SOS - Save Our Schools!

The IW Councillor for Pan, Geoff Lumley, has learnt that the IW Council intends to close Downside Middle School in 3 years time as part of its ‘education reorganisation’.

This is the first inkling throughout the last 4 months that there would be no school on the Downside site, and Cllr Lumley is both shocked and angry.

Consequently he is now calling for a halt to the proposed Pan development - due for a planning application submission in July - until the Pan community has a satisfactory and acceptable explanation as to why there has been such a sudden and surprising change in Council policy.

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Those of you who signed one of the petitions on the Downing Street petitions website will have received an email containing the Downing Street’s response to it:

You have petitioned for a review of the Isle of Wight’s proposals for changes to local school organisation and to provide for an option to be considered whereby the current system can be retained but standards raised.

First, it is important to note that school place planning is the statutory responsibility of the local authority (LA). It is for each LA to review school place provision regularly to ensure that there are sufficient places to meet the needs of the population and to secure high standards. The local authority also needs to consider how best to implement the changes to the 14-19 curriculum, which will become a national entitlement from 2013. Where the LA propose to make any changes to local school provision they must publish statutory proposals which are decided under local decision making arrangements and Ministers cannot intervene.

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A vote of no confidence in the IW Council’s director of children’s services Steve Beynon has been passed by the local executive of teaching union NASUWT — and it has been overwhelmingly backed by members .

The executive unanimously agreed on the vote, with members backing the result at a ratio of 15 to 1.

David Porter, of the NASUWT, said the reason behind the vote was Mr Beynon’s relationship with the Island Teaching Council and because members believed he had undermined Island teachers, headteachers and schools in a report in the March 13 edition of the Independent newspaper, in which he was reported as saying some heads, particularly at middle and high schools, who were just not strong enough.

“Mr Beynon has lost the faith and confidence of the Island’s teachers,” said Mr Porter.

Cllr Alan Wells, Cabinet member for children and young people, said Mr Beynon retained the confidence of the authority’s leadership. In the many recent meetings with headteachers and other professionals there had been no suggestion whatsoever of the teaching profession on the Island having no confidence in Mr Beynon.

Chief executive Joe Duckworth said Mr Beynon had the complete confidence of his fellow directors and he was extremely disappointed at such a personal attack on an officer by a union representative.

Courtesy of the Isle of Wight County Press

We have just been sent in the following statement courtesy of Standards-Not-Tiers.

Councillor Alan Wells, Isle of Wight Council cabinet member for children and young people has reportedly said:

“The details regarding the location of secondary schools form part of an area by area discussion which the council will be holding with head teachers and chairs of governors later this month.

The motion agreed at Full Council on March 19 said that secondary schools would be established with lower (11-14) and upper (14-19) sections. These schools would be established on the same site wherever possible and would provide a focused learning environment for pupils.

The intention is not to divide the secondary schools but to break them down into manageable sections on the chosen sites and is not a junior high (Middle School) model.

Instead, under our proposed set up, there would be single management, leadership and governance of the secondary schools across the upper and lower sections – a situation which is not uncommon on the mainland.”

We understand that throughout April and May there will be a series of area by area meetings held for Headteachers, representatives of governing bodies, pre-school leaders, and union representatives.

These meetings will consider the original proposals under option 3 for school organisation in the area, as published in the consultation document, any alternatives as a result of submissions made by governors of schools in that area or further work by officers in the light of the consultation responses.

Following up from our previous article on Independent - Letters: We Need Small Schools in our Towns and Cities, Wendy has sent in a letter and had it published on their website and in the Education & Careers section of today’s The Independent (3rd April).

Threat Remains

Mervyn Benford (Letters, EDUCATION & CAREERS, 27 March) highlights the countrywide crisis facing small schools. To update the Isle of Wight story, the council voted on 19 March to close its 16 middle schools, reorganise to a two-tier system, and to close “fewer” primary schools than originally threatened.

But as at least 25 of the island’s 46 primaries were on the initial hit list, “fewer” could still mean a large number. We won’t know the final tally until the summer.

The Isle of Wight council is driving through this reorganisation with no evidence that it will improve standards; and many successful schools remain threatened. National government has given councils the power to make local decisions about school organisation, and argues that councils are democratically accountable for those decisions when they come up for election. The next local elections on the Isle of Wight are in 2009, but by then our Tory council (which won by a landslide last time on a promise of retaining the three-tier system and protecting rural schools) will have begun a very expensive series of changes.

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VentnorBlog ran a very funny April Fools story a few days ago. It could be suggested that it shares a few similarities with the events that have been happening on the Island regarding it’s schools.

Click here to read the story. Make sure you read the comment from “Chris” below the story afterwards!

So, the controversial consultation process costing approximately £55,000 (Source: County Press) is now over. I have closed the voting on the old Survey on the site. Here are the final results:-

Do you agree with the Isle of Wight Council’s decision to close 23 Primary Schools?

