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The European SHERPA project aims to share knowledge for energy renovation in buildings by public administrations. The EU Energy Performance in Buildings Directive (EPBD) recast, indicates the necessity of transforming EU buildings into Nearly Zero Energy Buildings (nZEB). Each Member State transposes differently the EPBD, usually based on European norms like Spain did. The generated knowledge about improving performance and transforming public buildings into nZEBs, is applied here to schools, according to the Spanish transposition. SHERPA, among other buildings, has audited four schools sited in the Valencia Region (Spain, Southern European Country). The paper starts describing, briefly, the general auditing protocol devised by SHERPA. Particularly, one school was chosen out of the four to illustrate the protocol and was converted into a nZEB. This school led to the most unexpected and outstanding results, although the trends were shared among all the audited schools. Finally, based on the results, the paper suggests some recommendations to the policy makers about the practical definition of nZEB and financial instruments to engage this nZEB challenge for schools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]