The house system is a traditional feature of British schools, and schools in the Commonwealth. Historically, it was associated with established public schools, where a 'house' refers to a boarding house or dormitory of a boarding school. In the case of a day school, however, the word 'house' refers only to a grouping of pupils, rather than to a particular building.
Pupils are likely to be divided into a number of houses, which are often named after saints, famous historical alumni or notable regional landmarks (at international schools, for example, houses may be named after famous local people). Other more arbitrary names – animal names or colours, for example – may be used where the house system is adopted by a primary school.
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House system exists to provide pastoral care of the students. In a world with absentee parents, some children require schools to look after their basic physical, social and emotional needs. Learning can only take place when the needs of the students are being met. Schools that use a house system provide this care along with boarding.
A secondary feature of house systems is the competition between houses. The traditional school sports day is usually an inter-house competition. Debating competitions and charity drives are also often organised along inter-house lines. Merit points for behaviour and academic achievement may also be totalled up for comparison between houses.
In the past, pupils may have been assigned to houses randomly, on their first or last names or based on ability, with the aim of balancing the houses in order to increase competition. But today, the assignment is based on the social and emotional needs of the student and to ensure proper peer mentoring is enhanced with the right fit of students within a house. Traditionally, however, once a pupil has been assigned to a house, any younger siblings he or she has may automatically become members of that house when they arrive at the school, but this varies from school to school. (This tradition sometimes extends to the children of former pupils.)
One notable feature of the house system is the nomination and election, or appointment, of house captains for the junior and senior school, whose job it is to run the entire house, with staff assigned to the house serving only as advisors and mentors. Large schools may have a house captain for each year group (with vice-captains in the largest schools).
In boarding schools the term housemaster is held by the member of staff responsible for pupils living in a particular dormitory. In state schools, members of staff are appointed as (or volunteer to become) head of house. However, both terms can be used at either style of school for the sake of formality.
The term "house system" is also used to refer to the residential college systems found in some colleges and universities, such as Caltech, Yale College, Harvard College, and University of Chicago. These systems are based on the college systems of Oxford and Cambridge Universities in the United Kingdom, which in turn share many similarities with the house systems of British secondary schools.
The first boarding school story was Sarah Fielding's The Governess: or Little Female Academy, published in 1749.[1] They didn't become popular until 1857, with Tom Hughes' novel Tom Brown's School Days.[1] The house system has since featured prominently at many thousands of school stories books, with many authors writing whole series of books like Chalet School, Mallory Towers, Jennings and Billy Bunter, which have been published around the world and translated to several languages.[2][1] The Harry Potter books and films (re)popularized this genre, and created unprecedented popularity of British boarding schools (and its associated house system) in countries where they were previously unknown.[1]
These stories depict the popular conception of a British boarding school rather than how these boarding schools work in reality, and focused in the most positive aspects.[1] For example, loyalty to own's house is very important in real life houses, and it's featured prominently in these books.[1] The Harry Potter books have updated the boarding school to modern values, for example by using mixed-sex education houses.[1] Many British people never went to a boarding school, but have integrated their values by reading these books.[1]
The translators of the foreign editions of the Harry Potter books had difficulties translating the "house" concept in countries like Russia, because there was no adequate word that could convey the importance of belonging to a certain house, the loyalty owed to your house, and the pride in the prizes won by your own house.[3] This forces translators to insert extra explanations in the dialogues, making foreign readers think that the house and boarding systems were a special feature of the fantasy setting, when they are really a real word feature doesn't need to be explained to any typical British child.[4] The French translation doesn't explain the differences between the French and English real-world boarding schools, including that French houses are not responsible for their own discipline via head girls/boys.[4]