Ethos, Vision & Values
Rathdown School: A place of belonging
Our objective is the advancement of education, within a Protestant ethos, for the girls and boys enrolled at Rathdown School. We welcome students and families of all faiths, and none, and from all traditions and cultures.
Rathdown School promotes understanding and respect for the sincerely held beliefs of all. We believe that a progressive, contemporary, inclusive and holistic education is essential to the moral, social, emotional, cultural and academic development of each individual student.
The school’s overriding objective is the holistic development of each student so as to fulfil their unique potential and in doing so prepare students to contribute to the wellbeing and moral development of their community and society as a whole and make informed choices about personal faith and related matters for themselves.
We create, for every student, an environment with the space to inspire, challenge, encourage and nurture to develop their full potential to become the amazing person they can be in this rapidly changing world, with friends for life. Each student is encouraged to develop self-esteem, intellectual curiosity, confidence without arrogance, care and respect for others, independence, excellence in all they do, and a love of life.
We are Supportive
We offer a supportive and nurturing environment for our students. At the heart of our ethos to support and nurture is a focus on wellbeing and relationships. We support and encourage the growth and self-development of our students, helping them reach their full potential and discover their personal strengths. We celebrate individual talent and spirit while giving our students the space to be themselves.
We are Inclusive
We are inclusive at Rathdown. We believe diversity and difference make us a better school, a better community, a better place to learn and a better place to grow as individuals. Our inclusive school community provides a framework, so every student feels safe and has a sense of belonging. We believe respect and understanding thrive when students of different abilities and backgrounds play, socialise and learn together.
We advocate Honesty, Respect and Loyalty
We believe in providing a moral foundation for all our students to become better individuals and global citizens. These foundations reinforce the importance of truth, honesty, fairness, respect and loyalty. We want all our students to never forget the values we hold dear.
A School Where Belonging Changes Everything
Rathdown School is a small, inclusive, educationally progressive school that provides a holistic education for girls and boys from ages 3 to 19. It is a school that speaks to and reflects contemporary Irish society, a society that has transformed in recent decades.
There is an overwhelming sense of belonging and community at Rathdown. Every student who has passed through our doors has felt it; it is a major component of who we are. We understand that a sense of happiness and wellbeing, motivation and health, is inextricably linked to the feeling that we belong to a community that shares common interests and aspirations. It is this carefully cultivated environment that enables our students to learn, succeed, achieve, discover, question, grow in confidence and find their own purpose that sets us apart.
Our aim is to create an open, happy, stimulating and mutually respectful community where all our students are able to discover their potential in a balanced, integrated and liberal manner, and will become citizens and leaders of a society that in contemporary times has become more forward-looking, diverse and open-minded. The learning journey at Rathdown School will nurture students’ academic wellbeing, their intellectual enthusiasm and their social confidence, giving them an enjoyment of learning that will sustain them through higher education and beyond.
Rathdown is progressive in the sense of being a student-centred school where relationships and the exchange of ideas are at the core of the learning process, rather than a school that relies merely on the delivery of information by teachers to students. It is a school community that values engagement, debate and discussion among the full range of its constituent parts – students, staff and parents/guardians – from Pre-School all the way to graduation.
Rathdown is a school that values the whole person in its students, providing a holistic, all-round education that balances academic, cultural, artistic and sporting pursuits in its curricular and extra-curricular programmes. In this context, it is a school that supports and instills confidence in its students, a school that encourages its students to identify their interests, to express themselves through their attachment to these interests, and to realise their potential in the broadest possible sense.