Defunct schools in Sandwell

Last updated

This article details a number of defunct schools that were once located in Sandwell in the West Midlands of England. For details of currently operating schools in Sandwell, please see: List of schools in Sandwell .

Contents

Albright Secondary Modern School

Albright Secondary Modern School was a secondary modern school situated in Oldbury, Worcestershire (now West Midlands), England.

It was built in the 1930s and named after local manufacturer Albright and Wilson. The school buildings were situated on Pope's Lane to the south of the town centre.

The school's name changed in September 1974 – the same year that Sandwell was created from the merger of Warley with West Bromwich – when it gained comprehensive status and became Albright High School. However, this arrangement only lasted for nine years, as the school closed in July 1983 on a merger with nearby Oldbury High School to form Langley High School, which in turn closed 24 years later on a merger with Warley High School to form Oldbury College of Sport (now Oldbury Academy).

The Albright school buildings remain in use as a community facility. [1]

52°30′03″N2°00′14″W / 52.50093°N 2.00391°W / 52.50093; -2.00391

Britannia High School

Britannia High School was a secondary school located in Rowley Regis, West Midlands, England. [2]

It was opened in 1932 as Rowley Regis Secondary Modern Boys School and later became a mixed school with the title Britannia High School.

Plans to close the school were first drawn up in 2001, but these were initially shelved in July of that year after a re-think by Sandwell council officials. [3] Council officials changed their mind the following year, with all but the oldest pupils being transferred to Heathfield Foundation Technology College for the 2002-2003 academic year. [4] However, the 2001-2002 Year 10 pupils were allowed to remain at Britannia in order to complete their GCSE studies, before the school closed completely in July 2003. The school buildings were demolished in 2004 and the site is now occupied by the new Blackheath Primary School. [5]

The school featured in an edition of On The Record, the BBC's flagship political TV programme, in 1989. [6]

Hill Top High School

Hill Top High School was a secondary school located in West Bromwich, West Midlands (formerly Staffordshire), England.

It opened in 1911 as Hill Top Council School, incorporating infant, junior and secondary departments, on the corner of Hill Top and Coles Lane. The buildings were enlarged in 1914 to take in extra pupils.

Part of the school was damaged by the Luftwaffe during the Second World War. The infant school relocated to a site of the new Hateley Heath housing estate in 1950, with the juniors following in 1952, leaving only the secondary school pupils at Hill Top.

The schools status changed from secondary modern to comprehensive in 1969, when it took on the title of Hill Top High School.

By the late 1980s, numbers on the school roll were falling and Sandwell council decided that it was no longer viable and would have to close.

The final intake of 11-year-old pupils started at Hill Top in September 1989, with youngest two year groups transferring to Wodensborough Community Technology College after the end of the academic year in July 1990. The oldest two year groups in the school were allowed to remain at Hill Top until it closed completely in July 1992 [7]

The school buildings were then demolished and replaced by housing [8]

52°32′N2°01′W / 52.54°N 2.01°W / 52.54; -2.01

Langley High School

Park Lane Secondary Modern School

Park Lane Secondary Modern School was a secondary school located in Tipton, Staffordshire (now West Midlands), England.

It was the last of seven schools to be opened by Tipton School Board, which was formed in 1871. The foundation for the school was laid on 20 May 1903 by the chairman, Mr Atkins Hinton. It was opened the following year as two single sex schools school for children aged 11 upwards.

After 65 years, it closed in July 1969 on a merger with Tipton Grammar School to form Alexandra High School and Sixth Form Centre (a comprehensive school), but the buildings remained in use for the youngest three year groups in the new school. By the early 1980s, however, extensions were added to the main Alexandra site on Alexandra Road which meant that the younger pupils only used the Park Lane buildings (by this stage in a deteriorating condition) on a part-time basis. The Park Lane site closed completely in July 1990, ending 86 years of education at the site, and it was demolished the following year.

Victoria Infant School was opened on the site in September 1995 to replace Manor Road Infant School.

Rowley Regis Grammar School

Rowley Regis Grammar School was a grammar school situated in Rowley Regis, West Midlands (formerly Staffordshire), England.

The school started life in Wrights Lane, Old Hill using the old Victorian premises used by the local Central School. It became a Grammar School in 1948. After persistent lobbying particularly by the headmaster Mr George Lloyd that the premises were unfit for a Grammar school, a new school was built at a site on Hawes Lane in Rowley Regis and opened in September 1962, providing education for pupils aged 11 to 18 years. It remained opened for 13 years until Sandwell Council decided to close it in July 1975, as part of a local phasing-out scheme of grammar schools in favour of comprehensive schools.

