Longhill High school, in conjunction with Fabrica Gallery, LCP and Creative Partnerships has begun the first steps in a ground breaking initiative that will perhaps change the way we consider both school environments and the students relationship with the display of work.
Until now most schools, almost purposefully present a clinical institutionalised environment for the staff and students to operate within. In many cases it is difficult to identify the difference between a public hospital, government office or a school – except perhaps by the types of warning messages that are displayed.
This Spartan approach to the interiors of schools appears to have come about by default, rather than through any considered strategy, as if a puritan rejection of all things decorative will in some way by default lead to an improvement in the learning environment. This attitude is one that has been questioned and found lacking, to good effect in some more enlightened workplaces. Bearing in mind that school is where life skills are gained and attitudes are first formed, it seems even more crucial that an awareness of the effects of environment and context are considered, and acted upon for the benefit of schoolchildren in the short term, and society in general in the longer term.
At Longhill High School the students themselves identified the issue of the dismal environment in schools almost by accident, during a detour from a project to refurbish a newly covered playground. We decided to follow the detour for a while and look into the question of display throughout the school, what it brought to the learning environment and students attitudes to it.
In part, responses to the quality and content of the schools display strategy, or lack of it, were influenced by a single new occurrence in the school. A new year 11 canteen had been built, it was furnished with modern well designed and interesting furniture and fittings, the walls were painted in colours and there were several posters framed upon the walls.
Without exception the students recognised this room as one that confirmed their maturity, aesthetic intelligence and more realistically portrayed the world they occupied outside of school. Even those who were not yet old enough to enter the canteen recognised the enlightening effect it had on the school just by its presence. One student even noticed that the time seemed less oppressive on a blue faced clock, than on the standard uniform white ones.
But the factor that was to give us most food for thought were the posters, these where A0 art prints that you might find in a print gallery, and were carefully chosen to have broad appeal, yet without referring directly to anything that smacked of curriculum.
Briefly, the key observations on the school as a whole were:
- Existing display is limited to a variety of large soft-board panels fixed to the walls around the corridors.
- Display panels are shoddy and untidy – some are decorated with church fete like signage and frills.
- Staff attempts to ‘brighten up’ display boards are reminiscent of kindergarten (primary colours, clipart cartoons etc).
- Only schoolwork is ever displayed on them – often for so long no-one remembers who did the work.
- Students work, unless of an exceptional standard, never sets as high aspirational goals as professional images/displays would.
- Other students work is more often annoying or embarrassing than interesting.
- Essays make appallingly dull display (text in general too).
- Staff seem to feel obliged to represent curriculum subjects on display boards, but are seldom creative about it (portraits of great men).
- Some staff cannot produce displays that match the visual literacy of the majority of students.
Some students felt the display boards were actually aimed at parents and visitors – to demonstrate the standard of work expected by staff, rather than to inspire and stimulate students on a daily basis.
There was minimal need for active notice boards, for timetabling notices etc, what space remained was generally dealt with poorly.
Classrooms however were felt to be much better considered as environments for learning, and that many teachers created interesting and inspiring rooms.
Corridors were often treated as a sort of no-mans-land of un-adopted passageways between subjects, yet these are the spaces students inhabit between subjects.
The result of these rather unexpected discoveries is that Longhill High School is developing a strategy to address display within the schools corridors. This strategy is experimental, it approaches how display is achieved in the school from two directions:
- Physical issues – the design and location of display sites. The effect on the common-ways of new display areas and strategies.
- Practical issues – the skill and specialism of providing excellent displays and understanding its impact.
The Design & location of display sites.
As part of the Creative Partnerships Change Schools Project the students developed an innovative strategy for making the schools display more intriguing and professional.
All existing soft-board ‘notice-boards were removed, and during the summer refit a large number of lockable clip frames were installed.
These new frames were arranged in all corridors and stairways in sequences more like a galleries display than the old ‘scout-hut’ approach.
The frames themselves can be loaded from the front, covered with a non-reflective ‘glass’ and locked, giving the appearance of a framed work.
The school has now got its own extensive, 300 frame gallery, in what not so long ago was clinical corridor ...
Reposted from Exegesis | Art, location & Culture
