The closure of an inner-city Bristol primary school is set to be confirmed by council leaders next week. A report to cabinet on Tuesday, February 7, recommends approving a request from governors to shut St Barnabas, in Montpelier, at the end of August because of dwindling pupil numbers and a lack of funding.
It said all the children would be guaranteed a place elsewhere and that the 22 staff would be either redeployed or made redundant. Parents have campaigned to keep it open and raised a 1,700-name petition, with several fearing youngsters with SEND will struggle to find a suitable mainstream alternative.
The Bristol City Council cabinet report said education chiefs had explored other options, including joining up with a nearby academy or reclassifying the 150-year-old school as specialist provision but that none were feasible. It said: “St Barnabas CofE Primary School has been operating well below capacity for a number of years and the school governors feel the school is unsustainable with the funding available from these low pupil numbers.
Read more: St Barnabas primary school in Bristol set to close despite parents' campaign to keep it open
“The governors asked the council to consider the future of the school. Bristol City Council has been working with the school governors and the Diocese of Bristol to look at options including possible academisation. The low pupil numbers mean that it has not been possible to identify anything that would offer a secure future for the school.”
The report said pupil numbers in the city had been falling since 2016, leaving many surplus places in primary schools, and that the proportion was particularly high in the Ashley and Lawrence Hill school place planning area, which includes St Barnabas, with one in five spaces forecast to be empty in the 2023/24 reception year, it said. The report said there were only 56 pupils now at St Barnabas out of a capacity of 210, including only six youngsters in year three.
“Cost saving measures have already been taken including combining year groups so that they can share a teacher,” it said. “All available reserves have been used and governors have not been able identify any other savings that would be sufficient to keep the school sustainable.
“School budgets are directly related to the number of children on roll and it is inevitable that the school budgets will be challenging with lower pupil numbers. Governors have considered the issues and options available and do not feel able to provide an appropriate standard of education for the future.”
The report said the feedback from a four-week consultation period before Christmas had been taken into consideration. Parents told the authority that the school had played a big role in the community for many years and that it provided excellent support for children with special needs such as autism because of the small classes and high pupil-to-staff ratio.
But the report said: “Options including federation and academisation were explored, however due to uncertainty of any increase in demand for places could not be taken forward. Rules around changing the nature of a school mean that it is not possible to redesignate a mainstream primary school to become a special school.
“If the proposal is approved, parents will be asked to name up to three preferences of alternative schools. Where places are available, they will be offered.
“We can guarantee that all pupils will receive an offer of an alternative school place. There are nine teachers and 13 support staff employed at the school and the local authority will ensure all affected employees are entered into the council’s redeployment scheme to find suitable alternative work.
“Any employee with two or more years’ service who does not secure a new role within the authority will be entitled to a redundancy payment.” The report said there were no current plans for the site and that future use would need to be agreed by the council and the Church of England Diocese which jointly own it.
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