The training college of the Brothers of the Immaculate Conception

A conversation with Wim Luiten and Frans School of the Brothers of Maastricht. In 1840, priest Louis Rutten established a monastic community in Maastricht, with an educational purpose. The official name was Broeders van de Onbevlekte Ontvangenis van de heilige Maagd Maria (Brothers of the Immaculate Conception of the Holy Virgin Mary).

Wim Luiten is now a Superior of this community, which also calls itself the Broeders van Maastricht (Brothers of Maastricht). ‘Rutten was convinced that education was the best way to fight poverty’, he states. The first brothers attended the episcopal school for teachers in Rolduc. In 1894, the congregation founded its own school on Capucijnengang in Maastricht.

Historic building

The school proved popular and quickly outgrew the building. So, in 1909, it relocated to the new building on Tongerseweg. In the 1930s, a vocational school for crafts was added to the school. ‘Due to changes in education, and because the space was badly needed for classrooms, in 1964 this vocational school moved to our juniorate in Zevenaar’, explains Luiten.

The students in Zevenaar also undertook the first years of teacher training. Frans School was one of them. He came to Maastricht in 1960: ‘For four years, I lived in the monastery on Tongerseweg. Even back then, it was an amazing historic building. I can clearly recall the dormitories, with the open ‘chambrettes’ in the attic. You

‘The brothers always took very good care of the monastery, doing everything themselves.’

Frans School Wim Luiten

didn’t get your own room until the third year. It wasn’t much, but it was enough. You had a bed, a small book shelf, and a foldaway desk.’

Ice rink

Although students had to adhere to a strict regime, there was also time for relaxation, says School: ‘We played games in the recreation room and listened to Radio Luxembourg. There was a darkroom for photography lovers, a piano room, and a room where you could tinker with electronics. We played football and baseball on the sports fields. One thing I’ll never forget is the cold winter of 1963. We turned the school yard into an ice rink and organized skating competitions.’

Wim Luiten lived in the building for just one year. ‘That was in 1969, the last year of the juniorate. Only our graduating class of ten boarders were able to complete the course.’ In 1994, the last brothers moved out of the complex, although some did continue teaching there. ‘The brothers always took very good care of the monastery, doing everything themselves. That’s why the building was so well preserved over the years. The renovation was completed beautifully, with a great deal of respect for its history. It is wonderful that the building is now inhabited again’, Luiten concludes.

‘The renovation was completed beautifully, with a great deal of respect for its history.’