Letter to Editor, County Press - Warning to parents on access to local secondary schools

Dear Editor

Parents - please read this letter. If your child is entering Year 4 (or younger) did you know that he or she may not get into your local secondary school in three years time?

Academies Enterprise Trust (AET) is proposing that all the new secondary schools on the Island will be Academies. They are also proposing to have a banding system for admitting children into the schools. This will mean that if there are too many children wanting to attend a school it is likely that not all local children will be admitted to their local school. For example Carisbrooke School will be admitting 270 (they currently admit 350), Medina will be reduced from 317 to 270 and Sandown will be reduced from 418 to 270. I believe lots of parents are blissfully unaware of these proposals. I urge you to check on the Council's website www.iwight.com and look at the AET proposals. Consultation by the Council ends on 20th August - less than a week away.

Academies are funded directly from the Government which will give the new schools more money which will mean less for the rest of the school system on the Island. This may well mean that more primary schools will close in the future due to lack of money in the system. Four year olds will have to be bussed to bigger schools. I ask myself whether there will be any rural schools open in ten years time if the Council decides to award AET the contract to run the schools.

The Government seems hell bent on schools becoming Academies; the Conservatives want to extend the Academy programme to include Primary schools. Liberal Democrats believe local schools should be run by their local communities.

Yours sincerely

Jill Wareham

Liberal Democrat Prospective Parliamentary Candidate