Looking around the globe, those involved in Building Schools for the Future (BSF) could do worse than learn from a project in the Cayman Islands in the Caribbean, where four new "schools within a school" were conceived, designed and built all within 18 weeks. The schools opened in September 2006, and a recent official inspection has already noted "a significant improvement" on the school that preceded them.
The four new schools on Grand Cayman, the largest of the three Cayman Islands, replace the overcrowded and poorly regarded 11–14 George Hicks high school, where discipline and results were both at a low point. Splitting it into four separate institutions of around 270 students, each with their own leader but sharing a campus, was seen as a way to get people to reconnect with the school.
Smaller schools have worked better around the world, says Professor Stephen Heppell, an authority on education innovation who acted as consultant to the Cayman project. "It's not rocket science to see that if you recognise the faces when you walk around the school corridors, that creates a sense of community."
School leaders are responsible for teaching and learning, assessment, students, staff and administration in each of the four schools, while ICT maintenance and catering, plus external special needs services, are handled by a whole-campus manager.
The plan was borne out of Heppell's discussions with Angela Martins, permanent secretary at the Caymans education ministry, and Gareth Long, an adviser to the islands' education minister and a former London secondary headteacher.
It was, says Long, first sketched out on a paper napkin over lunch, and met its tight deadline — including consultation with students, staff and parents — thanks to strong local commitment.
"The new deputy director of public works wanted to prove what his department could do, so we set them a challenge. We finished literally half an hour before the children were due in."
The reorganisation has transformed teaching and learning, Long says, and will act as a model for more new schools. The new schools have a variety of learning areas — research areas, refl ective learning space, seminar areas, informal learning areas, practical areas, presentation spaces — all supported by laptop technology, and the whole campus is a wireless environment.
"It is giving the learner the agility to organise how they do their learning individually, in groups, through research — and the teacher can be totally flexible about the learning activities they organise," says Long.
Lyneth Monteith, a teacher at the previous school for 27 years and now one of four school leaders, says the smaller scale enables staff to focus intently on teaching and learning.
"Small is better. It's easier to monitor students and to use diagnostic tools to find out what we need to do with them to improve things. It also means you have more control over manipulating timetables — so, for example, year 9s can do an eight-week work placement. It was more difficult to organise before with 1,000-plus students."
Competition between the schools is also pushing up standards and increasing participation, she adds. "There is a greater sense of school pride among the students. We are fostering a sense of belonging."
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Educational transformation in the Caymans:
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