THE ARRAN HERITAGE PROJECT - ABOUT THE PROJECT
Overview of The Arran Heritage Project Extracted from the foreword of the Arran Heritage Project Book   The Heritage Project has been an integral part of life at Arran High School for a good number of years now [20]. In its early days the Project was seen as a medium for connecting the young people with the heritage of the island, and establishing an ongoing and sustainable system for the recording and archiving of both past and present activity contributing to the island's heritage and culture. It is of value not only to the island and those interested in its history and culture, but more importantly to the young people themselves. Some of the buzzwords in educational circles today are "education for citizenship" and "learning for life". Through the Project, pupils here have been learning and practising skills relevant to both of these concepts in an enjoyable and worthwhile way. Communication, teamwork, research, recording and organizing all form an integral part of the term's work for first year pupils. Other pupils, from third to sixth year, contribute by providing traditional music during the museum visit, by baking and serving teas at "The Gathering" and by supporting the Heritage Group during the checking and recording of material gathered by the pupils. Approximately twelve teachers play some part in the Project each year, preparing pupils for their tasks and supporting visits to sites of historical interest. No mean commitment for a school of this size. Susan M Smith former Headteacher, Arran High School .   History of the Group In 1994, a small room was found in Arran High School, refurbished, furnished and equipped with computer, scanner, etc. and the material gathered over the years was gradually sorted, catalogued and stored properly. As well as raising funds for the archive room, the Group set about forming teams with the School staff, the Museum and the community itself. This has been invaluable in developing workshops, field trips and the interviews between the pupils and the old folk. The Group is also able to call on a wider circle of volunteers with specialist skills in the community to link with the School's project. At the time of writing, all the members have, over the past few years, worked hard on selection teams engaged upon the difficult task of choosing and checking material for this book from hundreds of good examples. The Arran Heritage Community Group makes a substantial contribution now to all the Heritage events outside the classroom. In addition, for the past few years, Grace Small (pictured in the photo above) has given a slide lecture to the pupils in the school as an introduction to the Project. Some departments have absorbed into the curriculum aspects of the course. The Head of Home Economics, Muriel Tod, adapted a third year standard grade course to include the catering required for the main Gathering in the school. The Head of English, Alan Kelly, has been teaching the interviewing skills to all the pupils involved. The Scottish Education Department’s “5-14 Initiative” has provided encouragement to build into the curriculum Heritage Studies for all first year pupils in the Social Subjects department (see page 238). A new course entitled “Community Involvement” run by the H.E Department (Marie Walls) for all fifth year pupils has also provided further opportunities: the two pupil representatives in the Community Group are volunteers from the fifth year course. They are timetabled to work for the Project: in 1998 the two pupil representatives Sam McConnell and Eila McNeish sorted all the first year pupils’ research, corrected and typed it, illustrated some of the text as well as the “book” covers for that summers’ Museum display. They presented some good work that year by pupils such as Laura Keeney who produced several pages in essay form on Dippen - the area where she stays. This district had not been researched before by our pupils, so her material is especially valuable.   The finalised material produced by the first year students, prior to being digitised for the book (in 2001) and for this website (in 2006)	The Isle of Arran Heritage Book.   (The following text forms the preface to the book) Although the idea of producing a book began in the 1980s, there was no real possibility of undertaking such a task without the broad base of community support which has grown up over the intervening years. Not until about 1997 when the Arran Heritage Community Group had been well established could the major tasks of selecting material and fund-raising finally begin. The material for the book was selected from work produced between 1982 and 1995. The reader will find that most of the material published here is from the 1980s because many senior citizens interviewed then had recollections going back to the 1920s and much information from the nineteenth century. Work was carefully selected by the AHC Group and senior citizens of each area in the community. We apologise to all whose excellent work from those years and to those whose valuable material from more recent years has not been given a place in this publication.*: the book has doubled its size from the original design and was still expanding at the publication deadline. In view of the lack of space the decision was made by the Group to include only work which was directly about Arran itself; so sadly good contributions such as people’s experiences on the battle fronts of World War Two were omitted. But be assured that every contribution is now carefully catalogued, housed and treasured in the High School archive. With the help of today's technology, it is hoped that wider access will one day be available to the entire collection. Apologies are also made for any perceived inaccuracies: the AHCG checked and double checked every page, but something could have slipped through the net and of course there are different versions of every tale. In most cases pupils carefully noted the names of their interviewees. Nevertheless, there are some exceptions which have been included on their merit. Wherever possible people's original photographs were used and the majority are the same ones which were copied with the pupils' manuscripts. There are one or two cases in each chapter where these copies of old photographs have had to suffice because the originals could not be traced. The material represents the teamwork of both child and senior citizen and, as such, we have allowed the latter to make recent corrections and additions to the child’s original manuscript. The only other changes have been made where the pupils text was unclear. Each drawing is by the pupil named in the title unless otherwise stated. The reader may observe that the lengths of chapters vary, not just in accordance with the differing geographical areas, but also because of the varying pupil population in each area.   Some of the children interviewing the residents of Arran.   The material is the result of good teamwork between pupil and senior citizen and both generations share the limelight equally with this unique publication about their island home. The groundswell of support has included many staff at the High School, the Heritage Museum Committee, the Arran Community Councillor, the Community Education Office, the Council for Voluntary Service, Arran Textiles, educationalists further afield, in particular Margaret Mackay, Celtic and Scottish Studies, Edinburgh University. Mention should also be made of our patient and expert publisher, Graham Chappell. To all those and to so many individuals who have encouraged and supported the publication of this book may we extend our gratitude. STEWART LAMBIE, Chairman MAUREEN FARQUHARSON Editor and Secretary For the Arran Heritage Community Group April 2002   © 2006 Arran Heritage Project; Arran High School ; Other sources