Published: Tuesday, 29th November, 2005 14:25
Minister criticises SBC's school review 'triggers'
By Border Telegraph Newsroom
Print Article
FOUR more primary schools have been earmarked for review by Scottish Borders Council.
But Education Minister, Peter Peacock, has criticised the council’s methods for choosing them.
SBC’s director of education, Glenn Rodger, recently confirmed that the department had singled out four unnamed schools for review, with the possibility of closure.
Mr Rodger said: “We have internally identified four schools that we are starting to build up a profile card for, and we are in the process of looking at the details.
“This is not about setting up a list of schools for closure. All we are identifying at this stage is which schools have triggered the need for further work to be done.”
The schools were identified using the council’s controversial Small Schools Policy, which came into force in May this year, amid strong opposition from parents who feel it is a licence to close country schools.
The policy automatically puts a school forward for review if a certain number of “trigger points” are set off.
These include schools falling below being half full, losing a teacher, or if the amount of pupils likely to attend the school is less than 13 in the next three years.
But policies like the one adopted by SBC have come under fire from Scotland’s education minister.
During a recent question time at the Scottish Parliament, Mr Peacock criticised councils who have an automatic means of choosing which schools will go under review for closure, and called for a more flexible approach.
He said: “Some councils are adopting a rigid criteria on the triggers for school closures, thereby locking themselves into a situation in which schools automatically come up for review, irrespective of political judgements.
“That is an unfortunate position for any council to get into.”
But Mr Rodger defended the policy, saying it gives the council a system of monitoring schools, rather than having to make it up as it goes along.
He said: “The basis of the triggers which we identified is about reviewing changes to schools that require us to take a management response.
“That is not about closure. It could be, but in the first instance it is about seeing that schools are changing.
“They might be reducing in size, or have issues with their buildings. We need to look at that. It might be about looking at additional resources to keep it viable.
“Reviewing our schools is something we should be doing all the time.
“You have to have some mechanism that triggers off those schools that you have to look at in more depth. It is a structured response rather than an ad-hoc one.”
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