Barr Beacon Language College is a mixed secondary school

Secondary school

Secondary school is a term used to describe an educational institution where the final stage of schooling, known as secondary education and usually compulsory up to a specified age, takes place...

 in Pheasey

Pheasey

Pheasey is a residential area of Great Barr in the West Midlands of England.It is situated in the east of the Metropolitan Borough of Walsall and is located near to the Sutton Coldfield district of Birmingham. Prior to 1974, it was part of Aldridge-Brownhills Urban District. The area was...

, Walsall

Metropolitan Borough of Walsall

The Metropolitan Borough of Walsall is a local government district in the Black Country part of the West Midlands, England, with the status of a metropolitan borough. It is named after its largest settlement, Walsall, but covers a larger area which also includes the towns of Aldridge, Brownhills,...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

. It takes its name from the adjacent hill, Barr Beacon

Barr Beacon

Barr Beacon is a hill on the edge of Walsall, West Midlands, England, very near the border with Birmingham. It gives its name to nearby Great Barr and to the local school Barr Beacon Language College. It is historically the site of a beacon where fires were lit in times of impending attack or on...

. The school has been a specialist Language College

Language College

Language Colleges were introduced in 1995 as part of the Specialist Schools Programme in the United Kingdom. The system enables secondary schools to specialise in certain fields, in this case, modern foreign languages...

 since September 2003 and has a sixth form

Sixth form

In the education systems of England, Wales, and Northern Ireland, and of Commonwealth West Indian countries such as Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, Belize, Jamaica and Malta, the sixth form is the final two years of secondary education, where students, usually sixteen to eighteen years of age,...

 of approximately 180 pupils.

The school opened in 1965 as an 11-16 secondary modern school, before converting to a 13-18 comprehensive in September 1972 under the reorganisation of schools in Aldridge-Brownhills, the urban district that was absorbed into the Metropolitan Borough of Walsall

Metropolitan Borough of Walsall

The Metropolitan Borough of Walsall is a local government district in the Black Country part of the West Midlands, England, with the status of a metropolitan borough. It is named after its largest settlement, Walsall, but covers a larger area which also includes the towns of Aldridge, Brownhills,...

in 1974. However, it reorganised to an 11-18 school in September 1986, and has retained that age rage ever since.