The British Schools Museum has been awarded further funding for a project.

The Hitchin British Schools Trust has received a £9,800 from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) in a project entitled Bring Back the Benefactors. The project recalls the philanthropists who opened and funded the first monitorial school in Hitchin for boys and girls more than 200 years ago.

Terry Ransome, member of the board of trustees of the Hitchin British Schools Trust said: “Volunteers and staff saved our heritage site when it was threatened with redevelopment in 1990. At that time the Trust’s vision was supported by many local benefactors, just as 200 years earlier Hitchin businessman and lawyer William Wilshere founded the first school on our site to enable poor children to learn and to better their prospects.

The Queen Street site has been a place of learning ever since as school, college, and now museum, still supported by volunteers and funded largely by grants and donations. Heritage buildings need constant tender loving care.

“With this grant from the HLF we have appointed Craigmyle Fundraising Consultants to help us to focus our passion to attract funding to look after and use our buildings and museum collection for the benefit of all well into the next 200 years.”

This award from the HLF is the second in recent months. HLF have recently funded a learning and outreach post at the museum.

The three year project will develop and enhance the museum’s schools education programme, deliver a range of informal learning activities and increase community engagement and outreach work.

This is the second funding that the museum has received in recent weeks. HLF awarded the museum £89,000 for a three-year education project.