[Tagging] schools

[David Earl]

Because it is likely to be useful to my local authority in a real world 
project, I am considering adding some tags to schools to classify them, 
something like this:

operator=Somewhereshire County Council
school:level=early|first|nursery|infant|junior|primary|prep|secondary|tertiary|special|referral
school:status=independent|c_of_e_aided|c_of_e_voluntary_controlled|community|foundation|inter_church_aided|non_denominational 
|roman_catholic_aided

I hope operator is largely uncontroversial as the operator tag is 
already widely used in other contexts, though I'm sure someone will find 
the need to argue about it.

school:level is describing the kind of school: mostly corresponding to 
age group, but special, for example is about special needs students, and 
age groups overlap and are sometimes fluid, so it's a bit more than just 
age. These are terms used in the UK: I am sure there will be additional 
terms from many countries, some of which may overlap and some may not. 
(Incidentally, it is hard to tell pure age ranges from the notices 
outside schools and other non-copyright sources. Where age ranges are 
fixed and the info obtainable, no problem adding it, but I'm 
concentrating on what I can get from surveys here). The list above is 
what my local authority uses.

school:status is about a bit more than the operator. Schools in the UK 
have complex governance: the County or Unitary Authority is responsible 
for education, but schools may be provided by the local authority or 
indeed central government but run by some other body which wants a part 
in indoctrinating children, including churches of various kinds. I don't 
know whether such nuances exist in other countries, I'd be interested to 
hear. Again, such information is usually available from the notice 
boards outside schools. The ones I've listed above are those of my local 
authority: I guess there may be some others I don't have even in the UK 
- for example I'm sure there must be muslim aided schools, but the 
principle follows.

One might argue that the denomination tag is appropriate, as per 
churches and cemeteries, for example:
   school:status=religious_aided
   religion=christian
   denomination=church_of_england
so the status is simpler but broken down further in some cases.

So, has anyone used similar tags already, and if so, what are they?

I have no strong feelings about what I would call such tags if they 
haven't already been invented, so I shall let the argument rage over 
what they should be called and other aspects which will no doubt come 
up, and then use whatever seems to be the consensus or majority view 
after a few days.

David