Board Responsibility

 Before continuing with this week's post an apology is due to all SAOEE readers.  The current series of education blog posts was created in advance and then released individually each week.  With only one instalment to go I realised I have two posts held in draft. So, the "chapters" of the story which you have all read have an important gap, in that the reference to the Board schools is missing.  You, dear readers, have been remarkably restrained – and patient.  Below, therefore, is the really important thirty years in which the 1870 Education Act enabled local education Boards to get to work. 

Enjoy!

Abbey parish created its National schools in Spicer Street, and the title is still displayed
boldly above the entrance to the former boys' school.  From the 1870s new schools built by the 
St Albans School Board provided places to larger numbers of children.

1870 was a key date for children's education; this was the first time Parliament assumed a responsibility for education – note, a responsibility, not the responsibility.  The existing system of British and National schools continued, for which the state provided grants. Now there was to be a Board of Education and local committees to ensure sufficient resources were available for all children within the age confines stipulated, which initially was ten years, but later extended to 12.  What the state undertook was to build a system while the existing parish schools continued to operate separately.

The first board school was on land owned by St Peter's Church and named Hatfield Road Boys'
School.  The buildings were subsequently enlarged as the population increased.  During the
post-war period the same buildings were used by Pemberton JMI school until their new site was
completed in Hall Place Gardens (now called Maple School).  Many residents will recall
children at play on the former playground (photo below) where the St Albans City
School is today.
COURTESY ST ALBANS MUSEUMS

To illustrate the slow pace of progress in St Albans, its Board unwilling to do anything which would cost money, and only then when they really had to!  Talk was as far as the Board got until 1877.  However, two Board schools emerged quickly after that.  Hatfield Road School opened in 1881, and an almost immediate enlargement gave it a capacity of 500 boys by 1885.  It was built almost opposite the Marlborough Almshouses and where St Albans Free School is today.  The school continued until 1938 when the remaining pupils transferred to the then new Beaumont School.  However, the buildings re-opened after World War Two and became the temporary home of Pemberton JMI School.

The architect's drawing of the second Board School in Alma Road.  The view is from the junction of Alma Road and Bedford Road.  Once more the school was enlarged for greater numbers. The
entrance on the corner was reserved for children of the Infants department.  It became Alma 
Road JMI in the re-organisation plan, and post-war was a temporary home to at least three 
starter schools before their new buildings were complete.
COURTESY HERTS ADVERTISER

Opening a year later than Hatfield Road, in 1882, a second Board school opened in Alma Road for 250 infants and 230 older girls.  It was the first Board school in St Albans to have classrooms on two floors.  Alma Road became a JMI after 1930s reorganisation, and continued to offer accommodation temporarily to many schools right through the 1960s.  The existence of these two Board schools greatly relieved the pressure on classroom space throughout the city.

By the end of the 19th century it was necessary to divide the senior boys in St Albans between two
schools.  Priory Park was opened on a site in Old London Road and adjacent to St Peter's National
School.

Many residents remember Priory Park being a girls' school, which it was following the re-
organisation plan in the 1930s.  The plaque still proves, however, that originally it was 
Priory Park Boys' School.

The period from 1870 was also one of accelerated population growth with new house building in the development area known as New Town, both as Bedford Park and St Peter's Park.  So, by the turn of the century a third Board school was created in Old London Road.  Located next to St Peter's National School, Priory Park was a basic school for boys (on a not very convenient site).  From the 1930s reorganisation Priory Park became a girls' school and only ceased to be a school after the opening of St Julian's (now Marlborough) School in the 1960s; although in the meantime some of its accommodation was utilised by St Peter's next door, which is probably why the title St Peter's was occasionally applied to both buildings.

Before Priory Park, however, the overcrowding from the central infants sites had to be
managed.  This was handled by the building of Garden Fields Board School. Below the top roof
space the plaque still announces St Albans School Board. Above the entrance to the right
the name Garden Fields School is identified.

The St Albans Board opened a further school in 1896, Garden Fields,  at the western end of what was then known as Catherine Lane (now Catherine Street).  Specifically, it was intended to replace the much overcrowded and restricted buildings in Cross Street and Bernard Street.  Both infants and girls accommodation were extended within a few years.

A part of St Albans then outside of the city boundary was a developing area called Sandridge New Town.  We know it as Bernard's Heath, but for education purposes it was the responsibility of the St Albans Board.  The building was an all-age facility, but a later addition opening onto Upper Culver Road became separate infants accommodation.  By 1914 there were 150 infants, and 225 girls and boys on roll.  In 1950 it became an infant-only school; the juniors taking advantage of a new school, Spencer, in Watson Avenue.  So, a single school with two difference names, a confusion not adjusted until 2005 when Spencer Junior School was renamed Bernards Heath Junior School.

A further school of the Board period, though rather later, was the responsibility of St Peter's Rural Council.  Its Board  planned a school in Camp Road, for opening in 1898, and accommodating children of all ages in the rural district, which would, within a couple of years also include an increasing number of Camp and Fleetville children.  While technically planned and opened as a Board school it has always been considered an elementary school – the developing system which heralded transfer of responsibility for schools to the then new county councils.  This is undoubtedly the reason for the wall plaque displaying the name St Peter's Rural Elementary School.

So, at the start of the Board system, if we assume the new school infant numbers to be about 170 boys and 170 girls, who would then transfer to the appropriate senior departments, this would still leave the two senior girls schools less than half full, and Hatfield Road boys' only one-third full.  Three processes were probably at work concurrently.  First, the previously described population expansion in the New Town area.  It was only in 1879 that the city's eastern boundary was moved from Lattimore Road to Albion Road.  Second, a proportion of older children previously at one of the National or British schools undoubtedly took the opportunity to transfer to a Board school.  Third, there will have been an unknown number of children who had received no education at all in their younger years and as the facilities became available these new learners took up their places at the Board institutions – just as the state had intended.

Next time we discover the role of Hertfordshire County Council in developing the elementary system in line with government expectations.