 It is the only secondary school in the Chew Valley area, providing further education to local children, from various local primary schools, and some pupils who live outside the catchment area.As of 2015, the school had over 1,160 pupils, including 186 in the Sixth Form.The school was proposed in May 1955 in a public notice issued by Somerset County Council Education Committee, to eventually comply with the 1944 Education Act which had required secondary education for all, which had previously been provided by "all age primaries" in the area.