page_title: Dorchester, Dorset
section_title: Education and healthcare
hierarchical_section_title: Dorchester, Dorset / Education and healthcare
caption_attribution_description: Visited by members of the Taskforce team. Photo credit: Julia Chandler/Libraries Taskforce
context_page_description: Dorchester is the county town of Dorset, England. It is situated between Poole and Bridport on the A35 trunk route. A historic market town, Dorchester is on the banks of the River Frome to the south of the Dorset Downs and north of the South Dorset Ridgeway that separates the area from Weymouth, 7 miles to the south. The civil parish includes the small town of Poundbury and the suburb of Fordington.
  The area around the town was first settled in prehistoric times. The Romans established a garrison there after defeating the Durotriges tribe, calling the settlement that grew up nearby Durnovaria; they built an aqueduct to supply water and an amphitheatre on an ancient British earthwork. After the departure of the Romans, the town diminished in significance, but during the medieval period became an important commercial and political centre. It was the site of the "Bloody Assizes" presided over by Judge Jeffreys after the Monmouth Rebellion, and later the trial of the Tolpuddle Martyrs.
  In the 2011 census, the population of Dorchester was 19,060, with further people coming from surrounding areas to work in the town which has six industrial estates.
context_section_description: Dorchester has thirteen first schools, three middle schools:St Osmund's Church of England Middle School, St Mary's Church of England Middle School, Puddletown and Dorchester Middle School and an upper school; The Thomas Hardye School which was founded in 1569 and endowed by Thomas Hardye, a merchant in 1579. It was expanded and reopened in 1888. In 2011 had 2,283 pupils on the roll. The author Thomas Hardy, a distance relative, was a school governor here from 1909 until shortly before his death. The nineteen schools in the Dorchester area form the Dorchester Area Schools Partnership (DASP). There is also a private school, Sunninghill Prep School,
  Kingston Maurward College is a land-based studies college on the outskirts of the town. It offers full-time and part-time courses, apprenticeships and university-level courses in a wide range of subjects including agriculture, horticulture, conservation, construction, countryside and wildlife management.
  The town's hospital is Dorset County Hospital on Williams Avenue. It offers a twenty-four-hour accident and emergency treatment with services being provided by Dorset County Hospital NHS Foundation Trust.
caption: Dorchester Library and Learning Centre
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