Human Scale Education
Established in 1985, Human Scale Education (HSE) works with schools, parents and educationists to develop small learning communities within large schools, as well as within local communities, where students and teachers can establish the kind of personal relationships that help students to learn and to thrive. The organisation is practice-led and project-based. In 2006-2009, in partnership with the Gulbenkian Foundation, HSE ran the Human Scale Schools Project where some 40 secondary schools across the UK received grants to develop different kinds of human scale practices.
A key finding of the independent evaluation of the Human Scale Schools project, published at the end of 2010, was that schools found it difficult to introduce pedagogies that kept pace with human scale innovations in the field of the curriculum and classroom organisation. This led to the introduction of a programme of study visits, organised by HSE, to schools in Denmark to witness vibrant pedagogies in practice and other relevant activities. In 2009/10 HSE ran a seminar programme on different features of human scale education attended by teachers and educationists. Headteachers of some of the schools funded by the Human Scale Schools project addressed the seminars, in partnership with senior figures from the world of education.
HSE maintains a lively publication programme, many of its titles being available online. These include ‘Towards Schools where People Matter : A Study of the Human Scale Schools Project’ (Gulbenkian Foundation, 2010), ‘Schools Within Schools : Human Scale Education in Practice ( Gulbenkian Foundation, 2009), a series of Occasional Papers on different aspects of human scale education; and papers that draw together the themes of the seminar programme, funded by the National College for School Leadership. HSE has recently received a major grant from the Gulbenkian Foundation to enable it to enlarge its staff team and its programme of activities. These will include the creation of an exemplar human scale school, the further development of the study visits programme and the expansion of the publication programme, as well as work with parents.
Website
hse.org.uk
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