Wootton County Primary and Lower School

Wootton Lower School July 2007

The Education Act of 1944 established the principle of County Primary Schools for children up to the age of 11, at which time they took an examination to determine the nature of the secondary school they would attend until they were 15, the most academically able going to grammar schools, the rest to secondary or secondary modern schools. At that date Wootton had two schools, an infants’ school and a junior mixed school. These two establishments, which were council schools, became Wootton County Primary Infant and Junior Schools respectively.

The two schools were merged to form one Wootton County Primary School in 1954. A new school was built further along Bedford Road and opened in 1962, the two old schools being demolished; the sites are now housing.

In the 1970s Bedfordshire County Council introduced comprehensive education, doing away with the 11+ examination and grammar schools and introducing a tier of school between the old County Primary and County Secondary Schools. Thus Lower Schools now taught children aged 4 to 9, Middle Schools from 9 to 13 and Upper Schools from 13 onwards. Wootton County Primary School became Wootton Lower School. In addition a new Wootton Upper School opened in 1976 in Hall End Road.