District #10 served Pleasant Valley.  A school was established in 1836 at the corner of West River Road and Albough Road by the “Eighth School Society – Winsted.”  In those days schools were established and run by “School Societies,” not by town governments, and so their service areas often crossed town lines.  The school served the Valley area well but soon severed its relationship with Winsted to become Barkhamsted’s 10th school district.  In 1861 it was decided to move the building across the street to the banks of the river.  In those days the road was much narrower and there was more room on the river bank.  The school was enlarged, renovated, updated, and took on a distinctive “L” shape with a large woodshed extending off to the right. Tradition has it that the woodshed was the remains of the original 1836 building.  The school on the banks of the river served the community well into the twentieth century.  On a sad day in January 1927, a fire took hold in the chimney, spread to the roof, and soon the whole building was in flames. There were no injuries, but the building was a total loss. 

The school was replaced in 1928 by a new building on Ripley Hill Road.  The Ripley Hill Road school was soon outgrown and in 1938/39 the building was expanded to provide an additional classroom, a library, a work room and, a first for Barkhamsted schools, indoor toilets. 

Pictures of the school from the late 1930s show differences in roof color that identify the expansion. Pleasant Valley could now accommodate kids from the smaller schools, making it possible to have just two school districts: one in Pleasant Valley and one in Riverton. During the 1930s as the roads improved and the reservoir project advanced, the last one room schools gradually closed and their students were transferred either to Riverton or to the newly enlarged Pleasant Valley School. In the 1940s the town was growing and there was much discussion about the need for a newer and bigger school. 

The 1947 Town Meeting voted $150,000 to build a new school, but that vote was rescinded by the next Town Meeting.  Instead, it was decided to build a small brick building that would house a couple of new classrooms and a Principal’s Office behind the existing Pleasant Valley School.   Most classes would remain in the old wooden building for a few more years.  In 1951 the Town Meeting voted to add six more classrooms plus an auditorium, kitchen, Teacher’s Room and a Health Room to the new brick building.  As students were gradually moved into the new classrooms, various parts of the old wooden building were taken over by town government.  By the mid-‘50s the old  schoolhouse had officially became the Town Hall and most students had been moved to the new brick building, now known as Barkhamsted Elementary School.  The seventh graders remained in the Town Hall through the 1955/56 school year and in the following year, as eighth graders they too were moved to the Elementary School.  In September of 1958 the new Northwest Regional School #7 in Winsted was ready for occupancy.  Seventh and eighth graders from Barkhamsted (along with those from Colebrook, Norfolk and New Hartford) were transferred to “Regional,” and Barkhamsted Elementary became a 1-6 school.  Kindergarten was not a part of the regular school curriculum in those days but was available in a privately run program that for a time operated in the basement of the Town Hall.  To serve the needs of a growing population and expanded school programs, several more rooms were added to the school building in 1961.  In that same year Kindergarten became part of the regular school curriculum.  In July of 1988, the old Pleasant Valley School, by then the Town Hall, was lifted from its foundation, partially turned, and moved a short distance east to make way for a $3,000,000 expansion and renovation of Barkhamsted Elementary School.