Document Handed to me about Hesketh Fletcher Proposed School Closure.

 

 

Hesketh Fletcher Proposed School Closure

 

Reasons For (According to the Local Authority):

 

• Falling Numbers on Roll – for the past three years rumours have caused uneasiness in local primary schools after a series of meetings were held that gave possible options for the future of education in Atherton. Even then one of the proposals out of a possible seven was to close Hesketh Fletcher so what happened to the other six possibilities? Falling results cannot be the main reason for this shift away from sending local pupils to the local school. Our results have risen year on year overall and even last year were better than Westleigh’s in every area except the 5 A – C with English and math's. The real reason for the falling numbers has been the lack of support from the LA and some feeder schools.

Parents cannot be blamed if they do not send their children to a school that could close if those pupils have to move schools at a crucial point in their education.

• Perceived Image – there has been a general belief that our pupils are ill-mannered and badly behaved because of the access to the town at lunchtime but this has been addressed, all pupils remain in school during a severely shortened lunchtime. Now local people and shop owners are praising our young people for the way in which they behave and there has been no trouble in the town centre at lunchtime for at least two years.

Some officers of the LA have suggested at the consultation meetings that the standards of education at the school were putting parents off but all our young people leave school with qualifications including NVQs and Vocational Qualifications that are necessary in the work place. We do not just concentrate on the gifted and talented although we have a programme in place to stretch them fully.

In addition three members of staff gained AST (Advanced Skills Teacher) status whilst at the school, another was nationally recognized by the RSC as an outstanding teacher of Shakespeare and another has gone on to deliver Early Intervention Strategies in failing schools in another LA. They did not suddenly become all of this when they left the school, they were excellent teachers whilst here.

Hesketh Fletcher is the only school in the area that teaches AS English and RE to year 11 pupils with a 90% + pass rate at grade C and above.

• Financial Necessity – The LA needs to reduce the number of secondary school places but this does not mean automatically closing a school. The LA should have addressed this problem three years ago by creating catchment areas to service all three schools in the area. This is one of the proposals in their BSF brochure and could still be applied to Hesketh Fletcher. Unfortunately political parties do not want to be seen closing the school as it serves their voters and so natural wastage has been encouraged. The LA can now say that this is the best solution to their problem.

The focus now is on bigger schools. However, there is no reason to believe that these are more successful, on the contrary they concentrate problems in one place which can be detrimental to the overall effectiveness of a school. Why not have three schools of equal size with a local feel to them?

 

Reasons Against:

 

• Removal of a Valuable Local Resource - Hesketh Fletcher High School provides access for all within walking distance of all parts of Atherton. Fred Longworth can be reached on foot but this school is in the second phase of BSF and will not have places available until 2012 at the earliest but more probably 2014. Fred Longworth is not even in the consultation process although Westleigh is which suggests that only Westleigh or Bedford will be available to Atherton children.

     Children going to these schools will need to catch at least one bus

     At a cost of £8 per week or two buses to Bedford at a cost of £16

     Per week per child. When this proposal was eventually brought out

     Into the open it was suggested by local councilors that free

     Transport could be made available but now parents are being told

     That there will be no funding for this. Is this just another example

     Of how they have been misled?

• Undermining Community Life – If schools are the heart of the community as the BSF brochure repeatedly says then where will Atherton’s heart be? In Tyldesley, Westleigh or Bedford or all of these? That is where our children will be and that is where their parents will be asked to travel to for parents’ evenings, school events and to pick up sick children. If people do not have their own transport how can they easily access the resource that the LA says will be at the heart of their community?
• Denying Local People Choices – If Fred Longworth and Westleigh are oversubscribed how can they offer places before 2012? This means that parents who do not wish to see their child’s education disrupted at the end of year 9 will have to send them to Bedford or Hindley, no choice! There is also the possibility that Westhoughton High School will look to offering  places to our children, again another transport cost, and I have anecdotal evidence that at least one parent was told to send her child to Standish and not Hesketh Fletcher. Another submitted two

Application forms for Hesketh Fletcher only to be told that they

had been lost and was then advised to look for a place elsewhere.

     Parents considering moving to allow them to send their children to

     Saint Mary’s could be left high and dry because the admittance

     criteria for Catholic schools places children of other faiths/no faith

     right at the bottom of their lists. There is already disruption at primary

    level and secondary education is becoming a post-code lottery for many

    parents.

          Why should parents have their children change schools at the end

          of year 9 with the cost of a new uniform and transport? Why

          should young people of 14 have to cope with a new environment, new 

          staff, new friends and the extra time spent travelling in addition to

          the pressures of GCSEs?

• Local Support – this is growing within the local community as parents begin to understand that they are not being treated fairly and that their views are being ignored just as the views of the staff at their consultation were ignored because they were denied the time to express their views and ask their questions. They were given an hour to consult with the LA and half of that time was taken up with a presentation. The Governors’ consultation will also be an hour. How much can be openly raised and discussed within that time?

Fred Longworth School, parents, pupils and governors are supporting our wish to remain the community school at the heart of Atherton. They do not want the proposed expansion as they are drastically short of space already. They also feel that the township of Atherton deserves its own school.

 

Concerns:

 

• The lack of effort by some local councillors in support of the school
• False impressions being given of the school and not being addressed within the local community
• The speed of the consultation process and lack of in-depth discussion
• The biased nature and the inconsistencies within the brochure produced to explain the thinking behind BSF
• The fact that the LA officer responsible for seeing BSF through the council process is also in charge of the consultation and will be writing the report
• The fact that the report will be written before the school’s results are out in August
• The fact that the improvement in the school’s results was not part of the information in the brochure
• The lack of investment in the school over the years. Hesketh Fletcher did not receive any funding under either the Coalfield Challenge or the Education Action Zone initiatives to improve local schools whilst both Westleigh and Bedford did yet the school has continued to improve.

 

Missed Opportunities;

 

At the last Director’s Briefing for Chairs of Governing Bodies we were told that the LA is looking to devolve centralised services to 5 local areas, including Social Services, Welfare, Health and Housing, to make them more accessible to people of all ages. Hesketh Fletcher could be one such centre but if the school closes and the heart of our community is elsewhere how will parents, families and the elderly access these services easily? Not everyone has a car or can afford the bus fares.

Hesketh Fletcher is literally the only school at this side of the Borough that has room to expand. It is this aspect of the move to closure that is so attractive to the LA and Manchester Diocese. The site is prime building land with a lovely aspect over the Forestry Commission land; it is worth more to the LA and the Diocese to have the site unoccupied. Hundreds of houses could be built there. The question is where will the children in these houses go to school? One local primary is moving to change its admission number to two form entry as from next year. Will the LA need to expand Fred Longworth and Westleigh even more as these numbers percolate through to secondary level.

 

For a copy of the consultation document please ring 01942 486028/29 or write to Wigan Council, CYPS, School Placement Commissioning Team, Progress House, Westwood Park Drive, Wigan, WN3 4HH

 

You can also find this document at libraries, town halls and early years establishments and it is also available on the Wigan Council Web site at:

www.wigan.gov.uk/Services/EducationLearning/Schools/SchoolsFuture 

 

If you are interested in making your feelings known then you should write to Janet Newton at the above address or send an email to schoolsforfuture@... by June 26^th or your views will not be counted.

 

It is important that everyone has their say.