Schools in South Ronaldsay and Burray

Go to: a quick history of schooling on the islands | Tomison’s Academy | Widewall School | Herston School | Hope Schools | Grimness School | Burray Schools

The opening image is of Tomison’s Academy in South Ronaldsay’s South Parish

We are going to take you through a quick history of schooling in South Ronaldsay and Burray, then go on a tour. Our starting point is Tomison’s Academy in the South Parish. It provides both an interesting story and an excellent opportunity to see the building, which is Category B Listed. From there, we head north and take in some key former and current schools. The route takes you to Burray.

Parish and other schools for children

By the late seventeenth century, the lowlands of Scotland were able to boast a near-complete network of parish schools. The Highlands and Islands could not (Anderson 2003). They were plagued by problems of distance and isolation, and by the lack of familiarity of teachers and ministers with Scottish Gaelic and local dialects. This meant illiteracy was common in more remote areas until well into the nineteenth century.

Most schooling was associated with churches and religious groups. There were some early examples in South Ronaldsay. For example, on March 18, 1666, the local Kirk Session agreed that a school should be established in St. Margaret’s Hope for the north district. The south district had one already (the forerunner of Tomison’s Academy). A Mr Walter Kynnaird, the first schoolmaster of the Hope School, was quickly appointed (Picken 1972: 37), but where any other schooling took place is difficult to identify.

Another initiative was linked to the Society in Scotland for Propagating Christian Knowledge (SSPCK – founded in 1709). They recorded, for example, the appointment of a schoolmaster based at ‘Brandequoy’, South Ronaldsay, from 1716-18. SSPCK in its early days focused on evangelising what were seen as Catholic areas, particularly in the Highlands. By the last decade of the century, Brandyquoy still appeared to be the base for a schoolmaster, but a local minister was still trying to persuade the SSPCK to establish a Society school in the parish (Picken 1972: 45). It eventually arrived in 1815.

The growth of Catholicism across Scotland (particularly with the large numbers of Irish immigrants following the Great Famine,1845 -1852) remained an issue for Protestant churches, but a further, major shift occurred. The so-called Disruption of 1843 created the breakaway Free Church of Scotland and fragmented local churches and schools. We see this in South Ronaldsay with the establishment of St Mary’s, St Margaret’s Hope around 1854 as a United Presbyterian Church, and the appearance of the South Ronaldshay South Free Church (around 1870). In Burray, the United Presbyterian Church appeared in 1847. [See Churches and chapels in South Ronaldsay and Burray].

Before the Education (Scotland) Act 1872, most schools were subscription-based. As we will see, we have one example of a free school – Tomison’s (see below) and one of a Parochial School (based at Brandyquoy from 1815). In 1842, there appeared to have been eight subscription schools in South Ronaldsay. These could be quite small and operated from the teacher’s home, or larger units linked, for example, to a chapel or church.

Free schooling for children

The 1872 Education (Scotland) Act profoundly changed the nature and direction of schooling. It required the establishment of around 1000 parish school boards that controlled the curriculum, finances and timetables. Generally, these boards took over control of most of the old and new Kirk schools and were able to start enforcing attendance. The Church of Scotland, for example, handed all its parish schools to the state following the Act. Many Free Church and Presbyterian schools were also assigned to the state. Rather than being called Parish or Parochial Schools, they were now described as Public Schools (but not in the fee-paying sense).

South Ronaldsay and Burray had their own school board as a result of the Act. It was chaired by John Gray of Roeberry (close to the Sands of Wright) and included the Rev. A. B, Rogerson from the Burray United Presbyterian Church (who was also President of the island’s Temperance Society).

Parish school boards offered free education. Children aged 5 to 13 years were required to attend (although in rural areas such as Burray and South Ronaldsay, attendance continued to drop during harvesting, etc). All across Scotland, there were major school-building programmes. Classrooms were often overcrowded (70 students being common). One further key feature was the repression of Scottish Gaelic. Students were to be taught in English and punished if they spoke in Scottish Gaelic.

By 1884, there were five public schools in the Parish (Burray and South Ronaldsay had become a single parish): Burray, Grimness, Hope, Widewall, and Tomison’s Academy. They were joined by a sixth school in Herston in 1888. Now, there are two schools, both primary. Secondary school education takes place in Kirkwall.

The school leaving age was raised to 14 years in 1901. The 1947 Act defined the compulsory school age as five to fifteen years. In 1972, it was raised to 16 years [see The Educational Institute of Scotland Education Timeline]. Over this period, there was a significant decrease in the population of South Ronaldsay and Burray. In 1881, for example, there was a population of 3305 on the two islands. In 2022, they had a population of 1440. While this reflects significant growth in recent years, with an ageing population, both the percentage of young people and the actual number of school students have dropped.

