The folly of CCTV in schools

Guest post by Rupert Matthews

There has been much concern recently about CCTV inside schools. As ever BBW has been at the forefront of the issue with articles such as “Rising number of CCTV cameras in schools”, “CCTV in York Schools (and new research which says it's a total waste of time)” and others.  One school has 113 cameras, and several have them in the pupils toilets.

The reason usually given for the installation of these intrusive cameras is either “security” or “measures to stop vandalism”. In other words, the school staff have lost control of the school buildings. Why should this be the case? Well, an obvious reasons is the general breakdown in school discipline that has taken place over the past 20 or 30 years. But it is not that simple. In large part school staff have lost control of the school buildings because of the school buildings themselves.

I sometimes go to schools to give talks and presentations on history. Most visits are much of a muchness, but a couple of weeks ago I went to a school that pulled me up short. It was an old school city centre, about 1880 I would guess, and it was quite unlike most other schools I visited. For a start the school grounds were surrounded by high walls and the only way in was by way of a tall gate, I had to press the bell to get in. Inside the school was rigidly compartmentalised. Each classroom had solid walls with one door in and out. Corridors had doors at each end, as did staircases. The playground was small and open, so every corner could be seen from every other corner.

There was no CCTV at this school. There was no need. Staff could control the buildings easily because of the way they were designed. Back in the later Victorian age when this school was built, schools were built to provide a safe and discliplined learning environment for children who wanted to learn.

Then the concept of child-centred learning was developed and acquired the grip on the educational establishment that it has maintained ever since. School architecture was no more immune than discipline or curriculum.  “The school is not a place of compulsory instruction, but a community of old and young engaged in cooperative experiment … No longer are teachers content to impart information and today teaching gives place to conversation”, proclaimed the 1931 Hadow Report.

Schools were deliberately built so as to be open to the wider community. Perimeter walls went and so did gates through them. Adult education buildings were squeezed on to sites with junior schools and many school buildings were designed to be multi-purpose. Strangers wandered on and off the site at will. From 1928 there was a massive rebuilding programme. There was nothing wrong with the old schools – indeed in many cases the demolition of Victorian stone and brick buildings proved to be costly as they were so stoutly built.

 “The school belongs to the children and in planning it we must sweep away our grown-up, pre-conceived ideas”, proclaimed the school architect Stevison in 1928. The Director of Education in Wiltshire in 1936 went even further when denouncing the Victorian buildings he was happily demolishing, “Symmetry of architecture is associated with acceptance of a given order of things. Nowadays we hold that children should as far as possible construct their own order”.

By the 1940s and 1950s open plan school architecture had become orthodox. It had been imposed for ideological reasons that had nothing to do with running an efficient school and everything to do with the child-centred learning dogma that has proved to be so disastrous.

Headteachers turn to CCTV and intrusive surveillance measures when all that is needed is a high wall, doors, solid interior walls and firm discipline. In seeking to impose their supposedly liberal utopian dogma on our children to make them free, school architects have instead made them slaves to the surveillance state.

Comments

[Furor Teutonicus]

XX For a start the school grounds were surrounded by high walls and the only way in was by way of a tall gate, I had to press the bell to get in. Inside the school was rigidly compartmentalised. Each classroom had solid walls with one door in and out. Corridors had doors at each end, as did staircases. The playground was small and open, so every corner could be seen from every other corner. XX

Hmm, let me think....STRANGEWAYS! THATS the place it rings to mind.

Damn good. Should be building them like that again.

[Donald Trump]

So what you're basically saying is that schools need to be built like prisons and students like convicts?

The problem is not the size of the school's front gate but rather the student to teacher ratio. A single teacher cannot be expected to control 30+ students, particularly when there will undoubtedly be ~5 students who are either not interested in learning, cannot adjust to a teacher's method of teaching, or are just general troublemakers/attention-seekers.

You also completely overlooked changes in disciplinary techniques and law. Teachers are simply more fearful of being accused, by a student seeking revenge, of doing something illegal, which can have a devastating and unrepairable effect on their careers.

