Making school closures a success in Hjørring Municipality: Samling og Sammenhold

Hjørring Municipality in rural Northwestern Denmark has over the past four years closed 11 village schools. In some villages private schools have opened, and thereby remained a focus for the local community and a central meeting place for the people living in and around the village. In other villages, Hjørring Municipality has, immediately after the school closure, reached out to the local community in order to help them establish a substitute meeting place that replaces the school as the social hot spot in the village and local community. The project, named Samling og Sammenhold, has been successful in fulfilling its aim, and is now used as an approach to citizen involvement in a range of municipal development project in Hjørring Municipality. This research has evaluated the project, and through interviewing both villagers and municipal project managers, the central factors that have ensured the success of the project have been identified. The outcome is a range of suggestions on how a local village can re-establish a social center through collaborating with the local municipality. This paper thus reports on a successful development project, and discusses how closing of rural schools need not mean the closing of a village social hot spot.