English Heritage Urges Councils to Examine the Value of Historic Schools
The Government’s current Building Schools for the Future initiative represents the biggest school building and refurbishment programme for 50 years. This is creating many new issues for England’s historic schools, such as proposals for redevelopment, accommodation of new uses or, in extreme cases demolition.
While English Heritage recognises the need for change and investment, for example to enable the use of new information technology in the classroom or to create multipurpose learning spaces, it is urging local councils to ensure that the value of their historic schools is fully understood before decisions are taken affecting their future.
In a new policy document entitled The Future of Historic School Buildings, English Heritage, with the support of the Department for Education, sets out its approach to safeguarding the most important aspects of our historic schools while still enabling change.
Tim Brennan, English Heritage Policy Officer said: “Proposals for change should be sustainable, based on an understanding of the architectural and historical significance of the school and the way in which it is valued by the community.
“Historic schools can often be the most prominent building in a community after the parish church. The shared experience they represent, sometimes stretching across many generations, can be a powerful source of community identity and cohesion. In many places, their architectural style makes an important contribution to local character and identity, while many continue to play a central community role through secondary uses such as life long learning activities.
In such cases English Heritage will favour repair, refurbishment and reuse as a school rather than direct replacement. If it can be demonstrated that the school can not be adapted to modern educational use, English Heritage will normally favour conversion to re-use, possibly as offices or flats. Demolition should always be a last resort in the interests of sustainability and preserving local character.
The Future of Historic School Buildings contains a useful checklist for all those involved in the decision making process and also draws together a series of case studies of innovative modernisation projects at schools across England.
The document forms part of a series of guidance notes and position statements produced as part of English Heritage’s HELM project, which is intended to help local authorities reach better decisions in relation to the historic environment. For further details please see www.helm.org.uk.