"school" definition, meaning, and origin

Noun Canada, India

An institution dedicated to teaching and learning; an educational institution.
- Our children attend a public school in our neighborhood.
- Harvard University is a famous American postsecondary school.
Synonyms: academy college university
An educational institution providing primary and secondary education, prior to tertiary education (college or university).
- One particularly damaging, but often ignored, effect of conflict on education is the proliferation of attacks on schools, said the report, as children, teachers or school buildings become the targets of attacks. Parents...
At Eton College, a period or session of teaching.
- Divinity, history and geography are studied for two schools per week.
Within a larger educational institution, an organizational unit, such as a department or institute, which is dedicated to a specific subject area.
- We are enrolled in the same university, but I attend the School of Economics and my brother is in the School of Music.
Synonyms: college department faculty institute
An art movement, a community of artists.
- The Barbizon school of painters were part of an art movement towards Realism in art, which arose in the context of the dominant Romantic movement of the time.
The followers of a particular doctrine; a particular way of thinking or particular doctrine; a school of thought.
- These economists belong to the monetarist school.
- Let no man be leſſe confident in his holy faith […] by reason of any difference of judgement vvhich is in the ſeveral Schools of Chriſtians concerning the effects and conſequent bleſſings of this Sacrament. - 1660,...
- Here the stripped panelling was warmly gold and the pictures, mostly of the English school, were mellow and gentle in the afternoon light. - 1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 3, in The China Governess: A Mystery, London:...
The time during which classes are attended or in session in an educational institution.
- I’ll see you after school.
The room or hall in English universities where the examinations for degrees and honours are held.
The canons, precepts, or body of opinion or practice, sanctioned by the authority of a particular class or age.
- He was a gentleman of the old school.
- His face pale but striking, though not handsome after the schools. - 1883, Arthur Sherburne Hardy, But Yet a Woman:
An establishment offering specialized instruction, as for driving, cooking, typing, coding, etc.

Origin

From Middle English scole, from Old English scōl (“place of education”), from Proto-West Germanic *skōlu, from Late Latin schola, scola (“learned discussion or dissertation, lecture, school”), from Ancient Greek σχολή (skholḗ, “spare time, leisure”), from Proto-Indo-European *seǵʰ- (“to hold, have, possess”). Doublet of schola and shul. Compare Old Frisian skūle, schūle (“school”) (West Frisian skoalle, Saterland Frisian Skoule), Dutch school (“school”), Low German School (“school”), Old High German scuola (“school”), German Schule (“school”), Old Norse skóli (“school”). Influenced in some senses by Middle English schole (“group of persons, host, company”), from Middle Dutch scole (“multitude, troop, band”). See school (“group”). Related also to Old High German sigi (German Sieg, “victory”), Old English siġe, sigor (“victory”).

Noun collective

A group of fish or a group of marine mammals such as porpoises, dolphins, or whales.
- The divers encountered a huge school of mackerel.
Synonyms: shoal
A multitude.

Origin

From Middle English scole, schole (“group of persons, multitude, host, school of fish”), from Middle Dutch scole (“multitude, troop of people, swarm of animals”), from Old Dutch *scola, *skola (“troop, multitude”), from Proto-West Germanic *skulu (“troop, group”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kʷel- (“crowd, people”). Cognate with Middle Low German schōle (“multitude, troop”), Old English scolu (“troop or band of people, host, multitude, school of fish”). Doublet of shoal.

Forms

schools skull

Synonyms

school

Hypernyms

institution organization

Hyponyms

nursery school preschool kindergarten elementary school grade school primary school middle school junior college junior high junior high school grammar school secondary modern school comprehensive school high school secondary school college university graduate school polytechnic boarding school

Verb Entry 3

To educate, teach, or train (often, but not necessarily, in a school).
- Many future prime ministers were schooled in Eton.
- I tooke delights / In plucking Apples from t’Heſperian Trees, / Which Eating, I grew Learn’d: adde to All theſe / My Priuate Readings, which more School’d my Soule, / Then Tutors, when they ſternliest did Controll /...
To defeat emphatically, to teach an opponent a harsh lesson.
- A blind law graduate who put the National Conference of Bar Examiners to the test got schooled in federal court. - 1998 April 13, Leigh Jones, “National Bar Exam Methods Win in ADA Regulation Test”, in The Journal...
- Two weeks later, the Cornhuskers put on their road whites again and promptly got schooled by miserable Iowa State in Ames. After the shocking loss […] - 2006, Steve Smith, Forever Red: Confessions of a Cornhusker...
- "You again?" Sandman demanded. "I guess you didn't learn your lesson." "This time I'm gonna school you." - 2007, Peter David, Alvin Sargent, Spider-Man 3, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN, page 216:
To control, or compose, one’s expression.
- She took care to school her expression, not giving away any of her feelings.

Forms

schools schooling schooled schole

Derived

schooling

Verb Entry 4

To form into, or travel in, a school.

Forms

schools schooling schooled skull