How the Heritage Schools Programme Operates
Our Heritage Schools programme is part of a range of cultural education work funded by the Department for Education (DfE). Here you can find out what's involved and the impact the scheme's had.
Who's involved?
Local Heritage Education Managers work with clusters of schools across the country to:
- Co-ordinate training
- Offer curriculum support
- Broker partnerships with local heritage providers
400 schools are directly involved in the programme.
The Churches Conservation Trust (CCT) is the Heritage School's national partner organisation and has developed a parallel project in three regions to promote the use of CCT properties as learning resources.
Impact of the scheme
Each school has nominated a Lead Teacher who is trained to embed local heritage in their school's curriculum. Teachers have reported that they are much more confident and knowledgeable about using local heritage as a result of their training.
Schools are now using local heritage to connect children to where they live, develop a sense of a place and an understanding of how local heritage relates to the national story. Our research shows that, as a result, children are increasingly proud of where they live.
I had a priceless moment when a child in my class [...] was holding the census in his hands of a hundred years ago of the people who lived in his house, so that kind of link has been really good for them to think 'Wow, this was in my house.'
The benefits of learning about local heritage
Learning about local heritage:
- Supports the delivery of the history and geography curriculum
- Inspires creativity
- Develops literacy and an awareness and appreciation of architecture and design
- Encourages young people to value and protect the heritage around them.
So far we have:
- Trained over 2,000 teachers
- Spoken to 1,000 people at Heritage Schools events
- Reached 470,000 children
- 30,000+ resource downloads each year
