Winchester College was founded in 1382 by William of Whykeham, who was bishop of Winchester and high chancellor of England, and therefore was very rich. Being religious and rich presented him with a few theological difficulties, so he set up Winchester College and New College, Oxford to try to do something useful before he died. The school was originally intended to train men for priesthood and taught a range of subjects including Latin and maths. It originally comprised of 70 scholars who paid no school fees, the money for the running of the school being provided by William of Whykeham's estate.
Nowdays the school has changed greatly since its original creation. In order to make ends meet it took on fee-paying pupils forming 10 new boarding houses in addition to the original scholars house, now called College. The general intake of the school has changed from poor but intelligent boys to the children of the middle classes, although the entrance process is still demanding. Although the scholars still exist, and receive a substantial reduction in fees, they are no longer as “poor and needy” as their predecessors. The 600 or so pupils (all boys, at least for the moment) sleep and work in their boarding houses and share lessons with pupils from the other houses. Although it has worse facilities than many private schools in the same price range, it has one of the best academic records in England and one of the highest rates of entry to Oxford and Cambridge
Winchester college has developed a number of obscure traditions, the most important of these are notions and Winchester college football. Notions are an extensive slang language that has developed at Winchester college over the years, from simple abbreviations such as Win: Coll for Winchester College, to bizarre words such as toyetime for homework. This language is said to have been so incomprehensible that Whykehamists were said to have conversed freely over enemy monitored radio during World War Two. Winchester college football is best explained be the highly detailed description at its own node, but is essentially a combination of football (soccer) and rugby.
Winchester is an extraordinary place to learn; I will leave this year having spent five years both loving and hating it. On one side it offers the best education money can buy: not just exams and tests but the freedom to work at your own pace and to explore concepts that interest you, taught by some of the best teachers in the country. On the other it suffers from the problem that it continues to perpetuate a stereotype rich kid attitude,is not co-ed, and thus screws up many people's ability to relate to the opposite sex, and it suffers from the universal school problem that intellectuals are unappreciated when compared to sportsmen. For £18,000 it represents the best chance of getting into an Oxbridge college of almost anywhere in the UK, but it will affect you for the rest of your life.
Pupils/ex-pupils of Winchester (Wykehamists) now have their own user group: e2Wykehamists. We may also have the highest percentage population of noders of any educational establishment in the world: over 1%