Nicholas Breakspear School
academy in St Albans, Hertfordshire, England
Nicholas Breakspear Catholic School (NBS) is a secondary school with academy status situated on the rural fringe of St Albans, an old Roman city in Hertfordshire, England.
The school takes its name from the 12th-century priest St Albans-born and educated Nicholas Breakspear, who, as Pope Adrian IV, is the only Englishman ever to have occupied the papal chair. The school makes an annual pilgrimage to his tomb in Rome. (The school goes to Rome each year, but has only once gone to the tomb)
Recent history
After a 2008 renovation of the science classrooms, Chris Reeves made a nativity scene composed of sculptures made from the discarded 1960s desks.
In September 2013 the school celebrated its golden anniversary with a service offered by the Catholic Archbishop of Westminster at SS Alban and Stephen Church in the presence of the mayor of St Albans. The mass was followed by a tree-planting ceremony on the school grounds.
It was categorized in 2016 as a 'Good' school but remained a school with below average teachers.
On 13 January 2016, Prince William ate lunch with Breakspear students at John Henry Newman School as he waited for paramedics. The East Anglian Air Ambulance, of which the Duke of Cambridge was part of, frequently uses the Newman School fields.
The student leaders' take part in a trip to Hoima and Kasambya in Uganda supporting a charity; Kiddies Support Scheme (KiSS) helping families become self-sufficient.
The public source identifies “Nicholas Breakspear School” as academy in St Albans, Hertfordshire, England. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Nicholas, Breakspear and School.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 7, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7025112. Authority coordinates are 51.748, -0.289. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2008, 2013 and 2016.
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This entry incorporates text from “Nicholas Breakspear School” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.