‘What’s Your School’s Story?’ is the Archive’s main outreach programme for 2025 and will feature stories about nine schools, eight of which are still in existence. The parish schools are St John’s, St Martin’s, St Luke’s, La Moye, First Tower, St Lawrence, St Clement’s and Trinity. One of the talks will also look at St Mark’s School, which closed in 2005.

The programme begins on Saturday (15th) with a talk about the history of education in Jersey. This will focus on earlier schools and the evolution of the Island’s education system, including compulsory education, the drive to build the parish schools and the States of Jersey taking over the management of the school system.

The monthly events will then move on to the individual schools and their history from the 19th and 20th century. The talks will finish in December by looking at how Christmas has been celebrated in local schools, illustrated by photographs taken over the decades.
Stuart Nicolle, Senior Archivist at Jersey Heritage, explained that the Archive team would be using school records, including admission registers, and additional resources, such as the census and newspapers, to uncover a variety of stories about each school and its surrounding area.

He said: “The history of the parish schools is something we’ve been keen to delve into for some time. The schools have touched the lives of so many Islanders and our records are packed full of stories about the buildings, the teachers and staff who worked there, the pupils who started their journeys in the classrooms and the surrounding communities. We can’t wait to share our research and believe the talks will be of particular interest to anyone who has a connection with one of the schools, whether they are a past pupil or currently have family there.”

The ‘What’s Your School’s Story?’ talks take place at Jersey Archive at 10am on the third Saturday of every month. They will be recorded and added to www.jerseyheritage.org for anyone who is unable to attend in-person. The Archive will also be open to the public for general research from 9am-1pm.
The talks are free to attend but booking is recommended. This can be done by emailing archives@jerseyheritage.org or calling 833300.