Sheffield Labour Councils Baldrick Plan to Create Mega Primary Schools, Greystones Example

By: N_Walayat

The parents of Sheffield's primary age children in ever greater numbers each year tend to find that their child has been rejected for a place at their school of choice, even for catchment area schools due to the blanket reason for rejection being that of schools being over-subscribed. However, what this masks is the underlying truth of severe cuts in the schools budget / places over many years that has been further exacerbated by the huge influx of several thousand's of east european migrant families.

In response to the exploding school places crisis, the Labour controlled Sheffield city council has decided it is finally time to act. However, whilst logic would dictate that child places should be best created in schools where the highest demand is, instead the Labour Council's baldrick plan is literally to pick the worst performing schools in a particular area and then increase its school place numbers by upto 50%, the effect of which will be even LESS choice for parents to send their children to their first choice catchment area school but instead akin to an Orwellian programme for social engineering seek to create a series of under performing pockets of 'ghetto' schools towards which children will be increasingly funneled all in the interests of engineering future vested interest Labour voters.

The list of primary schools for expansion are-

• Hallam Primary School
• Greystones Primary School
• Wybourn Primary School
• Acres Hill Community Primary School
• Tinsley Junior School

Greystones Primary School Example

Greystones Primary School is located in the Ecclesall area of Sheffield which is far from being ranked as one Sheffield's worst performing schools that according to the 2013 league table ranks 30th out of the Sheffield's 114 primary schools. However the problem is in relative terms for parents of children living far closer to other primary schools in the area such as Dobcroft (7th), Totley (2nd), Hunter's Bar (28th), Abbey Lane (20th) will now find that their child is being funneled into a worse performing enlarged Greystones school, which looks set to be a similar case for all of the schools set for expansion.

For instance parents living near Dobcroft Junior School which is where they expect their children to go will not want to end up having to take their child more than twice the distance to a worse performing Greystones Primary School, but that is where the children for Dobcroft catchment will increasingly be funneled towards.

Furthermore, the performance of these greatly expanded schools is likely to worsen, especially as these already big schools are barely able to cope with their existing number of pupils let alone after the student roll has been increased by as much as 50% as once again illustrated by Greystones Primary school where there are numerous instances of how the existing school size resolves in a lack of productivity i.e. In school review meetings parents can be kept waiting for literally hours for pre-arranged appointments of more than a month in advance, only to eventually give up and walk out. Increasing the pupils at already big over populated schools by 50% will only make such occurrences more frequent.

Communications at Greystones school are also seriously lacking where messages disappear literally into a void especially where emails are concerned, again a situation that can only worsen as the School student roll increases.

Therefore instead of funneling children into a few already too big over populated schools set for further expansion in numbers, it would be infinitely better to expand the number of places by a more manageable amount in the schools where parents actually want to send their children. For that is what logic dictates but politicians are not motivated by logic but by social engineering, thinking along the lines of what would both maintain and increase the number of Labour voters in an area so as to bolster votes at elections.

Whilst both labour and Lib-dem politicians can lay the blame for Sheffield's school places crisis on the rising birth rate and immigration (which they tend to ignore), however the following excerpt from my article of last year explains the real reason for why Sheffield has a school places crisis -

09 Jun 2013 - Sheffield School Admissions Appeals Help - What You Should Do

Sheffield School Places Chaos

The reason so many children fail to get a place at for instance a catchment area school, is as a consequence of the Labour run Sheffield City Council continuing the Liberal Democrats programme for spending deep cuts in Sheffield's education budget as the below graph illustrates that in nominal terms has seen the education budget already cut by 11% since 2010 and 17% in real terms for the year 2012-13 and with the budget for 2013-14 announced continuing the the deep cuts to 14% and 24%, (after inflation of 3% per annum).

The impact of these cuts on child places in effect reverses the picture of more than a decade earlier, when Sheffield's children could more or less have expected to receive a place at a catchment area school of their choice at the application stage, with the remaining accepted on appeal, this was as the below graph illustrates by virtue of the fact that for many years Sheffield had a surplus of 5,000 school places (about 5%). However over the past 2 years deep cuts in the budget in real terms has reversed the situation from a an estimated 5,000 surplus places to a deficit of 5,000 places as of 2012-13, i.e. a cut of 10,000 school places through school closures and reductions in the number of classes running at exiting schools, against that which were available during 2010-11, the consequences of which is that schools are being effectively stuffed full to the rafters with the number of children per class now far exceeding the recommended guidelines for maximum class sizes which is resulting in the lack of school places at catchment area schools.

The consequences for 2013 school places has been that many families face a crisis of failure to attain a place in catchment area schools even if siblings attend the school due to an estimated deficit of 8,000 school places for 2013-13 which is resulting in children being placed at schools right across the city thus making it impossible for children with siblings to be in receipt of an effective education service that parents are still forced to pay for through high council and payroll taxes.

The consequences of this is not just lack of school places at schools of choice but that ALL existing schools will be stuffed full to rafters with children they have no room for with severe consequences in terms of the quality of teaching and social consequences in terms of breakdown in school systems including the the behaviour of students, and ultimately in the performance of schools as all schools are likely to see a worsening in the attainment levels of their students.

Source and comments: http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article45687.html

By Nadeem Walayat

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