uziq
Member
+493|3669
a great number of the schools in the UK have been there for 100-200+ years. i don't think i attended a single school/institution that was newer than late victorian.

do people kvetch that the college of william & mary or harvard are 'old buildings'? or noble rutgers itself?
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+640|3937
The expectations regarding where your adult child goes vs your Pre-K kid are probably different.
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
uziq
Member
+493|3669
hmm, not so in the UK. old buildings get renovated, new facilities get built. nothing wrong with a 100+ year old classroom or dormitory, necessarily.
unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|6989|PNW

If a school building is safe/up-to-code and fulfills area needs, and updates aren't too troublesome, tearing it down and building a new one seems rather a waste. There's a lot of loss in US buildings to mourn, and a certain sense of impermanence.

https://detroiturbanism.blogspot.com/20 … -arts.html

https://la.curbed.com/2020/4/8/21213755 … os-angeles

The three original mid-60’s buildings were classy, IMO. They were ruined when the building from the mid-80’s was built. My bro and I, along with some friends, used to hang-out at the park and visit the museum occasionally. This was back in 1966-67. So, more childhood memories are being torn down for a new building that reminds me of a highway rest stop.
I (tongue-in-cheek) blame the British for setting fire to our old White House.
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+640|3937
I hate seeing old buildings torn down. I like old stone and brick buildings. Now everything is glass. I know it is better to have natural light coming in but I also think old stone buildings make neighborhoods look more classy.


https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9b/Dickenson_High_JC_jeh.jpg
That's a local high school. A lot of local schools are big brick and stone things built in a other time.

Another in the same city.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/90/McNair_Academic_High_School_Jersey_City_September_2020.jpg


But everyone perceives things differently. While we may look at those old buildings and see "fancy" and "heritage", the kids going to them may see "old" and "dilapidated". A lot of people rather have a school that looks like the New World Trade Center than a castle.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8f/New_York_%2833224081040%29.jpg/250px-New_York_%2833224081040%29.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+640|3937
Hogwarts
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|6989|PNW

I wouldn't have been ashamed to be in those buildings. My high school was old, but unkempt, unrepaired, and ill-equipped. Our pool had been out-of-commission for like over a decade due to an earthquake. A lot of science classes took place out in dingy portables. Very minimalistic lab settings. History books were vastly obsolete. In contrast, football got amazing funding. Baseball though, derelict field full of more goose droppings than grass.

Nearby, the administrative building was ritzy by comparison. Near to that, city hall got a lot of non-functional, esoteric architecture included in its construction, and even so it's only a matter of time before that's torn down and rebuilt to "compete" with the neighboring town. There are commercial lots in town that have been vacant for over three decades.

Three schools near to all that, in the same district, were utterly demolished and rebuilt from the ground up (and two entirely new ones built), yet still sport a certain throwaway vibe. The ones I went to look as dingy and architecturally dead as ever. Disposable brick.

I like to imagine the wizard school in America is frequently dismantled and replaced with something more tacky and soulless than the previous. Maybe it even rebuilds itself worse each time, and they can't figure out how to get it to stop. Current form probably looks like a Kohl's to muggles.
unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|6989|PNW

Probably like 1 wizard to every 500,000 muggles in America, and it still has 50 students to a classroom.

Do you think Rowling's American wizards have problems with school shootings? Maybe that's why Voldemort stayed out of our country.
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+640|3937
American Hogwarts needs to rebuild itself every 6 months to avoid having to make payments on the adjustable rate mortgage it took out.
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|6989|PNW

What kind of drills do you think the students have to do for active hexers? Do the house elves throw food in the trash in front of everyone if a student is late on a payment?

Last edited by unnamednewbie13 (2022-01-18 09:47:03)

unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|6989|PNW

Parents up in arms about mandatory vaccinations for troll-pox. Keep critical runes theory out of our schools. Frequent mind-reading of teachers to make sure all opinions align.
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+640|3937
They just have the sorting hat announce that your parent didn't refill your lunch account.
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+640|3937
At American Hogwarts everyone knows there is one teacher who is openly a Death Eater on Facebook but nobody can do anything about it.

Last edited by SuperJail Warden (2022-01-18 09:55:23)

https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|6989|PNW

American Hogwarts Quidditch stadium: state-of-the-art, valued at 500 million gold coins. New equipment every year. Legal cushioning for student athlete lawbreakers.

Potions lab:

https://i.imgur.com/DVBn1SK.jpg
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+640|3937
At American Hogwarts campus security set a kid on fire for not leaving class with them.
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|6989|PNW

wizardstarflipflop
uziq
Member
+493|3669

SuperJail Warden wrote:

Hogwarts
pretty much all my schools looked like this, i.e. victorian, 'great schools'-era school and civic buildings. it was a very important movement in architecture generally.

admittedly at our version of 'elementary' school the victorian high-windows and cold dining halls had a slightly austere and disciplinarian character; but i digress. much better than plate-glass lowcase-m modern design.
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+640|3937
I also went to schools that looked Victorian. My childhood high school was built during the New Deal. It looks like a castle. During the New Deal they purposefully made everything they created look fancy and something to be proud of. I don't think they would do something like that again. Aside from needing to make every dollar stretch, there would be many people very angry that public money was spent to make something look fancy.