It became a sixth form college after closing as a grammar school, until Dudley College took it over in September 2001, although this arrangement only lasted for three years, and in early 2008 the buildings were demolished.[ permanent dead link ]

The new St Michael's Church of England High School opened on the site in September 2011 to replace the existing buildings on Throne Road, which were later demolished.

52°29′36″N2°02′19″W / 52.4934°N 2.0386°W / 52.4934; -2.0386

Warley High School

Warley High School was a secondary school located in Oldbury, West Midlands (formerly Worcestershire), England. The school was granted Sports College specialist status.

It opened in 1930 at the Junior Technical School, later becoming Oldbury Technical School, moving from the Flash Road site, a type of school which bridged the gap between secondary modern and grammar schools and was very biased towards the teaching of technology.

The head teacher was Mr Bullerwell and the deputy head was Mr Thompson. There was also a sixth form centre, which survived the name change in September 1975 but closed during the 1980s following a rise in popularity of sixth form colleges like Halesowen College.

The school's best known former pupil is Frank Skinner, the television comedian who attended between 1968 and 1973 when it was still Oldbury Technical School.

The school merged with Langley High School (formerly Oldbury Grammar School) during the 2006-2007 academic year to form Oldbury College of Sport, with a lower and higher school site, and a new school is to be built on the upper school site. The new school opened its doors early in January 2007, at the beginning of the Spring term.

The school made the headlines for all the wrong reasons in February 2007 when teacher Kenneth Paskin, 59, was found guilty of sexual offences against a 13-year-old girl who had been placed in his care some time earlier. Mr Paskin, a teacher and netball coach for some 30 years (the final nine of them at Warley) prior to his arrest, was sentenced to three years and three months in prison and put on the sex offender registry for life. [9] The school is now known as Oldbury Academy.

52°34′48″N2°00′36″W / 52.580°N 2.010°W / 52.580; -2.010

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">West Midlands (county)</span> County in England

West Midlands is a metropolitan county in the West Midlands Region, England, with a 2021 population of 2,919,600, making it the second most populous county in England after Greater London. It was created in 1974 by the Local Government Act 1972, from parts of Staffordshire, Worcestershire and Warwickshire. The county is a NUTS 2 region within the wider NUTS 1 region of the same name. It embraces seven metropolitan boroughs: the cities of Birmingham, Coventry and Wolverhampton, and the boroughs of Dudley, Sandwell, Solihull and Walsall. The county is overseen by the West Midlands Combined Authority, which covers all seven boroughs and other non-constituent councils, on economy, transport and housing.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tipton</span> Town in the West Midlands, England

Tipton is an industrial town in the West Midlands in England with a population of around 38,777 at the 2011 UK Census. It is located 16 kilometres (9.9 mi) northwest of Birmingham.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Smethwick</span> Town in West Midlands, England

Smethwick is an industrial town in Sandwell, West Midlands, England. It lies 4 miles (6 km) west of Birmingham city centre. Historically it was in Staffordshire and then Worcestershire before being placed into then West Midlands County.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sandwell</span> Metropolitan borough in England

Sandwell is a metropolitan borough of the West Midlands county in England. The borough is named after the Sandwell Priory, and spans a densely populated part of the West Midlands conurbation. According to Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council, the borough comprises the six amalgamated towns of Oldbury, Rowley Regis, Smethwick, Tipton, Wednesbury, and West Bromwich, although these places consist of numerous smaller settlements and localities.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Oldbury, West Midlands</span> Human settlement in England

Oldbury is a market town in the Metropolitan Borough of Sandwell, West Midlands, England. It is the administrative centre of the borough and one of its six constituent towns.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rowley Regis</span> Human settlement in England

Rowley Regis is a town and former municipal borough in Sandwell in the county of the West Midlands, England. It encompasses the three Sandwell council wards of Blackheath, Cradley Heath and Old Hill, and Rowley. At the 2011 census, the combined population of these wards was 50,257.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Blackheath, West Midlands</span> Human settlement in England

Blackheath is a town and ward in the Rowley Regis area of the Sandwell Metropolitan Borough, in the county of West Midlands, England.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">County Borough of Warley</span>

