Next Major Rally - Shanklin (Pugh’s Ward) this Saturday
| February 9, 2008 | ||
| 2:00 pm |
Update: This protest is now planned to be in silence, please click here for updated details.
The next major protest rally will be on this Saturday (February 9th 2008) in Shanklin, which is the ward for Councillor Pugh.
Meeting up at the car park of Shanklin Train Station from 2pm, the march will depart at 2.30pm, heading along Regent Street - which is the main thoroughfare and shopping area - encircling the Conservative Club, returning along the same route and briefly stopping off via Clarendon Road, finishing at the Train Station.
We are expecting to see almost double the amount of support shown at Newport.
Please bring as many banners as you can muster, and school children in uniform.
We look forward to seeing you at the march TO PROTECT THE FUTURE OF OUR SCHOOLS AND OUR RURAL WAY OF LIFE!
Remember, Apathy gets us nowhere. People Power has worked in Shropshire and is working here too!
Click here to download a poster to spread the word and get us many people there as possible!
Although the rally in Shanklin (Cllr David Pugh’s Ward) on Saturday will be passing near to Pugh’s home, we will not be marching down Spring Gardens past his house as we respect that he has a personal and private life and this is a strictly peaceful protest.
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February 8th, 2008 at 6:32 pm
26 - Ronise
Thank you for getting to the bottom of this and clearing up the misunderstanding. Isn’t this site a great way to get the truth.
Hopefully we’ll see lots of people from Northwood and Gurnard joining the March tomorrow showing support for all schools.
February 8th, 2008 at 5:21 pm
To number 25 and 23,
I spoke to the Save Gurnard Action Group today and they gave me a very throughout answer, demystifying the false rumours about the Matrix and the collection of signatures in Northwood. It is clear to me that the rumours were escalated from misunderstandings, and some groups are taking advantage to create an air of mistrust. Let’s not let this happen.
I thought it would be better if I copy and paste their reply here:
“Dear Ronise
Thank you for your email regarding the Save Gurnard Primary School
campaign. We are aware of the concerns of Northwood parents and we
welcome the opportunity to clear up this issue.
Firstly the Save Gurnard Primary School campaign is most definitely not
about trying to get the council to close any other school in the Cowes
area. Northwood is an excellent school and just as in Gurnard’s case we do
not believe that the local authority should be closing sucessful and viable
schools.
The research group have been looking at the matrix as the council have used
the matrix to support their rationale for closing schools. We have found
some inconsistencies that means that Gurnard should score slightly more points than we currently have. We are going to point this out to the local
authority. This does not mean that we score more than Northwood and we are
not using this is to make our business case. What we are saying is that
Gurnard, Cowes and Northwood are all successful schools and the local
authority should be supporting all of these schools to remain open.
Instead of shutting Gurnard school we have built a business case on
limiting the size of the proposed ‘new’ school at Solent. The current
proposal for option 2 & 3 is a 3 FE at Solent which would mean a school of
630 children. We feel that this is not the right solution for this area,
and propose that Solent should have a 2FE and Gurnard a 1 FE, under our
proposal Northwood and Cowes stay open. We have costed this proposal and
believe that it is the best solution economically, educational and socially
for the good of all children in this area.
In terms of the peition outside Northwood school. This was undertaken by
members of the Northwood community who happens to send their children to
Gurnard school. On the day they collected their signatures, they met with a very positive response. The top of the petition stated clearly that the petition was to Save Gurnard School…not a generic ‘Save Our School’ petition. As soon as we
heard that one person had complained we immediately contacted the Head of
the school to apologise if any offence had been taken. Furthermore we have written a response to the letter from the Northwood Supporters along the lines of this email to clarify our position.
We are really happy to talk about this further should you wish to and I
hope it has cleared up any misunderstandings.
A newsletter has gone out in the book bags today to update parents on where
we are up to.
Kind regards
Kathy, Vicky, Andrea and Tracey
Save Gurnard School Action Group “
February 8th, 2008 at 3:20 pm
23
Thanks for the information.
One point while I did see a a couple of people collecting signatures the other week, probably with hindsight to support Gurnard, they were away from the school entrance and were waiting for parents to approach them - certainly they were not doing anything that made me feel uncomfortable or stop me.
I haven’t heard anything about the matrix - i would have thought that as it has already been published it is unlikely to change, otherwise the council would look ridiculous!
What a shame that Pugh and his clowns are creating such an air of distrust when we all just want what is best for the children of the Island.
February 8th, 2008 at 1:31 pm
To number 23
It is the first time I hear about a petition to “save gurnard school” being done outside Northwood, which I think it would be of a very bad taste and also a stupid PR move. It is also the first time I hear about the rumour that there was an attempt to modify the Assesment Matrix weighting/criteria to show that Gurnard had a higher score than Northwood - something that I also think that it is of very bad taste and a strategic mistake. If both those things happened, please be assure that it is not representative of the parents with children at Gurnard School. It is certainly not representative of my family. The more important now is that we all stick together and not allow mistakes done by a minority or a rumour to spoil the campaign.
February 8th, 2008 at 1:08 pm
19 & 21
I believe that the Northwood letter originated from the PTA (named Supporters of Northwood) and was clearly labelled as such, not from the staff.
I understand that some parents had felt uncomfortable being stopped at the gate and being asked to sign a ‘Save Gurnard school petition’. there was also a rumour that there was an attempt to modify the Assesment Matrix weighting/criteria to show that Gurnard had a higher score than Northwood. (Perhaps someone on the Gurnard team could clarify please - it may just be interpretation of the language used).
I had sight of a letter and it did seem cautiously worded.
Both are good schools and appear sustainable.
February 8th, 2008 at 12:40 pm
As a concerned parent with a child at gatten and lake primary i shall be attending the rally on saturday, as has been said we as parents received a very negative letter from our board of governors the other day and to be quite frank i found the figures and reasons to shut the school distressing , how on earth they have come up with the number of free spaces supposedly in the school beyond belief , we as parents have a duty to challenge these figures coming out of our schools / council. And what of the parents who have children at seemingly safe schools can’t they see how this is going to affect there children as much as ours, god help us all if these idiot’s get there way with this proposal. I attended the meeting at sandown high scchool and heard not one iota of any evidence that the council have any idea why the education system on the island fails our kids after primary age , could it be that the later schooling happens in school’s that are too large ?
February 8th, 2008 at 11:39 am
To Janet - number 19,
Janet,
Just to reinforce your point, I am a parent of a child at Gurnard School. Speaking for myself and my family we are against the closure of “ALL” schools. I also know of a lots of very politically aware parents at Gurnard, who are very conscious that if any of the proposals go ahead, we will all be affected, and therefore are also against the closure of all schools. Like many of you, I believe that there is a lots of “divide” and “conquer” tactics being used. Of course, we are in favor of improving education standards in the Isle of Wight, but as we have been relentlessly discussing, there is no evidence that any of the proposals will achieve this goal.