Like that school they are trying to build above? I imagine people who already don't like it would be even angrier if it was meant to look fancy.

"$20 million for a stone facade? My house doesn't even have a stone facade. Grr"
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|6989|PNW

No wonder the idea of going to school in a magical castle caught the imaginations of some of the kids learning nouns from scratch for the 4th year in a row inside dimly-lit buildings with the drab exterior aesthetic of a department store or a strip mall. If I was in third grade, I would've felt cheated.

Hogwarts: grand, magical feast.
Public schools: reheated pizzas of dubious origin (probably discarded from local prisons), on a good day, generally looked forward to. soften with ranch before consumption to avoid constipation. avoid beady-eyed detection from the lunch ladies so you can wash it down with a second chocolate milk.

Hogwarts: priceless, hundreds-year-old library.
Public schools: *removes To Kill a Mockingbird from circulation*

Hogwarts: 10 points from Gryffindor for being late to class
Public schools: parents called away from their jobs to the principal's office because their fifth-grader said the word "butt"

Hogwarts: restrooms you could probably eat off the floor in
Public schools:

https://www.belloflostsouls.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/DaysofNurgle-Day7-Thumb6hds.jpg

Point overmade, but whatever.
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+640|3937

unnamednewbie13 wrote:

No wonder the idea of going to school in a magical castle caught the imaginations of some of the kids learning nouns from scratch for the 4th year in a row inside dimly-lit buildings with the drab exterior aesthetic of a department store or a strip mall. If I was in third grade, I would've felt cheated.

Hogwarts: grand, magical feast.
Public schools: reheated pizzas of dubious origin (probably discarded from local prisons), on a good day, generally looked forward to. soften with ranch before consumption to avoid constipation. avoid beady-eyed detection from the lunch ladies so you can wash it down with a second chocolate milk.

Hogwarts: priceless, hundreds-year-old library.
Public schools: *removes To Kill a Mockingbird from circulation*

Hogwarts: 10 points from Gryffindor for being late to class
Public schools: parents called away from their jobs to the principal's office because their fifth-grader said the word "butt"

Hogwarts: restrooms you could probably eat off the floor in
Public schools:

https://www.belloflostsouls.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/DaysofNurgle-Day7-Thumb6hds.jpg

Point overmade, but whatever.
We have everything we need to make our school's the envy of the world. It's a matter of willpower. And I can't totally blame adult pig people for collective punishment against the poor. I plan to send my kids to a private school.
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|6989|PNW

I had one year of private school. Mixed feelings on that. It was a Christian one, and a lot of the staff were kind of flakey. Still, a lot of the staff in public schools were flakey as well. At least public school was completely uninterested in the religion of the students and their families. High school there might've been a better experience.

In that one year, I think I wore enough polo shirts and khakis to last me an utter lifetime.

Mentioned elsewhere, but another prospective public school had a demented principal with a personal collection of paddles. Kinky. Creeped both my parents out in the interview with his … enthusiasm. One of them was like a pizza spatula with holes drilled into it. I never saw the dude but the story always puts me in mind of that guy from Poltergeist.

SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+640|3937
I have heard older teachers talk about the nuns that would hit them on the fingers with a ruler to get them in line. Usually it is brought up at the same time the teachers are talking up the great education they got received there. "Sister Mary was a bitch but she had a good system for analyzing text". So a mixed bag.

Religious schools are creepy. Catholic schools are great but I would tell my kids to not trust the priest.
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
RTHKI
mmmf mmmf mmmf
+1,741|6954|Oxferd Ohire
Never heard anything about my church's priests. Some of the neighboring ones though...
https://i.imgur.com/tMvdWFG.png
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+640|3937
It's always "someone else's priest"
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|6989|PNW

SuperJail Warden wrote:

I have heard older teachers talk about the nuns that would hit them on the fingers with a ruler to get them in line. Usually it is brought up at the same time the teachers are talking up the great education they got received there. "Sister Mary was a bitch but she had a good system for analyzing text". So a mixed bag.

Religious schools are creepy. Catholic schools are great but I would tell my kids to not trust the priest.
I haven't heard any weird news out of the Catholic school near where I lived. Might've enjoyed it more, maybe not. It would have been a much shorter drive, almost walking distance for a kid if the town had been less sketchy. And near a shopping mall at that. Book store(s), the movies. Rental places, two delicious bakeries on the way back home.

The protestant school I went to was an entire town over, and I had to get up early because of the trip out. Its surroundings were golf and copy/paste commercial wasteland.

I know it's weird saying that last part when I mentioned the mall as a plus, but it was indoors, out of the rain, and had an expansive arcade, decent food court. EB Games, KB Toys. If we had had a rec room, maybe we'd have had pool and air hockey. The arcade, where it sort of merged with the theater, at least had air hockey. The "commercial wasteland," however, was just rows upon rows of strip malls and parking lots. Couldn't get anywhere fast without a car.

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