Warley was a short-lived county borough and civil parish in the geographical county of Worcestershire, England, forming part of the West Midlands conurbation. It was formed in 1966 by the combination of the existing county borough of Smethwick with the municipal boroughs of Oldbury and Rowley Regis, by recommendation of the Local Government Commission for England. It was abolished just 8 years later in 1974 under the Local Government Act 1972, with its area passing to the Metropolitan Borough of Sandwell.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brandhall</span> Human settlement in England

Brandhall is a suburb of Oldbury in the south of the Metropolitan Borough of Sandwell, West Midlands, bordering Birmingham and Halesowen. The development of the area commenced during the 1930s with the construction of several hundred private houses along the Hagley Road and Wolverhampton Road, as well as several side roads leading off the main dual carriageways. However, most of Brandhall was developed in the 1950s and 1960s, when several thousand council houses, flats and bungalows were built by Oldbury Council. Most of the high and medium-rise flats in Brandhall were demolished in the early 2000s and in their place housing associations built new low-rise homes. Brandhall is growing to be a more popular place due to the construction of new facilities, such as a local supermarket and a doctor's surgery.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cradley Heath</span> Human settlement in England


Cradley Heath is a town in the Rowley Regis area of the Metropolitan Borough of Sandwell, West Midlands, England approximately 2 miles (3 km) north-west of Halesowen, 3 miles (5 km) south of Dudley and 8 miles (13 km) west of central Birmingham. Cradley Heath is often confused with the neighbouring Halesowen district of Cradley, although the two places are separated by the River Stour and have long been in separate local authorities, and until 1966 were in separate counties.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Halesowen and Rowley Regis (UK Parliament constituency)</span> Parliamentary constituency in the United Kingdom, 1997 onwards

Halesowen and Rowley Regis is a constituency in the West Midlands represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2010 by James Morris, a Conservative.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Warley, West Midlands</span>

Warley is a residential area of Oldbury in the Metropolitan Borough of Sandwell in the West Midlands of the United Kingdom. Historically in both Worcestershire and Shropshire, the name has been used for both a civil parish (1884–1908) and a county borough (1966–1974). Warley has been the name of a UK Parliament constituency since 1997.

Warley West was a parliamentary constituency in the borough of Sandwell in the West Midlands of England. It was initially centred on the towns of Rowley Regis and Cradley Heath, and from 1983 also incorporated parts of Oldbury.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Old Hill</span> Human settlement in England

Old Hill is an area of Rowley Regis in the metropolitan borough of Sandwell in the West Midlands, England, situated around 2 miles (3.2 km) north of Halesowen and 2.5 miles (4.0 km) south of Dudley. Initially a separate village it is now part of the much larger West Midlands conurbation.

Q3 Academy Langley is a coeducational secondary school located in the Langley Green area of Oldbury in the West Midlands of England.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Holly Lodge High School</span> Foundation school in Smethwick, West Midlands, England

Holly Lodge High School College of Science is a secondary school located in Smethwick, West Midlands, England.

This article details a number of defunct schools that were once located in the Metropolitan Borough of Dudley. For details of currently operating schools in the area, please see: List of schools in Dudley.

Bristnall Hall Academy is a secondary school with academy status located in Oldbury, West Midlands, England.

Oldbury Academy is a mixed secondary school and former sixth form located in Oldbury, West Midlands, England. It opened as a merger of Warley High School and Langley High School on 1 January 1999 The head teacher, John Martin, led the merger of the two schools from 1983 until 1999. Phil Shackleton took over as head teacher from then on.

References

  1. ↑ "More bright sparks from Albright Secondary, Oldbury". Black Country Bugle. 8 March 2007. Archived from the original on 16 July 2011. Retrieved 27 June 2010.
  2. ↑ Black Country History
  3. ↑ "Closure rejected". The Halesowen News. 19 July 2001. Archived from the original on 29 October 2008. Retrieved 27 December 2007.
  4. ↑ "School bows out with gold". The Halesowen News. 1 August 2002. Archived from the original on 18 July 2007. Retrieved 27 December 2007.
  5. ↑ "Planners back move on Britannia High". The Halesowen News. 13 June 2003. Archived from the original on 29 September 2008. Retrieved 27 December 2007.
  6. ↑ "Britannia High School on the Telly". YouTube .
  7. ↑ http://www.school-index.co.uk/urn/127166.php [ dead link ]
  8. ↑ "West Bromwich: Education | British History Online".
  9. ↑ "Child sex case teacher is jailed". BBC News. 16 February 2007. Retrieved 25 May 2008.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.