Purbeck schools shake-up set to beat cuts (From Bournemouth Echo)

Purbeck schools shake-up set to beat cuts

7:00pm Wednesday 21st July 2010 in

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THE FINANCIAL crisis will not stop the controversial £36.5 million shake-up of Purbeck schools, say county chiefs.

Dorset County Council’s cabinet agreed to forge ahead with plans to change the school system from three to two tiers, despite concerns from some parents, teachers and councillors.

At a meeting today, the full council is expected to do the same.

Cabinet members, who agreed the review yesterday, were told the education plan was still one of the authority’s top priorities and the money would be available regardless of sweeping budget cuts affecting the county.

Council leader Angus Campbell said: “We need to move forward for the children and for the life chances of the children in Purbeck.”

Cabinet’s recommendation to press on with the review followed a six-week period of statutory consultation, in which 14 affected organisations, including schools and town councils, took part.

Of these, six supported the review and eight were opposed.

The review was initiated in a bid to address more than 1,000 surplus places across Purbeck’s education system.

Cllr Campbell said: “I fully understand people are very fond of particular schools and our middle schools are terrific places, but that is not what the argument is here at all.”

The county will shut the four middle schools in Swanage, Bovington, Wareham and Sandford, paving the way for 13 of Purbeck’s first schools to become primaries.

Swanage Mayor Bill Trite, who also sits on both the county and Purbeck District Council, told county cabinet members he was disappointed at the level of consultation with Swanage residents.

In the earlier stages of the review, Swanage residents pushed for a secondary school site within the town, but this was turned down on the basis such a move would incur spiralling costs.

But Cllr Trite said: “I believe that my concerns grow more valid as time goes by, rather then less.”

He said no real alternatives were considered in Swanage, so the consultation was “neither robust nor transparent.”

He added: “At no time have the residents of Swanage been consulted on the loss of secondary education in the town.”