That awesome thing (see previous post)… I visited a new School in New Earswick, the garden village created by Joseph Rowntree in the early years of the 20th century. The school, which carries JR’s name, has been rebuilt, and opened last term. It is stunning – light and colour are everywhere. It was Plato who wrote that The most effective kind of education is that a child should play amongst lovely things. Well, Joseph Rowntree School is a lovely thing –I’m sure it’s being monitored and evaluated to bits, but I find it inconceivable that an environment as spirit-lifting as that wouldn’t affect, in a benign fashion, the demeanour of those who spend time there — students and teachers. I’m used to visiting places where the advance publicity doesn’t quite match the reality; this was an exception. It’s particularly interesting to me that the school head was very closely involved in the design, choice of colours etc. But there is a sad aspect to all this — the school has been the object of study and consultation by many others who have spent years planning towards a new school, and who want to learn from the experience of JR School. But of course many if not most of those will, despite all that work, have now learned that their plans will come to nothing, as the schools building programme has been all but axed.
And while I’m writing, Id like to add an apology: when I started this blog, I intended those who signed up to read it, to get an email with a link whenever there was a new posting. What I didn’t want was for the post itself to be sent in an email – first, because I wanted people to choose when or whether they read the post, and second, because the posts look much nicer in the context of the full blog. I now have a topflight team of technical advisers working on this problem, and hopefully they will sort it soon (sound of SB stretching and yawning as he wakes up and the dream fades…).
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