History
Following the 1967 Plowden Report, Bedfordshire LEA decided to implement the three-tier education system of lower, middle and upper schools in the county. This created a need for a new catholic upper school in Bedford.
St Thomas More Catholic Upper School was formally opened in 1979 by Baroness Shirley Williams (then Secretary of State for Education and Science). The dedication Mass was conducted by Bishop Charles Alexander Grant (then Bishop of Northampton).
When St Bedes Middle school closed in 2006, academic years 7 and 8 were transferred to St Thomas More School, along with some of the teaching staff. In July 2008 the school was awarded specialist status in the area of Humanities, and became a Humanities College.
The name of the school is derived from St Thomas More, an elder statesman from the sixteenth century. He is mainly remembered for his principled refusal to accept King Henry VIII's claim to be the supreme head of the Church of England, which decision ended his political career and led to his execution as a traitor. He was canonized by the Catholic Church under Pope Pius XI in 1935, and was later declared the patron saint of lawyers and statesmen.
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