Yes - 188 votes.
No - 1119 votes.
Don’t Know -  13 votes.

I have created a new Survey to gather your opinions on whether or not you’d re-elect your local Councillor if they voted for these school closures. You can vote on the poll on the right-hand side of the site, just under the list of links.

Don’t worry, there’s no trickery or fooling being done here, there is a simple Yes/No answer!

This week’s Rupert Besley cartoon from the County Press was very good again - thanks Rupert.

Here is an article from Ventnor Blog who attended the Full Council meeting in March:-

“The most telling and we think, shameful vote conducted at the schools reform debate last Wednesday was in reaction to when Cllr Deborah Gardiner suggested that the public question time should be increased, as so many people in the public gallery were keen to raise points concerning the future of their children’s education.

After the chairman, Roger Mazillius, asked her to quantify how much longer it should be, Cllr Gardiner made the suggestion of a total 30 minutes - 15 minutes longer than the time normally set aside for public questions.

When it went to the vote, the councillors responsible for voting it down — ie. stopping the public from having their full say — were all from the Tory party.

Let’s not forget, that all that was being asked for was an extra 15 minutes for public questions.

No explanation is required when a vote is taken, so quite why the ruling Tory party decided to vote against the public having sufficient time to express their views and concerns on a matter like the future of their children’s education, remains a mystery.

The behaviour that the Tories displayed, in our minds, shows a high level of arrogance, indeed of such a high level, that it’s led them to forget who voted them into the position of power that they currently hold.

It’s not rocket science to understand that when the public feel that they’re not represented by the people they elected, they’re highly likely not to vote them into that position again.

Why would you?”

Courtesy of VentnorBlog.com

Why small works

The Isle of Wight story (”Fight on Wight over closures”, EDUCATION & CAREERS, 13 March) reflects a countrywide crisis. Small schools represent one of the most effective models of education we have created, a perfect antidote to what is termed “toxic childhood”. Though large schools can perform well academically, small schools remain among the best-performing in tests and inspections.

It is either wilful deceit or shameful ignorance for local authorities to undermine parental confidence by making flawed claims such as those heard on the Isle of Wight.

The debate invariably boils down to finance. Unit costs are seen as too high and are said to drain resources from the rest of the system. But small-school costs in even the most rural areas are fragmentary proportions of overall budgets. No studies showing alleged savings from closure ever materialise, whereas there are studies that show transport costs overtaking the cost of keeping the original schools open. And £1,500 per pupil per year per five-mile journey is a lot for an LEA to commit.

Scottish research shows that the buses taking children to schools elsewhere cost more than heating, lighting, cleaning and repairing the buildings to be closed. The Scottish Executive reported in 2006 that children in its smallest primary schools had a 25 per cent better chance of entering higher education than the rest, and that children in such schools from impoverished backgrounds made progress. Their counterparts in big urban schools across the UK remain a sorry cadre of underachievement.

We need small schools in our towns and cities urgently, but must not destroy the successful rural models.

Mervyn Benford, information officer, National Association for Small Schools

Send letters to: The Editor, Education, ‘The Independent’, Independent House, 191 Marsh Wall, London E14 9RS (with a daytime phone number); or fax to: 020-7005 2143; or email to: education@independent.co.uk. Letters may be edited for length and clarity

Source: The Independent

Wendy has kindly sent in this link which shows the full footage of Jim Knight answering Q’s from Isle of Wight residents on the Politics show, 18 Feb (only one question was shown on the actual TV show I think, but the rest is shown here).

Big emphasis on presumption against rural closures, and imaginative ways to manage surpluses without closing schools.

Q & A’s are still just as relevant, of course, as we still don’t know the extent of primary closures.

Link to video on BBC website.

A little bit of light humour from Rupert Besley of the County Press.

I have a few thanks to make to various people:-

VentnorBlog for covering the Council meeting the other day so well - Thanks Simon & Sal!

Chris from Standards-Not-Tiers for the fantastic effort he has put into this campaign (for years”)

Jo & Terry at The Data Office for running this site for a week whilst I was away early March, and for uncovering all the mysterious changes that kept appearing on the Matrix data!

Clare, Tammy and her marshalls for organising the protests and making sure that the protests went smoothly.

All the councillors who have supported the campaign and done their very best to listen to the people that they are there to represent. I really do have the utmost of respect for you and wish that I could feel such gratitude for my own ward’s Councillor (Pugh!).

Isle of Wight Radio News for all the coverage and publicity they’ve given.

And of course all the people who have turned up to protests, and contribute to this website - the parents, grandparents, teachers, pupils, youth councillors, members of the community.

A big thanks, and well done to you all!

However, this is not over yet. The decision has been done and we cannot go back on that whether we like it or not. Schools will be closed, and we do not yet know which ones. As others have said, now is the time to ensure that this process is done smoothly in the best interests of the children and teaching staff of the Isle of Wight.