Rugby Group. In the 2023 A Levels, the school saw 62.9% of its candidates score A*/A.

Sir William Laxton, who had been eight times Master of the Worshipful Company of Grocers and was Lord Mayor of London in 1544, died in 1556, and in his will decreed the founding of a school for the local boys of Oundle, which was to be maintained by the Worshipful Company of Grocers. There had been a school on the site since at least 1485, at which Laxton himself was educated, and the school he established was known as Laxton Grammar School. The size and reputation of Laxton Grammar School rose gradually in the following centuries, and by the mid nineteenth century many of the school's pupils were being sent to Oundle from around the country to receive their education. In 1876, the decision was made by the Grocers' Company to divide the school into Laxton Grammar School, which was to continue to educate boys from Oundle and its surrounding villages, in accordance with the will of the founder, and Oundle School, which was to be a public school, accepting the sons of gentlemen from further afield as boarders. The rise of Oundle to prominence can largely be attributed to F. W. Sanderson, who was the school's headmaster from 1892 until his death in 1922. When Sanderson joined Oundle, he found a minor country boarding school; by the time of his death, it had become England's leading school for an education in the sciences and engineering. The success of Sanderson can be attributed to his educational ethos; he believed in teaching pupils what they wanted to learn, and as a result helped to introduce subjects such as the sciences, engineering, and to modern languages to the English public school curriculum. A major development came about in 1990, when Oundle admitted girls for the first time. In the year 2000, the decision was made by the school's governing body to re unite Oundle School and Laxton School as a single educational establishment under the common name Oundle School, with Laxton House becoming the day house of the school.

Oundle has 835 boarders and 235 day pupils. It is the third largest independent boarding school in England, after Eton in Berkshire and Millfield in Somerset. Pupils obtain strong results at GCSE and A Level. In their 2013 A Levels pupils achieved 89.1% A* to B grades, with over 60% of grades either A* or A. In the year 2016, 28 pupils achieved 10 or more A* results in their GCSE examinations, with 89% of all results awarded being A* or A. Many pupils go on to study at Oxbridge; the overwhelming majority continue to Russell Group universities. In 2019, 48% of pupils scored A* A for their A Levels examination, whereas 79% scored A* A for their GCSEs. The school promotes the practice of Christian values and maintains links with the Church of England by celebrating the major events of the Christian calendar. All pupils who board are required to attend services in the school chapel three times a week: one midweek lunch time service, Friday hymn practice, and the Sunday service. Pupils of other faiths are free to worship according to their own beliefs but must still attend chapel with the rest of the school. The school has an extensive programme of voluntary clubs and societies (approaching 50 in number), which range from poetry and debating to croquet and wine tasting. Each academic subject also has its own society which organises evening lectures from guest speakers throughout the year; these can be either directly related to the syllabus or simply to broaden interest in the subject. A new subject, Trivium, gives Third Form pupils timetabled engagement with extension topics for their own sake, using methods of thought drawn from the traditional liberal arts. Quadrivium is also an option for pupils in the Lower Sixth to study, similar to trivium taught in the Third Form. Outside term time pupils are given the opportunity to participate in the countless regular school trips which explore all corners of the globe. These include history trips to major European cities, language exchanges in Europe and Asia, charity work in Africa, AAAS conventions and politics trips in America, natural history expeditions to Antarctica, and many more. Sport is considered to be an essential part of school life and while there exists a multitude of sports to choose from, the emphasis remains on traditional team sports such as rugby, hockey, cricket, rowing and soccer for boys, and hockey, netball and tennis for girls. Oundle performs particularly strongly in independent school rugby, cricket, and girls' hockey. Like sport, music plays a vital role within school life for many pupils, and over 60% of pupils regularly practise a musical instrument while at Oundle. The school offers an extensive range of groups, bands, orchestras and choirs which cater for many musical tastes. Such is the success of music at Oundle that in recent years many pupils have gone on to receive musical or choral scholarships from Oxbridge, while school bands and choirs have gone on to perform concerts across the UK, Europe and Asia. The experimental/industrial music pioneers Throbbing Gristle played at the school in March 1980. Oundle School has the largest Combined Cadet Force of any school in the country which plays an important role in both the development of pupils as well as in the community, for example in the annual Remembrance Day service held in St Peter's Church. The CCF offers pupils the opportunity to practise their leadership skills whether on parade at school, on the termly field weekends, or on the annual camps. The school has a strong tradition of serving the community with many pupils opting to provide assistance in the local area, or Community Action as an alternative to CCF. There are a broad range of Community Action options available in the Oundle area which cater not only for the needs of the local community but also for the extra curricular interests of the pupils. Many pupils choose to undertake the Duke of Edinburgh Award Scheme which provides an ideal combination of the skills they acquire during CCF and Community Action. Every summer since 1982 sixth formers and former pupils have run the Oundle School Mencap holiday, a residential holiday for children with a range of learning disabilities and now a highly respected charity in its own right. The school has ties with the Laxton Junior School, for primary school pupils, some of whom continue their secondary education as pupils at the senior school. A modern building for Laxton Junior was completed in 2003, which allowed the school to double its intake. In November 2005 the school was found to have taken part in a cartel of price fixing among public schools. However, Mrs. Jean Scott, the head of the Independent Schools Council, said that independent schools had always been exempt from anti cartel rules applied to business, were following a long established procedure in sharing the information with each other, and that they were unaware of the change to the law (on which they had not been consulted). She wrote to John Vickers, the OFT Director General, saying, "They are not a group of businessmen meeting behind closed doors to fix the price of their products to the disadvantage of the consumer. They are schools that have quite openly continued to follow a long established practice because they were unaware that the law had changed." Oundle won the Tatler Public School of the Year Award in 2018.

Former pupils are known as Old Oundelians and the Old Oundelians Club (known as the OO Club) was founded in 1883. Former pupils of the school include Professor Maxwell Hutchinson, Past President of the Royal Institute of British Architects, Supreme Court Justices of the United Kingdom David Richards, and David Kitchin, evolutionary biologist and science writer Richard Dawkins, rock musician Bruce Dickinson, England rugby players (and twins) Tom and Ben Curry, architect Christopher Alexander, and feminist campaigner, researcher and writer Caroline Criado Perez.

The official school song is Carmen Undeliense (words by R. F. Patterson, music by Clement M. Spurling, published in 1912 by Novello & Company Ltd of London).