thumb|270px|[[Staples High School in Westport, Connecticut, US]]

A secondary school, high school, or senior school, is an institution that provides secondary education. Some secondary schools provide both lower secondary education (ages 11 to 14) and upper secondary education (ages 14 to 18), i.e., both levels 2 and 3 of the ISCED scale, but these can also be provided in separate schools. There may be other variations in the provision: for example, children in Australia, Hong Kong, and Spain change from the primary to secondary systems a year later at the age of 12, with the ISCED's first year of lower secondary being the last year of primary provision.

In the US, most local secondary education systems have separate middle schools and high schools. Middle schools are usually from grades 6–8 or 7–8, and high schools are typically from grades 9–12. In the United Kingdom, most secondary state schools and privately funded schools accommodate pupils between the ages of 11 and 16 or between 11 and 18, and some UK private schools, i.e. public schools, admit pupils between the ages of 13 and 18.

In South Africa, primary school runs from grade 1-7 and high school from grade 8-12, with no middle school.

Secondary schools follow on from primary schools and prepare for vocational or tertiary education. In high and middle income countries, attendance is usually compulsory for students at least until age 16. The organisations, buildings, and terminology are more or less unique in each country.

Levels of education

In the ISCED 2014 education scale, levels 2 and 3 correspond to secondary education which are as follows:

; Lower secondary education: First stage of secondary education building on primary education, typically with a more subject-oriented curriculum. Students are generally around 11 – 15 years old.

|Year

|rowspan="2"

|7

|8

|9

|10

|11

|12

|-

|Grouping

| colspan="3" |Junior high school

| colspan="3" |Senior high school

|-

! rowspan="2" colspan="2" |Canada

|Year

|rowspan="2"

|7

|8

|9

|10

|11

|12

|-

|Grouping

| colspan="3" |Junior high school

| colspan="3" |Senior high school

|-

! rowspan="2" colspan="2" |Hong Kong

|Secondary/form

! rowspan="2"

|1

|2

|3

|4

|5

|6

|-

|Grouping

| colspan="3" |Junior secondary

| colspan="3" |Senior secondary

|-

! colspan="2" rowspan="2" |India

|Grade

|6

|7

|8

|9

|10

|11

|12

|-

|Grouping

| colspan="2" |Upper Primary

| colspan="3" |Secondary / High School

| colspan="2" |Higher Secondary / Senior Secondary

|-

! rowspan="2" colspan="2" |Indonesia

| Grade ||6||7||8 ||9||10 ||11||12

|-

| Nickname || SD Kelas 6 || SMP Kelas 7 || SMP Kelas 8 || SMP Kelas 9 || SMA Kelas 10 || SMA Kelas 11 || SMA Kelas 12

|-

! rowspan="2" colspan="2" |Ireland

|Other name

|

|colspan="3" | Junior Cycle

|colspan="2" | Senior Cycle

|-

|Class & year

|6th Class

|1st Year

|2nd Year

|3rd Year

|4th Year

|5th Year

|6th Year

|-

! rowspan="3" colspan="2" |Jamaica

|Form

|First

|Second

|Third

|Fourth

|Fifth

|Lower Sixth (6B)

|Upper Sixth (6A)

|-

|Year

|7

|8

|9

|10

|11

|12

|13

|-

|Grouping

| colspan="3" |Lower School

| colspan="2" |Upper School

| colspan="2" |Sixth Form Programme

|-

! rowspan="2" colspan="2" |Japan

|Grade

|rowspan="2"

|1

|2

|3

|1

|2

|3

|-

|Grouping

| colspan="3" |Junior high school

| colspan="3" |Senior high school

|-

! colspan="2" rowspan="2" |Philippines

|Grade

| rowspan="2"

|7

|8

|9

|10

|11

|12

|-

|Grouping

| colspan="3" |Junior high school

|

| colspan="2" |Senior high school

|-

! colspan="2" rowspan="2" |Singapore

|Secondary

! rowspan="2"

|1

|2

|3

|4

|5

! rowspan="2" |

|-

|Grouping

| colspan="2" |Lower Secondary

| colspan="3" |Upper Secondary

|-

! colspan="2" rowspan="2" |Spain

|Grade

! rowspan="2"

|1

|2

|3

|4

|1

|2

|-

|Grouping

| colspan="4" |ESO (Mandatory Secondary Education)

