My latest Press Release - re. Downside Middle School:-
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.
Cllr Lumley said,
- "Even up to a Councillors' confidential briefing on education reorganisation on 28 April - a confidentiality I respected - there was never any suggestion that there would not be a school on the Downside site;
- During all the discussions with the Downside School governors - of which I am the longest-serving one - about the proposed merger with Kitbridge Middle School there was never any suggestion that Downside would be closing and lots of supportive words about its future. This change of policy now puts that possible merger under further scrutiny as far as I am concerned;
- There have been constant assurances about the place of Downside at the heart of the Pan community when the Pan development starts. Talk about a new school, perhaps combining health and community facilities, and building on its current status as the ONLY Full Service Extended Community School on the IW. This talk now seems to have been used purely to cheat some of the community into reluctantly supporting the development;
- Young people on Pan have been waiting, and waiting, and waiting for the long-promised Multi Use Games Area (MUGA) adjacent to Downside School. It is currently promised for October, but how long will it last after July 2011 if there is no school there to manage it ? Or indeed will it still be built ? ;
- When these latest confidential plans - they will be officially released next Friday - were conveyed to Newport school governors, heads and staff last Thursday 15 May, Steve Beynon (Director of Children's Services) explained that there was no longer a need for a school on the Downside site until the developers at Pan were selling the new homes, which was now less certain due to the downturn in the housing market. However, at a Pan Development Steering Group on 29 April with the Leader and Deputy Leader of the IW Council, I was assured that the developers had no such fears. Who is being honest here, and if the new houses cannot be sold, why do we need so many new private houses as part of the development ? If they can be sold, then there is no doubt we will need a school there.
12 comments:
This isn't terrible news. The kids on Pan will have a better chance if they're mixed in with non estate children. Pan is not the place for a school, it's like segregation. Don't fight this because you think you ought to, celebrate the brighter future for the kids of Pan.
They are mixed. Over 50% of children at Downside are from outside Pan; many from outside Newport. What about schools in other estates? Presumably you think all the schools at Carisbrooke Park estate should close? Or Binstead Primary, Summerfields Primary, etc?
This whole education re-organisation has been a fiasco! Sandham Middle is to become part of Sandown High School which will be a complete joke. Roll on next May, perhaps we can loose these idiots and their idiotic ideas!
I stand corrected. This was on IW radio today, you shouldn't have let the cat out of the bag they said. Not until Friday!
I will respect IW Council confidences when they show respect to the Pan community.
Geoff - where do you get your information from? Once again this is false scaremongering from what i know.
What you know is rubbish, and I do not scaremonger - I just tell the truth. A unique quality I know when your sources are probably Tory councillors. Ask any of the non-Tory IW Councillors in Newport who had the presentation to governors copied to them last Thursday - or any of the Downside governors and the Head who were at the area meeting. Or Beynon and his henchmen. Or let me know who you are and I will email you a copy of the presentation. Don't insult me or the Pan community. The IW Council are doing a good job of that as it is with their lies and deceit.
Paddy- Geoff I was driving on the outskirts of cChristchurch when I too heard Alex Dyke and the Doc say about Downside. As you know Geoff my heart is still with Downside as it is with Pan. A lot of people have worked so hard over the years including youself in making Pan what it is today. I lived on Pan for 32 years and it is better now than ever. The school is its long lost community centre that Pan never had but was promised.So many good things happen at Downside it would be a disaster if this was to happen. You would get my backing Geoff. Paddy
The isle of wight council seem to go from one sickening display of ineptitude to the next,
with this being the latest in a long line of examples of the council simply "cherry picking" the
more the palatable sections of there policies, in an attempted to hide there glaring failures.
and yet politicians still wonder why we have a record low number of voters, perhaps if they
took the time to look around them they would see that people simply don't trust them, and does
it really come as a surprise when we have grown so accustomed to this kind of political
"backtracking".under the education reform we were led to believe that downside school would
be safe, under the pan development plan they speak of "augmenting" the current site,
now please correct me if I'm wrong but neither of these seem to so much as hint at the possibility
the school would close and be left barren for several years until we had all forgotten about it,
so they could conveniently sneak a few extra houses on a valuable piece of land at the middle
of the site
we must demand an answer on this matter immediately if we want any hope of seeing the school
survive, and i say we as I'm sure every resident of pan estate is as outraged by this as i am,
we need a clear defined plan outlaying there proposals if we are to avoid conjecture and
heresy.
if this is an example the new "innovative" pathfinder projects then i think the government needs
to go back to the drawing board, or at least fire the idiotic Neanderthal sat behind the typewriter.
Simon
I was told about Downside and Nodehill last week.
Downside HAD TO CLOSE! It's a MIDDLE SCHOOL and they are all closing.
The Council say a new Primary will open on the site. End of..
Maybe so - if you are daft enough to believe anything this Council does. But when ? Certainly not for some years. Or will it be a lower school to Medina instead ? Read the whole document - and then tell me they know what they are doing ! In which case you are daft as they are. But then I know that already.....
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