The Old Grammar School, Richmond

Designing our approach

First, we co-designed the consultation strategy with RBPT by holding a trustee workshop to:

• Develop our approach
• Understand the key stakeholders in Richmond
• Build a list of suitable options and activities
• Agree a communications plan, including setting up a Facebook page
• Set dates for key milestones

Based on this, we decided to focus on qualitative, mixed-methods data collection. We also agreed to focus equally on engagement with both young people and adults.

RBPT’s brief to NICRE was to be innovative, provocative, and find an ‘iconic spark’ for Richmond, so we designed methodologies that did not pose restrictive questions.

Online survey

We developed an online survey with QR codes, which was intended to be completed by adults who live in Richmond, and by visitors.

The survey was made up of one free-text prompt: "I think The Old Grammar School building and grounds should be used for…". This question was chosen to enable participants to give imaginative responses, with no boundaries drawn by the research team.

We also included tick boxes for participants to tell us if they were Richmondshire residents or visitors, and an optional space to sign up to receive consultation updates.

A QR code poster linking to the survey was displayed around Richmond, and 30,000 copies were printed in A5 size and delivered within the DL10 postcode area.

We received over 600 responses.

Drop-ins

We were out and about in Richmond regularly over a six-week period, conducting drop-in sessions with suggestion forms. We chose to target a range of existing events, and put stalls up in key locations, including:

• Local markets
• Town hall coffee mornings
• The Station
• Catterick Garrison

The suggestion forms were made up of the same questions as the online survey, and designed with similar branding to the poster, in order to be recognisable.

The drop-in sessions enabled us to discuss the project with the community, promote the online survey and stakeholder events, receive positive and negative feedback, and develop FAQs.

We received 191 hand-written responses.

Open day Sticker Stories App

We held an open day in the grounds of The Old Grammar School, but visitors were not able to go into the buildings due to their condition.

To allow people to peek inside the building, OpenLab designed and developed an app using their Sticker Stories methodology.

QR posters were designed with a looking glass motif; a nod towards the building's heritage (Lewis Carroll went to school there!). Posters were placed around the site, and visitors scanned them to bring up a photo from 'behind the wall' along with a question: "I think this space should be used for..."

RBPT and NICRE staff were also on site to hand out maps of the QR code posters and answer questions. We also had suggestions forms available, and laminated prints of the images contained in the app, for those who preferred not to respond online.

The app, combined with a visit to the site and structured interactions with expert RBPT staff, successfully made participant responses more specific to particular spaces around the site.

We received 47 responses.

Stakeholder workshops

We designed bespoke stakeholder workshops that were solutions-generated, inspired by innovation sprints and climathons but designed specifically for this consultation.

The sprints were structured in the following format:

• First, develop lots of ideas and write them on post-it notes.
• Then refine the ideas, to identify the most innovative and the most achievable.
• After a coffee break, focus on developing lots of solutions.
• Present the best solution to the group.

This approach enabled stakeholders to co-develop ideas, identify key challenges and opportunities, and discuss them with RBPT directly.

We chose to group stakeholders as follows:

1. Business, tourism and the visitor economy
2. Community groups and organisations.

Stakeholder interviews

We invited stakeholders and interested parties which were not involved in stakeholder events to take part in an interview with either NICRE or RBPT.

This enabled NICRE to share social science methods, knowledge and skills with RBPT, which went on to lead interviews with key stakeholders.

We carried out a combination of 10 online and in-person semi-structured interviews, resulting in in-depth discussions about:

• Specific ideas for the use of the site
• Contextual aspects like previous consultations and building surveys
• Sentiment in the town.

Youth engagement

Children and young people’s engagement was a priority for the consultation. Our approach to youth engagement focussed on creativity and imagination, and enabled young people to develop ideas individually and in groups, and to design posters and pitch ideas.

Engagement took place in a variety of settings:

• A workshop with Girl Guides, focussing on poster creation.
• A workshop with a home-educated young people’s group, focussing on co-design of a poster and group discussion.
• In-school engagement co-designed with schools:
  • Richmond School – a multi-stage idea generation and refinement process for 1,060 young people, where school council reps pitched ideas in a Dragons' Den-style event.
  • St Mary’s Primary School – a Google Classrooms activity where more than 50 free-text responses were compiled and sent to NICRE to review.

Analysis

We uploaded all the data into NVivo software and manually coded it for themes. This approach was time-consuming and intensive, but made it possible to:

• Analyse different types of data in one place to derive themes.
• Incorporate both images (such as scans of handwritten responses, posters and post-it notes) as well as text-based responses.
• Summarise the most common themes, and relationships between themes (e.g. identifying possible compatible uses).
• Identify sentiments in the town, such as the meaning of The Old Grammar School to former pupils.
• Filter using RBPT and NICRE's co-created options appraisal criteria, as part of a second stage of data analysis.

Options appraisal

We carried out a second workshop with RBPT trustees to co-develop our options appraisal criteria, and to design our approach. 

Options appraisal criteria included some priorities and preferences decided in the workshop, and, in no particular order:

• Appropriateness to community need
• Suitability in the surrounding area
• Compatibility with limitations of the site
• Community benefit
• Environmental impact
• Social impact
• Impact on equality
• Likelihood of being commercially viable or sustainably supported by other commercial uses.

The options appraisal approach was adapted from the Estate Regeneration national strategy good practice guide.

We considered other approaches such as a SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) analysis, and an example from a regeneration project in Camden. The Estate Regeneration-style approach was chosen as it incorporated elements of SWOT and allowed us flexibility to embed our priorities and preferences.

Business planning

The Operation Regeneration team has now appraised all proposed uses, to tailor a cohesive site offer that will serve the community for generations to come. This informed the development of a detailed business plan for consideration by the building owners, North Yorkshire Council (NYC).

The business plan comprises:

• An overview of the consultation outcomes
• Details about proposed regeneration and use of the site
• Summary of expected impacts on the community, the environment, and equality.

RBPT arranged to attend County Hall at the start of February 2025 to present the business plan. Subject to a formal decision by NYC, the Operation Regeneration team will be delighted to announce the plans for the future of The Old Grammar School, likely in the spring of 2025.