The Royal Latin School (RLS) is a co-educational grammar school in Buckingham, England. It has continually existed for almost six hundred years; receiving a Royal Charter in this time and moving premises three times. In September 2011 the school became an academy. It takes children from the age of 11 through to the age of 18 and has over 1260 pupils, including a sixth form of 390 pupils. It maintains a staff of just over 160. In September 2003 the school was designated by the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) as a specialist school in science. It was successfully redesignated in 2007 and achieved a second specialism as a training school. Since the county's boundary adjustments of 1974 placed Eton College in Berkshire, the Royal Latin School claims the distinction of being the sole pre-Reformation grammar school in the county. The Royal Latin School was graded as outstanding in the 2009 report by Ofsted. History The school's earlist recorded reference occurs in 1423. A very small establishment at first, the school taught only six poor boys. Although Buckingham's citizens supported Catherine of Aragon and her daughter Mary Tudor, and were opposed to the Reformation, the Chantry Chapel in which the Royal Latin School was based, rather than being destroyed by Edward VI (as many similar establishments were) was instead converted into the Royal Latin School. King Edward VI granted a charter for the school, for 30-40 pupils, in 1548 with an endowment of £10 and with 12 trustees. A major fire in 1696 destroyed the Master's House which was rebuilt by Alexander Denton, complete with a garden. The Chantry Chapel dedicated to St John the Baptist and Thomas a Beckett had an original Romanesque doorway, it served as the main schoolroom. Early 19th century Master was Oxford-educated aristocrat Rev William Eyre, MA vicar of Padbury. It remained the home of the Royal Latin School until 1907 when Buckinghamshire County Council provided major new buildings for the school in Chandos Road, now the site of Grenville School and did so again in 1963, when the school moved to Brookfield House, formerly The Mount. Numerous extensions in 1963 were opened by Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, with further extensions being gradually added over the next few decades. The warm brown brickwork of the 1963 extensions complements the stone-built structure of the earlier buildings, the whole is enhanced by its parkland setting