Secondary school



A secondary school is an organization that provides secondary education and the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both lower secondary education and upper secondary education (levels 2 and 3 of the ISCED scale), but these can also be provided in separate schools, as in the American middle and high school system.

Secondary schools typically follow on from primary schools and prepare for vocational or tertiary education. Attendance is compulsory in most countries for students until the age of 16. The organisations, buildings, and terminology are more or less unique in each country.

Terminology: descriptions of cohorts
Within the English speaking world, there are three widely used systems to describe the age of the child. The first is the 'equivalent ages', then countries that base their education systems on the 'English model' use one of two methods to identify the year group, while countries that base their systems on the 'American K-12 model' refer to their year groups as 'grades'. The Irish model is structured similarly to the English model, but have significant differences in terms of labels. This terminology extends into research literature. Below is a convenient comparison

Theoretical framework
School building design does not happen in isolation. The building (or school campus) needs to accommodate: Each country will have a different education system and priorities. Schools need to accommodate students, staff, storage, mechanical and electrical systems, support staff, ancillary staff and administration. The number of rooms required can be determined from the predicted roll of the school and the area needed.
 * Curriculum content
 * Teaching methods
 * Costs
 * Education within the political framework
 * Use of school building (also in the community setting)
 * Constraints imposed by the site
 * Design philosophy

According to standards used in the United Kingdom, a general classroom for 30 students needs to be 55 m², or more generously 62 m². A general art room for 30 students needs to be 83 m², but 104 m² for 3D textile work. A drama studio or a specialist science laboratory for 30 needs to be 90 m². Examples are given on how this can be configured for a 1,200 place secondary (practical specialism). and 1,850 place secondary school.

Building design specifications
The building providing the education has to fulfil the needs of: The students, the teachers, the non-teaching support staff, the administrators and the community. It has to meet general government building guidelines, health requirements, minimal functional requirements for classrooms, toilets and showers, electricity and services, preparation and storage of textbooks and basic teaching aids. An optimum secondary school will meet the minimum conditions and will have:


 * adequately sized classrooms;
 * specialised teaching spaces;
 * a staff preparation room;
 * an administration block;
 * multipurpose classrooms;
 * a general purpose school hall;
 * laboratories for science, technology, mathematics and life sciences, as may be required;
 * adequate equipment;
 * a library or library stocks that are regularly renewed; and
 * computer rooms or media centres.

Government accountants having read the advice then publish minimum guidelines on schools. These enable environmental modelling and  establishing building costs. Future design plans are audited to ensure that these standards are met but not exceeded. Government ministries continue to press for the 'minimum' space and cost standards to be reduced.

The UK government published this downwardly revised space formula in 2014. It said the floor area should be 1050m² (+ 350m² if there is a sixth form) + 6.3m²/pupil place for 11- to 16-year-olds + 7m²/pupil place for post-16s. The external finishes were to be downgraded to meet a build cost of £1113/m².

Secondary schools by country
A secondary school locally may be called high school or senior high school. In some countries there are two phases to secondary education (ISCED 2) and (ISCED 3), here the junior high school, intermediate school, lower secondary school, or middle school occurs between the primary school (ISCED 1) and high school.