Based in an ivy-covered campus in the Upper North Shore suburb of Wahroonga, Knox is a Christian day and boarding school whose motto insists that ‘the manly thing is being done’ (‘Virile Agitur’).
Knox is a founding member of the Combined Associated Schools, and competes against the five other members – St. Aloysius, Barker College, Cranbrook, Trinity Grammar and Waverley College – in sports.
The school came under the media spotlight in 2009, when five former Knox teachers faced criminal charges for alleged sex offences between 1976 and 1990.
In a 2011 article, alumnus and Walkley Award winning journalist Malcolm Knox wrote that Knox was ‘a changed place’, requiring boarding masters to be married and their wives to be involved in boarding house activities.
Other old boys include former prime minister Gough Whitlam, actor Hugo Weaving, ABC managing director Mark Scott (whose wife is Wenona principal and alumnus Briony Scott), Macquarie Bank chairman David Clarke, Simon Longstaff of the St James Ethics Centre, and Rod McGeoch, who led Sydney’s bid to host the 2000 Olympics.