For readers unfamiliar with the current Scottish system, primary education (P1-P7) is for 5-12-year-olds, and secondary education (S1-S6) is for 12-18-year-olds. The latter looks to provide a broad general education until S3 and then encourages specialisation. Another distinctive feature of schooling in Scotland is that wearing a school uniform is not compulsory (although quite a few schools encourage wearing a school jumper or hoodie when going on trips, etc.).

We now turn to the schools themselves.

Tomison’s Academy

Getting there: Tomison’s Academy is on the A961 about 9km (or 5.9 miles) south of St Margaret’s Hope, it is easy to identify. To the west, you will see an old church and to the east, the old school building in the middle of a field. Park by the entrance to the school, not by the old church. [Click for map]. Access is via a track across a field.

Tomison’s Academy was created as a result of a legacy by William Tomison (1739-1829). It was to provide free education to children of the Island of South Ronaldsay, which it did until its closure in 1968. Tomison is believed to have been born in South Ronaldsay. We know little about his early years other than ‘his origins were humble and that he received no formal education’ (John Nicks 1987). At the age of 20 (in 1760), he signed on with the Hudson’s Bay Company as a labourer based in Canada. Over the years, he worked his way up the Company, and many of the people he came to manage were from Orkney [a large number of Orcadians worked for the Company at this time]. He lived in Canada (much of the time inland) and only very occasionally returned to London and Orkney. He became the inland chief. As John Nicks put it:

The comparative isolation of the inland posts had tended to solidify his natural preference for a solitary and Spartan existence. He showed little interest in social intercourse with his fellow officers and they in turn grew to dislike and then to resent deeply his parsimonious ways and his growing rigidity.

He retired in 1803 but soon wearied of the experience, returning in 1806 to take up junior roles. In 1810, he finally returned to South Ronaldsay and Dundas House. His temperament was not, apparently, well suited to being neighbourly. He also had no direct heir. As a result, he bequeathed a large part of his accumulated wealth to establish a free school for local children.

Tomison’s Academy appears to have become a Public School under the management of South Ronaldsay and Burray School Board in 1902. It closed in 1968. From this point, all state primary schooling in South Ronaldsay was based in St Margaret’s Hope.

There are three places to visit here: the school, Tomison’s home, and the old schoolhouse close by his home.

The school: Enter by the gate and walk up to the school. The building is unused and deemed  ‘moderately at risk’ (by the Buildings of Scotland Register of Scotland). It is listed as having been built in 1851. Tomison’s Academy is a Category B Listed Building, and it is easy to see why in its design, heating arrangements and execution. When it opened, it had 170 pupils (or 57 pupils per classroom – a not uncommon size at the time. The playground was at the back of the building, along with toilets, etc.

The school has been closed for nearly 60 years, but luckily, it has not been converted. This means you can walk around the building and peer through the windows. Looking in, it is easy to imagine what it looked like 150 years ago.

Dundas House: From the school’s front gate, you only need to walk a few metres south, and on your right is the track to Dundas House. Walk along the track, and as you get closer to the house, you will see Dundas Cottage. Just before it is a Corn-drying Kiln. Kilns like this could often be found in Orkney and were a necessary part of life on steadings like this. The reason for a kiln was that, often, it wasn’t possible to harvest grain in dry conditions. The two main grain crops here were oats and bere (a form of barley) (click to see Professor John Hume’s notes on Canmore). Access via a track.

Dundas House was commissioned by, and built for, William Tomison. He lived in it from 1810 to his death in 1829. Even after death, he didn’t leave. He was laid to rest in the front garden [Click for map]. He is said not to be keen on burial in the churchyard as it had too many rats. Sixty years later, the Ordnance Survey Name book (1889-90) recorded that Dundas House was in the ‘occupation of Thomas M. Cruickshank, Head Teacher of Tomison’s Charity School’. Interestingly, it is reported as the property of the Trustees of that institution.

The Old School House: We find the Old School House – the forerunner of Tomison’s Academy – just a little further up the track to the west. There appears to have been a church school in the south of the island since at least the mid-1600s. There was certainly a South Parish School at the time of the 1821 Census with Theodore Rainy listed as the teacher (and the next Census listing is William Tomison, Dundas House) (click for the transcription). Access via a track.

On the right of the entrance to the house is a Threshing Barn. British Listed Buildings describes it as a ’19th century, central single-storey threshing barn flanked by a rectangular kiln and byre. Coursed rubble flagstone’. It is listed as a Category C Listed Building.