We have a plan

In the second of a series of articles about the arrangements for educating the children of Camp and Fleetville we turn our attention to those over eleven years old.

A strategic plan for the re-organisation of schools in the East Ward of St Albans and district had been developed in the first half of the 1920s, but would, in theory, take a decade to implement, assuming that sufficient funds were forthcoming.

However, the circumstances in individual schools were becoming dire and the managers of some schools felt that they could not wait that long for improvements.  At Camp school, for example, there were places for 248 juniors and seniors, and 150 infants.  Although there was still space in the infants the junior/senior department (remember, progress was made through the school by ability and not necessarily by age), the County’s plan to add four further classrooms to a school in the centre of a fast-growing residential population, was at odds with the Board of Education’s re-organisation plans.

Strategically, the development of education services was progressing towards a system which separated schools into those which educated children up to the age of eleven, and those “post-primary schools” which provided a three-year curriculum for seniors up to the age of thirteen or fourteen and a four/five-year secondary curriculum for children up to fifteen or sixteen.  There would no longer be progression by ability.

The plan was to open a boys’ and a girls’ senior school on land which the County had purchased in Hatfield Road, Fleetville (the current Fleetville Juniors site). Camp and Fleetville schools would then become mixed schools for infants and juniors (JMIs).  The problem is that such bold plans (and this was for just the East ward) are very expensive and would take a long time to materialise.  

A surprisingly small senior class at Fleetville, possibly the final year, c1930,
in which senior girls attended the school.
Courtesy Fleetville Infants School & Nursery

In view of this urgency an interim plan was put into place for shorter-term gains, in which one half of the senior school would be constructed, for 320 girls.  Its numbers would come from the girls from Camp and Fleetville schools senior departments.  The Camp senior boys would move to Fleetville to occupy the places freed up by their girls, and the accommodation for Camp would enable the infants and juniors departments to expand.  The senior girls’ school would consist of eight classrooms each large  enough for 40 pupils (the norm at the time), a central hall and a practical block.

These discussions took place at the beginning of 1928, and at the time the education department had not even purchased a full site for one senior school, having just purchased a nominal four-and-a-half acres – enough for buildings but no playground or playing fields; that would have to come later.

Meanwhile, a site in Fleetville had already been pencilled in for a senior girls school to replace the existing Central Girls’ school – the same site!  Central schools were developed to provide further education opportunities, mainly for girls who had often left school up to a year earlier than boys. The Central in St Albans had  restricted accommodation in Victoria Street, part of the old library and school of art.  This was, essentially, a science and handicrafts centre, which itself desperately required replacing,  

Well, that was the plan.  

The Central Girls' School buildings with building added in 1938.

Fleetville and Camp areas were probably not surprised that the plan, which would have greatly advanced provision in the ward, was compromised by allocation of the senior school site for the Central girls’ school.  However, this school, when eventually built in 1931 did contain more capacity than originally intended, in order to accommodate the girls from the Central as well as those from Camp and Fleetville.  However, since a senior boys' school was not part of the immediate plan, Fleetville continued to provide for them, as well as Hatfield Road boys’ near St Peter’s Street, until Beaumonts’ and the boys’ grammar schools were built in 1938.

The new Central senior school site also included a separate block as a boys’ craft centre.  

A section of the school population with staff taken in 1931 when Central
Girls' School opened in Fleetville.

The school had not been on this site for more than seven years when the buildings were modified and re-opened as the St Albans Girls’ Modern school – by the time it opened it had already been renamed St Albans Grammar School for Girls, so becoming a secondary school.  As part of the improvements an extension was built and the craft block integrated with the main school.  The school was one of the first to have a caretaker’s house built under the many standards for secondary schools which the county adopted.  The house was built on a strip of newly acquired land which also acted as a wider and more welcoming entrance than the narrow way next to West and Sellick.

 

The caretaker's house added in 1938.  The new entrance was much more
imposing than the rather utilitarian gateway of today.  A detached house
set on a wide plot is now replaced by Grimsdyke Lodge, built right up to
the boundary fence.

Next time it will be the turn of the senior boys.

Educating the Newcomers

Work is now well advanced on recreating and improving the website St Albans' Own East End; delivering it on a new, more modern, platform.  There are many limitations to the present website platform, the most important that it is no longer being serviced.  So, as they say, the time has come ...  and we will hopefully see the new site in all its east end splendour later in the summer.

One small new feature on the collection of photo pages devoted to the schools will be a brief history of each one.  We take them for granted, but they came into existence for many different reasons.  Yes, each one opened to provide more places for children living in the district, but the more we explore how their beginnings the more we understand how flimsy was the planning in each case, and how little the various education authorities took account of the data which was available to them.

Today, of course, there is so much data available – and even more can be commissioned by virtually anyone and for any purpose. Even basic facts and numbers available to authorities in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, such as census returns and movement of households into districts, did not appear to convince planners that crunching this limited information could possibly assist in making provision for school places.

For example,  from the 1890s almost thousands of homes were emerging from the fields on both sides of Hatfield Road and for a decade the education authority chose not to commit itself to building a school in the district; not even to negotiate with the developers to reserve a plot of land on which a future school might be built.

Shortly before the emergence of county authorities the St Albans Rural Education Board constructed a school, Camp, specifically for children living in the villages and hamlets on the east side of the city.  This  became urgent because the St Albans (city) Education Board had reviewed its existing policy and denied future access by rural children to city schools, mainly Alma Road, St Peter's and Priory Park, and Hatfield Road.  

Children in all of the homes in the Cavendish, Fleetville and Castle areas were expected to attend Camp School.  It wasn't only a question of numbers either.  A child living in Brampton Road had no straight-line access to Camp School as the only rights of way across the railway line were in Sutton Road and Camp Road.

The first part of Fleetville School opened in 1908, although strangely, the authority had no expectation that many children would attend on the first day, only employing the head teacher and deputy until proof could be shown!  Between them, Camp and Fleetville carried the burden of education the east end's children – all of them up to leaving age – until the opening of Ss Alban & Stephen in 1934.  The removal of senior children into senior schools at Hatfield Road, Priory Park and, eventually Beaumont, occurred from 1930, and relieved some pressure on space. Incredibly, it was not until 1955 and 1958 respectively that new schools were opened at Windermere and Oakwood, the latter being known at the planning stage as the Fleetville Extension School.

We now have nine (10 if Samuel Ryder is included) centres educating primary-aged children, and during the post-war period the education authority was finally able to do what the 1944 Education Act envisioned: to enable primary children to attend a local school within a short walking distance of their homes.  Of course, the open enrolment concept of recent years has partly negated that aspiration, with many children being ferried by car to a school further away on the basis that it is a good school.  Yes, there's a debate to be had here.  Good schools everywhere, more open air and exercise for all, fewer cars, less stress around the school gates, cleaner air ...

Next time we will discover how bad it became for children over the age of eleven.