SCHOOLS

There was only one school in Yardley, the Trust School by the church, until 1710, when a second one was opened at Hall Green. This was for boys, and was financed by the Great Trust.

There was no school for girls until 1840 and then only briefly. St. John's School began on its present site in 1856 in a converted villa. It was rebuilt in 1884, and has been enlarged since World War II. The Yardley School Board was not elected until twenty years after the 1870 Act.

Four substantial Board Schools were built in the areas of greatest need; they were Greet and Redhill (Hay Mills) in '92, and Hall Green and Yardley Wood in '93. Greet School had been preceded by a makeshift school in Bard Street. The new premises in brick, tile and terra-cotta, were erected on the empty site of Greet Farm.

The Yardley Board also built part of College Road Schools in 1900; its successor, the Worcestershire Education Authority, completed them, and added Formans Road and Golden Hillock Road Schools in '07 and '10. The latter year saw the opening of Yardley Secondary School on Warwick Road, five years after a small beginning in Sparkhill Institute.

There has been a Catholic School in Evelyn Road since the '20's, bombed and rebuilt. Arden Primary School opened on the site of Sparkhill Grove in '70. The Secondary schools have 'gone Comprehensive' since '69.