Job Description

Information for applicants 
 
About the School 

King’s Ely can trace its origins from at least 970AD, making it one of the oldest schools in Europe. Originally a monastic foundation and then a grammar school by Royal Charter, today it is a thriving independent day and boarding school for around 1000 boys and girls aged from 2-18, offering a broad range of GCSEs and A-levels and from which almost all pupils go on to good universities in the UK and abroad. Most students are day pupils from Ely, Cambridge and the surrounding area, and there are also about 200 boarders with over 40 nationalities represented overall.

The School is subdivided into three sections: King’s Ely Senior (age 13-18) and King’s Ely Junior (age 7-13), which occupy adjacent campuses and shared facilities, and King’s Ely Acremont and Nursery (ages 2-6) which has its own self-contained campus about 400m from the main site.

The main campus extends to around 70 acres in total and comprises several historic buildings adjacent to Ely Cathedral as well as more recent, purpose-built facilities spanning the thirteenth to the twenty-first centuries, and almost 40 acres of playing fields.

King’s prides itself on being an academic school but not an academic hothouse. There is a great emphasis on personal development through an extensive co-curriculum of sporting, creative and performing arts and service opportunities as well as through building positive relationships with others in a tight-knit but outward-facing community. The safety, wellbeing and pastoral care of the whole community is central in what is a happy and purposeful school where our diversity and breadth of talent and ability is valued and nurtured.

King’s Ely also plays a key role in the local community. The School is one of Ely’s largest employers and also educates the boy and girl choristers of Ely Cathedral. King’s is also a proud founder member of the Cambridgeshire Educational Partnership, which numbers twelve local schools working together to improve educational attainment, especially for disadvantaged children. The School also offers a number of bursaries to enable pupils from all walks of life to benefit from the education it offers.

King’s Ely is a registered charity administered by a Board of Governors. The Principal is a member of HMC and the School is also affiliated to the Society of Heads, IAPS, the Boarding Schools’ Association and the Choir Schools’ Association.

King’s Ely has 4 different schools within its extensive grounds, which combined have over 50 different garden areas, set within and around the heart of Ely’s City Centre, and medieval Cathedral grounds. The gardens are in keeping with the various and diverse surroundings of the school and vary from medieval walled gardens planted with traditional schemes, to modern ornamentals and bedding displays, as well as an extensive number of formal lawns, and public areas. In addition to our main campus’s, we now also have Fairstead house school in Newmarket as part of the King’s Family of schools, which the department will assist with the maintenance and development of that site to.

King’s Ely’s Grounds and Gardens Department prides itself in carrying out nearly all the installation and maintenance required, in its extensive and varied range of gardens.
We also grow many plants in our purpose-built yard, consisting of Greenhouses, 2 polytunnels and workshops. These are then used around the school, in displays and containers, as well as other public displays. The department is also hands on with promoting and helping the school environment, working with groups of pupils and staff from all sections of school regularly.

We are also continuing with the ongoing restoration and maintenance in the Old Palace which the school acquired in 2011 and is now the schools sixth form centre. The garden provides all grounds and gardens staff with exciting, and varied work in its vast walled garden. As well as a unique working environment in the shadows of Ely Cathedral.

Managed by the Grounds and Gardens Manager the department consists of 9 members of staff, with 3 working in the Gardens team which the successful candidate will join.

Main Responsibilities of the Role

The Gardener reports to the Head Gardener on a daily basis.  The main responsibility of the Gardener is to maintain and develop the gardens across the 70-acre School grounds.

To maintain and develop the gardens to an exceptionally high standard.
To undertake tasks including, but not limited to, propagation, seeding, planting, weeding, bed preparation, irrigation, pruning, hedge cutting, strimming, mowing, seasonal lawn care, training, planting, staking, composting, pest and disease management
To contribute to the design of the school gardens
To use a wide range of tools and hand/small machinery
To work in a manner that ensures your safety and the safety of others at all times

In addition to working as a Gardener, He/she will also be required to work with and assist in duties within the grounds section of the department.

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