Have you ever wanted to own your own school?

The former Harrietsham Church of England Primary School is for sale at auction.

The school, on the corner of Ashford Road and Church Road, dates from the Victorian era and is a non-designated heritage asset.

It has stood empty since September 2006, when the new Harrietsham Primary School opened in West Street, and it has suffered from considerable vandalism.

The half-acre site has planning permission, won on appeal, for an extension and conversion into two three-bedroom homes plus the creation of a new four-bedroom detached home with double garage.

It is being offered at auction by Clive Emson Auctioneers with a guide price of £490,000.

Online bidding starts at 11am on February 5.

Click here for details of how to register.

Harrietsham’s new purpose-built primary school in West Street has a capacity for 390 pupils and was rated “Good” at its last Ofsted inspection.

The sale of the old school has prompted memories among past pupils.

Andy Ashenhurst went there as a five-year-old in 1950.

He said: “My father was a farm worker at Runham farm. When l was five, I walked across the fields to Harrietsham Primary School every day.”

“I remember a tanker truck arriving every month to suck sewage from the septic tank in the playground. When the crew finished they spread pink disinfectant powder round the drain cover.

“Us kids were gripped by this and watched avidly.

“In 1953 for the Queen’s Coronation we were all given a new one shilling coin and a ceramic mug with a picture of Her Majesty.

“I remember one day l coudn't eat my school dinner. It was a lump of liver with blood vessels sticking out. This was still the post-war period of waste not, want not.

“I was made to sit there all afternoon watching the gravy coagulate as the dining area reverted to a classroom and a class went on around me.”

It sounds harsh, but Mr Ashenhurst’s education doesn’t seem to have suffered. He retired as a lecturer in Psychology and Anthropology at the University of Kent.