A grandfather addresses the children sitting around him, in a circle on the floor, and tells them fascinating stories about the universe and existence. They stare at him without blinking: they listen to him with their mouths open. They drink in his words; and, from time to time, they hear the flight of a fly: that's school. The grandfather represents wisdom and experience; the children represent openness to the new, the anxiety to know and the personality under construction. And all the schools in the world would be more or less pale recreations of this essential status . Architecture sees itself as having the duty to welcome this scene; and good school architecture would be that which is capable of living up to the aspirations and yearnings it brings together: of offering itself to their service.

Of course, this existence of which the old man speaks to the children is much more crude and impious than it seems. The margin left for these longings is usually rather narrow, and there is hardly room for illusions. A cold pragmatism struggles to take control of our individual and collective habits. It is an icy and implacable utilitarianism; and we must be forewarned because, otherwise, it will conquer us without us even realizing it.

This observation can be applied to various aspects of our lives, and perhaps it has a particularly topical aspect. It would seem that we are only tasting the bitter fruits of a narrow rationalism, associated with the logic of money: a pretentious and self-confident rationalism, but incapable of becoming position of our needs by applying a reductionist and accounting interpretation to them.

Reflection should lead us to recognize, by contrast, the vocational commitment of many fellow architects who, when they have the opportunity, design buildings full of ambition, despite the harsh and hostile circumstances. And it should encourage us to expect much more from the results of their work.

We are facing a possibilist and enormously conditioned art. If there are housing achievements in the spaces we use is, perhaps, thanks to the stubbornness of professionals always motivated, despite the difficulties. Ours is a rather utopian official document ; most architects work with a disinterested hobby, moved by the passion to create and contribute; and we must overcome some too rigid dichotomies. Contrary to what people sometimes think, architecture seeks much less prominence than efficiency; yes, at a level that sometimes leads it to assume inevitable doses of prominence. And it demands our understanding, just as it expects our demands.

Architecture for the Education must have a special feeling for this challenge. It is not in vain that it is associated with the training of judgment and personality. It educates our sensibility: it polishes our taste; and consequently, it has a double responsibility.

ICOMOS, committee International Council on Monuments and Sites, is a global NGO associated with UNESCO that promotes the preservation of built heritage. This year 2013, on the occasion of the World Day for Monuments and Sites celebrated on April 18, it wishes to reflect on the heritage educational in various geo-cultural contexts. The Education has always been practiced in a wide variety of places: from open spaces, the protective shade of a tree or the agora, to institutional buildings intended for this purpose: schools, universities, madrasas, academies, libraries, monasteries.... Many of them are also recognized for their historical or artistic value, and represent an important part of our cultural heritage. Their protection and conservation comes to be, at the same time, to celebrate the Education as a right and a task.

The admired Louis Kahn defines the school in terms similar to those alluded to: "The school began with a man under a tree; a man who did not know he was a teacher and began to discuss what he had understood with others who did not know they were students. The latter began to reflect on what had happened among them and on the beneficial effect of that man. They wished that their children would also listen to him, and thus spaces were erected and the first school came into being." The school, he concludes, "is a place where it is beautiful to learn".

Surely it will be beautiful to learn in a space designed for the purpose and really attractive: functional as well as elegant and beautiful. This is the challenge facing our architecture: let us appreciate and demand it, with determination and openness, with magnanimity and open-mindedness: the stakes are high.