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Street School

Part 2 Project 2012
Stuart Everatt
Liverpool John Moores University Liverpool | UK
At a time when Britain’s high streets are in decline, Whitehaven, Cumbria is no different. Since the departure of the manufacturing industry in 2005 the town has struggled to find its feet, alongside this the introduction of larger out of town developments has seem a steady drop in town centre retail activity. Analysis of the towns existing Market place and its surrounding areas highlighted its prolonged failure, with just under 50% of the street currently vacant, debate was opened over the future of the High Street, subsequently interlinking the project with research such as The Portas Review and The Meanwhile Project. Alongside this a secondary strand of research was undertaken with consideration to the changing role of the school within a community, and the UK school systems current underachievement, with research suggesting that students currently not only have an increased aversion to typical learning styles but also leave education without the necessary people or business skills to survive in the business world. Street School is the proposition that the overall high street experience must adapt in order for the high street to survive; it can no longer simply remain retail centric but must expand beyond. Street school suggests that the high street will not longer simply be a market for produce but a market for knowledge and learning, interlinking the UK's sixth form learning system and the high street. While students provide services through hands on work experience, those parties running the businesses provide teaching services, not only for the students but for the public; the Deli becomes a cookery school, the music shop becomes a music school and high street becomes as much about learning as it does buying.
Stuart Everatt

Tutor(s)
Jamie Scott
2012
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