Unprecedented year for Harvard Offers at Shrewsbury

Shrewsbury School is celebrating a unique double as both Heads of School have been offered places to study at Harvard University for the first time in the school’s history.  

Out of a field of more than 54,000 applicants, Head Girl Nat T and Head Boy Luke W are two successful students that will be heading to the prestigious Harvard University in September. 

Excelling in all areas of school life, both Nat and Luke have backgrounds in rowing, music and CCF, all encompassed in showcasing their exceptional leadership skills as this year’s Heads of School.  

The offers to Harvard are two of nine US University offers for Salopians this year, along with 10 Oxbridge offers and five offers for performing arts students to study at some of the UK’s best conservatoires. In 2023 87% of leavers progressed to their first-choice university destinations, with two thirds of those being Russell Group universities.    

Headmaster Leo Winkley said: “We are very proud of Nat and Luke and their great successes in both being offered places to study at Harvard University, in what we think is a unique double.  

“For both of Shrewsbury’s Heads of School to be offered a place to such a prestigious institution is testament to them as pupils and the hard and work and dedication they have put into their time at school.  

“Only 42 applicants from the UK have received offers from Harvard, which is 0.07% of the total applicants and for Shrewsbury to have two pupils who have achieved this prestigious honour is phenomenal.  

“We know that they will finish their time at Shrewsbury with their characteristic humility and we look forward to seeing how Harvard continues to build them as people in the future.” 

Nat joined Shrewsbury in Third Form and has gone on to become one of Shrewsbury’s first female World Champion Rowers, representing Great Britain as a cox in the Mens’ Eight. In the same summer, she spent two weeks with the National Youth Music Theatre performing in The Boy who Sailed the Ocean in an Armchair playing the saxophone, piccolo and the flute. 

Nat said: “Being the first girl to receive an offer from Harvard at Shrewsbury is a massive honour.   

“I'm excited that I'll be going into a similar environment to Shrewsbury and will be surrounded by academia; in my mind it's very much an extension of the kind of people that Shrewsbury raises and encourages you to be. 

“I want to be a girl in STEM - I want to lead the way and to pioneer something in that field, so I hope I inspire as many young girls as possible to be as brave and make such bold and creative decisions.” 

Luke also joined Shrewsbury in Third Form and has been a key member of the CCF, completing the Air Cadet Leadership Course - the highest standard of leadership training with the CCF organisation – which he passed with Distinction and the top accolade of ‘Best Cadet’. He has performed in several school productions as a chorist or as a musician, as well as being Head of his Boarding House.  

Luke added: “When I was applying to Harvard I knew the extent of the admissions rates, so to be offered a place is surreal, and the fact that my partner in crime, Nat, has also got an offer I think is just a testament to the real breadth and the abundance of opportunities that Shrewsbury has to offer.   

“Being Head of School has been a real honour for me. It's especially nostalgic as my grandfather was also Head of School at Shrewsbury, and so to be able to follow in his footsteps was especially lovely. I'll never forget the time where I was able to tell him that I managed to become Head of School, and the time that I could tell him that I got into Harvard.”