| colspan="2" |Bachillerato

|-

! rowspan="4" |United Kingdom

! rowspan="2" | England / Wales

| Form ||First ||Second ||Third ||Fourth||Fifth ||Lower Sixth||Upper Sixth

|-

| rowspan="3" | Year ||7||8||9||10||11||12||13

|-

!Scotland

|

|S1

|S2

|S3

|S4

|S5

|S6

|-

!Northern Ireland

|8

|9

|10

|11

|12

|13

|14

|-

! rowspan="3" colspan="2" |United States

| Grade ||6||7||8 ||9||10 ||11||12

|-

| Nickname || colspan="3" ||Freshman||Sophomore||Junior||Senior

|-

| Grouping

| colspan="3" |Middle School

| colspan="4" |High School

|-

! colspan="3" |ISCED level|| colspan="3" | 2 || colspan="4" |3

|}

Schools exist within a strict legal framework where they may be answerable to their government through local authorities and their stakeholders. In England<!--(but necessarily in other parts of the United Kingdom) // might break WP:FUTURE? remove invisible comment if this is acceptable--> there are six general types of state-funded schools running in parallel to the private sector. The state takes an interest in safeguarding issues in all schools. All state-funded schools in England are legally required to have a website where they must publish details of their governance, finance, curriculum intent and staff and pupil protection policies to comply with The School Information (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2012 and 2016. Ofsted monitors these.

Theoretical framework

School building design does not happen in isolation. The building or school campus needs to accommodate:

  • Curriculum content
  • Teaching methods
  • Costs
  • Education within the political framework
  • Use of school building (also in the community setting)
  • Constraints imposed by the site
  • Design philosophy

Each country will have a different education system and priorities. Schools need to accommodate students, staff, storage, mechanical and electrical systems, support staff, ancillary staff, and administration. The number of rooms required can be determined from the predicted roll of the school and the area needed.

According to standards used in the United Kingdom, a general classroom for 30 students needs to be 55&nbsp;m<sup>2</sup>, or more generously 62&nbsp;m<sup>2</sup>. A general art room for 30 students needs to be 83&nbsp;m<sup>2</sup>, but 104&nbsp;m<sup>2</sup> for 3D textile work. A drama studio or a specialist science laboratory for 30 needs to be 90&nbsp;m<sup>2</sup>. Examples are given on how this can be configured for a 1,200 place secondary (practical specialism). and 1,850 place secondary school.

Size

The ideal size for a typical comprehensive high school is large enough to offer a variety of classes, but small enough that students develop a sense of community. Some research has suggested that academic achievement is best when there are about 150 to 250 students in each grade level, and that above a total school size of 2,000 for a secondary school, academic achievement and the sense of school community decline substantially.

Arguments in favor of larger schools tend to focus on economy of scale. An optimum secondary school will meet the minimum conditions and will have:

  • adequately-sized classrooms;
  • specialized teaching spaces;
  • a staff preparation room;
  • an administration block;
  • multipurpose classrooms;
  • a general purpose school hall;
  • laboratories for science, technology, mathematics, and life sciences, as may be required;
  • adequate equipment;
  • a library or library stocks that are regularly renewed; and
  • computer rooms or media centres.

By country

A secondary school locally may be called a high school (abbreviated as HS or H.S.), or called a senior high school. In some countries there are two phases to secondary education (ISCED 2) and (ISCED 3). The junior high school, intermediate school, lower secondary school, or middle school occurs between the primary school (ISCED 1) and high school.

<gallery class="center" |title="Secondary" schools="" around="" the="" world="">

File:School life in Greece.jpg|Students at First High School in Argos, Peloponnese, Greece

File:Kallaveden lukio.jpg|The red-brick building of the Kallavesi High School in Kuopio, Finland

File:First American Public School, Dedham, Massachusetts.jpg|The first taxpayer-funded public school in the United States was in Dedham, Massachusetts

File:Gymnázium Grösslingová.jpg|Pozsonyi Királyi Katolikus Gimnázium, a high school in Bratislava, Slovakia

File:TrefnGymn-2012-06.png|Hugo Treffner Gymnasium in Tartu, Estonia

File:APC-4.jpg|Rangpur Cadet College is one of the Cadet colleges in Bangladesh

File:Melk - Stift (0).JPG|Stiftsgymnasium Melk, a Roman Catholic Benedictine-run gymnasium located in Melk, Austria

File:Fairfax High School (2026).jpg|Fairfax High School in Fairfax, Virginia, United States

File:1950s extension at the former Chorlton Park Secondary School - geograph.org.uk - 2850294.jpg|Chorlton Park Secondary School in Manchester, England

</gallery>

Notes

See also

  • Kindergarten
  • Lists of schools by country
  • Secondary education
  • Tertiary education
  • Tech ed

References

  • Australian CensusAtSchool (Australia)
  • Canadian Education Statistics Council (CESC) (United States)
  • Office for National Statistics (ONS) (United Kingdom)
  • BB103_Area_Guidelines_for_Mainstream_Schools (2014) UK
  • National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) (United States)
  • OECD Standardised designs (2011)