Flying Start Nursery - Marjon | Ofsted Reports, Reviews (2025)

1993 saw the opening of the first Flying Start Nursery in Camborne.
Flying Start has changed and grown since then, and now there are 8 centres distributed around Plymouth and all of Cornwall.
The Flying Start family is growing stronger as Sophia, one of the Cowburn twins, is now a successful graduating nursery manager with Early Years Professional accreditation.
Since 2002, we have been Investors in People and currently have two OUTSTANDING results.
Steve and Sharon Cowburn launched Flying Start in 1990 in Bristol.
Initially, Flying Start was a consultancy that provided childcare assistance to the corporate, public, and nonprofit sectors.
In addition to managing a nursery for a private customer, Flying Start also operated a mobile crèche and provided childminder training.
In May 1993, Sharon and I relocated to Cornwall (back to Cornwall for Sharon), where we bought and renamed our first nursery Flying Start.
We purchased 4 pre-existing nurseries in 1995, both at Cornwall College and on school grounds.
Sharon also took on a variety of additional duties, such as NVQ assessor and verifier training and Ofsted inspector certification.
She also worked closely with the Early Years Development Childcare Partnership and was elected chair of the National Private Day Nurseries Association (Cornwall).
In 1999, we had the chance to deepen our ties with Cornwall College and establish new locations at Saltash College and Duchy College.
We opened a non-profit crche in Kerrier while collaborating closely with Sure Start.
With the addition of Flying Start @ Marjon, we now have eight centres, over 130 staff members, over 400 registered seats, and well over 600 children on roll. We took over the nursery at Marjon University and then developed a lovely new setting that debuted in 2015.