St Catherine's School, Waverley

other schools of the same name

St Catherine's School (commonly referred to as St Cath's) is a private Anglican Junior and Senior day and boarding school, located in Waverley, an eastern suburb of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Established in 1856 as a school for the daughters of clergy, St Catherine's is the oldest Anglican girls' school in Australia. It is also the oldest private girls' school in Australia. It is a non selective school, and currently caters for approximately 1,000 girls from Year K to Year 12, including 70 boarders. The school is affiliated with the Alliance of Girls' Schools Australasia (AGSA), the Junior School Heads Association of Australia, the Association of Heads of Independent Schools of Australia, the Australian Boarding Schools' Association (ABSA), and is a founding member of the Association of Heads of Independent Girls' Schools. St Catherine's has been reviewed by the Good Schools Guide International.

St Catherine's School traces its origins to 1855, when Jane Barker, wife of Frederic Barker, second Archbishop of Sydney, decided to establish a school for the daughters of the clergy. Barker and her husband had travelled throughout New South Wales, and realised that the poor stipends of the clergy in country areas meant that their daughters could not benefit from a good education. Within five months, Barker had raised enough money to secure a premises in Point Piper Road (now Jersey Road), Edgecliff, and had hired Ms Loftus to run the St Catherine's Clergy Daughters School. Barker wished for her school to be modelled on Casterton School, the school attended by the Brontë sisters, who were themselves the daughters of a poor clergyman. The Clergy Daughters School was officially opened in its temporary location on 5 March 1856.