Loughborough College School evolved from the Hickling Blue Coat School (originally for girls) endowed in 1690. By 1909 when Loughborough Technical Institute was opened the Hickling School had become a boys school. In 1916 this higher elementary school was closed and reorganised as a junior technical school and a department of the Technical Institute. The Junior Technical School was officially opened in September 1917. It changed its name to Loughborough Junior College in 1920 and in 1921 acquired grammar school status. Though its official name was Loughborough County Secondary School for Boys it continued to be known as the Junior College. The school name changed again - to Loughborough College School - in 1938. From 1942-55 it also included a school for Building & Constructive Trades. The Junior School of Art, which had opened in 1925 as part of Loughborough College's School of Art, was merged with Loughborough College School in 1950 and the school then became co-educational. As a result of the 1944 Education Act it became in 1946 a county school with its own governing body, though it retained strong links with Loughborough College. In 1956 the school moved to new premises at Thorpe Acre, though it continued to use its buildings in town until 1962. In 1967 Loughborough College School became a co-educational upper school taking pupils aged 14 to 19 under the Leicestershire Plan and in 1972 it became Burleigh Community College, 'a base where all members of the community can be involved in their own education'. In 1997 Burleigh became one of the first six specialist Sports Colleges in the country.
From the guide to the Loughborough College School, 1917-89, (Loughborough University Archives)