[Big Tory Watch]

"Rupert has written over 180 books, appearing on television and radio as a presenter and consultant. These have mostly been on history or military subjects, though in recent years he has developed a sideline writing about ghosts, cryptozoology, UFOs and other paranormal subjects."

Can only hope the 180+ books don't talk as much rubbish as this, perhaps you thought you were writing for the Daily Mail.

[John]

'Headteachers turn to CCTV and intrusive surveillance measures when all that is needed is a high wall, doors, solid interior walls and firm discipline. In seeking to impose their supposedly liberal utopian dogma on our children to make them free, school architects have instead made them slaves to the surveillance state'.

Now apply this theory to the surveillance state in general and see it for the twaddle that it is. Or are you saying that we all should be living behind high walls and subjected to 'firm discipline'?

[CCTV installers]

hi..
This is an excellent idea. But now the anti-social cretins will just move one elsewhere and annoy others!

[Rupert Matthews]

Thank you for your comments.

Starting with Donald Trump - "So what you're basically saying is that schools need to be built like prisons and students like convicts?" - and I think Furor may have been making a similar point. No this is not what I am saying. What I was trying to get at is that schools need to provide a safe learning environment for pupils, but that the open-plan buildings favoured over the past half century or so fail to do this. I am glad to note that you do at least accept my basic point that the building can affect behaviour.

Donald has also mentioned two other points in separate paragraphs which are, I think, quite closely related. He claims teachers cannot be expected to control 30+ students, then later talks about changes in discipline. I would agree that disciplinary changes make it more difficult to control higher numbers of pupils, but the built environment also contributes to this problem as do teaching methods for that matter. There are a number of inter-related issues here. In the original article I was seeking to highlight one that I feel does not get the attention it deserves in the popular discourse on this subject.

John asks "Or are you saying that we all should be living behind high walls and subjected to 'firm discipline'?" No, I am not. I am saying that for pupils to be able to be educated they need to be in an environment where learning is easy and disruptive behaviour is difficult. I did not extrapolate out to the rest of us, and neither should you.

CCTV Installers suggests that by solving one problem area we simply move the "anti-social cretins" on elsewhere. This is to despair of the whole problem and give up. I cannot accept that. By solving a problem in one specific area - in this case schools - we solve the problem there, which is good. Then we can move on to the next problem.

Thank you again for your comments.

[Richard Craven]

I'm fundamentally in sympathy with you. I think that it is really rather revolting to habituate the citizens of tomorrow to ubiquitous surveillance by installing spy cameras in schools.

Nevertheless, the following sentence of yours strikes me as a little unfortunate:-
"Headteachers turn to CCTV and intrusive surveillance measures when all that is needed is a high wall, doors, solid interior walls and firm discipline."

ALL that is needed?? This suggests to me that the only alternative to cctv is a huge capital investment in educational infrastructure. Perhaps I have developed a tin ear, but this sounds to me like an argument FOR cctv!

[John]

Rupert - good on you for responding but you misunderstand my point.

To put my point another way, if schools have introduced CCTV etc to overcome the shortcomings of environment, what is the excuse for widespread surveillance of society as a whole?

Headmasters, like politicians and the police, introduce CCTV because they have power and they can: the useless amongst us seem to grasp at any new technology because it's a status symbol that offers a temporary salve for our failings and the paucity of our lives. The value of the technology and its effect is rarely thought through beyond its headline attraction: CCTV is a good case in point.

Discipline and educational standards are nothing to do with the nature of school buildings but everything to do with the quality of the teaching staff and the curriculum. My own school was a very 'open' environment with high educational standards; a generation later, my daughters' school was the same.

The difference is that I'm not claiming that the disciplinary standards in those schools were relevant to the nature of the buildings. However, you are and I suggest that you need to re-think a theory based on a visit to one school.

I'd recommend 'The War on Kids' to see where your suggestions might lead.

[Richard Craven]

There is a nasty word which accurately describes the sort of person who installs cameras in a school toilet.