 Daz might just get caught... Cracking down on school graffiti
January 9th 2008 Graffiti is a real problem for schools in the UK as each intake of new students seeks to make its mark in their new surroundings. With high profile pranksters such as Banksy now gaining international acclaim for selling their ‘artwork’ to celebrity buyers, this problem is set to get much worse before it gets better.
One school that is managing to turn this tide is Dunraven School, in Streatham, London. Dunraven School is pioneering a new scheme with Ridge Crest Cleaning to tackle graffiti head on and three months in, the scheme is producing positive results.
Dunraven brought in Ridge Crest to specifically tackle the problem of graffiti and chewing gum deposits at the school. Ridge Crest has now set up a task force of cleaners who respond immediately to any gum deposits or acts of graffiti as soon as it is identified at the school. The cleaners clean up the area and then record each incident and the time it took to remove it.
By focussing specifically on these two areas, the team has been able to speed up the removal process and the school is now continually free of gum and graffiti. This has meant that there is no build-up and the school environment looks fresh and clean at all times. However, the clean-up is no mean feat: Over the Christmas period a team of six cleaners spent 30 hours removing gum from the underside of cafeteria tables. The total weight of gum removed was over five kilos.
The scheme is already being heralded as a success as the number of gum and graffiti incidences has dropped on comparable figures from the last school year.
“The new scheme has made a real difference to the school environment," says Dave Parry, facilities manager for Dunraven School. "As graffiti is tackled as soon as it is identified we don’t get a build-up, which can make a building look uncared-for. We have already seen a drop in incidences of graffiti since the scheme was pioneered and the atmosphere at the school has improved as students take more pride in their surroundings.”
The recording process also gives the school a permanent record of when and where these incidences are taking place. Where staff have taken photos, these have been passed on to the local police and this has already lead to some convictions.
The record also helps staff to focus their attention on high risk areas to make sure that pranksters aren’t tempted to re-offend at the same location. So far the scheme has resulted in a drop of occurrences comparable with the same months in the last academic year.
The record also means that the school is able to gain a realistic picture of how much time and money is being spent tackling this problem – so far it has been money well spent.
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