Bacup and Rawtenstall Grammar School
Contents
Staff and Students through the Ages
Foundation and Ongoing Construction
Main School Building
As every year 7 student at BRGS learns in their earliest history lessons, BRGS was founded at its current site in 1912, opening to its first intake in 1913, when the Newchurch Grammar School moved. Geography students taking a trip around Waterfoot learn that it is made of the same type and age of stone as most of the old parts of Waterfoot. It has held many thousands of students over the years, with increasing numbers in recent years, resulting in an ongoing need for construction work. Since 1913, many sections have been added to the school; the year of construction of any part can be ascertained by looking at the year number on each of the copper drainpipe tops in the offending section of school for the old sections, and the uPVC tops in more recent constructions.
Temporary Construction
The school also plays host to a number of "Temporary Classrooms", such as rooms 57 and 58 - the so called "English Block", which used to be music rooms (in the late 1960s). A new set of six Temporary Classrooms, T 1-6, now occupy old car parking areas, and are projected by some estimates to have a shelf life of about a century, but are expected still to be here in two.
Rooms 64 and 65 are expected to be here in the long haul due to the permanent construction work which has gone on around them to make access easier and "safer", though it is not unknown for students to sprain feet walking down the slope from the said rooms.
Extensions
Permanent construction additions to the school have included the Extension Corridor, which has been the starting point for a number of new extensions, and leads now to the Newchurch Wing, construction finishing at the back end of 1999. The Art Block, completed in 1996, is now too small; the area where it began (currently the Music Department) is also too small to host its named teaching rooms, and the two will soon be amalgamated in a new Arts Department, which is likely to have as much trouble with planning permission as the Sports Hall. The Clark Building, built in 1990, holds the tiny school Library, and is generally used only for sixth form teaching.
Physical Education
High on the list of the new headmaster Marc Morris' priorities, PE is taking a front line in producing well rounded individuals of all those who enter the school's gates. Both staff and students are encouraged to take part in extra-curricular sporting events, as diverse as Teacher Sports Day in the summer of 2005 and many interform competitions. The school also has a number of UK international sports players, both past and present students. Kristin Bromley, the Olympian Skeleton Bob star is perhaps the most high flying current sportsman, but is being pursued closely by Rachel Henry, an England U21 netball international, and David Groom, on the UK Judo team. Joe Hodgson is the first choice goalkeeper for the GB-22 handball team.
Fields
The PE department is in charge of the ever expanding sports facilities around the school. The Glen Playing Fields, a number of minutes east from the school are used for interschool football competitions, and rarely see the boots of less sporting students. The top field of the school is on a slope, and thus is the perfect site for a 200m running track. It also has the school's long jump and triple jump area, and an area of grass within the track, suitable for javelin throwing and rugby playing.
The old lower field, shadowed by a bank of trees, is now the host of a fenced in astro-turf area, large enough for a full sized game of hockey, and marked with numerous other courts for netball, 5-a-side football, and others. Being totally open, it gets very cold in the winter months, but due to the until recently very limited indoor sports facilities, was still where most boys' PE lessons took place during colder months, in wind, rain, hail, or scorching sun. Generations of boys remember getting back into the changing rooms and defrosting their hands on the single radiator, and having great trouble with buttons.
Gym
The main reason for this ongoing pain was the PE staff's decision that cold sport is better than no sport, which itself was required by the fact that more often than not it is cold in Rossendale, and the old Gym (soon to be converted into a 6th form study area and common room) was far too small for the classes of 60-90 taking games at any one time. Constructed for a school of 300 students, the gym is now entirely out of date and has been replaced by the Sports Hall.
Sports Hall
The PE facilities were added to by the £1m Sports Hall in 2005, with extra classrooms, a fitness studio and dance studio, in addition to a large indoor (but nontheless badly heated) area with basketball hoops, a sprung floor, and cricket nets. Finally, the courts at the front of the school are available for use generally by students, on a rotational basis with different year groups being assigned a different court each week. For year 7 students, who are not included in the rotation until year 11 leave in May, the cubby hole adjacent to room 69 is available for their sporting escapades.
