Appendix 1B(i) Transcripts of Heathcote public meetings

07-06-07 Heathcote public meeting 1 

  Speaker key MS Unknown Male SpeakerFS Unknown Female SpeakerPD Pauline DavisLM Lindsay MartinJD Justin DonovanPD Pauline DavisJT Jo TwineS Student  LM [asides] Okay, Beryl, thank you very much. [asides] Very nice to see you all this evening; this is rather a formal arrangement, but we’ll try and keep it relatively informal or as much as we can. And you might wonder why we’re such a large hall and we’ve got so few people in it; why haven’t we had larger numbers? And, I think, our view and our experience and certainly the experience that I think Accent would share is that where the meeting’s of a modest size everybody gets a chance to make their point or to ask their question. In the past when we used to run meetings with hundreds of people at a time, sometimes people spent the entire two hours with their hands up and were never reached simply because there wasn’t enough time. So although it means that we do more evenings and there are more meetings I think it means that you get more of a chance to get your question asked, or your point made. [asides]

So this is our agenda for this evening, I’m introducing [unclear] and then we’ll talk about Building Schools for the Future which is the context within our review this evening is taking place. My colleague, Pauline, will talk about [unclear] and what our proposals are and then we’ll go into a question and answer session which we’ll keep as much time for as we can.

So, who’s here from County Council? Can I introduce first Justin Donovan on the far left who is Deputy Director [unclear] and Chief Education Officer. I’m Lindsay Martin, I’m Head of School Planning and the Programme for Building Schools for the Future. And my colleague Pauline Davis, Area Planning Manager who [unclear]. And we would all like to answer your questions when we get to the panel part of the evening.

Probably none of us, certainly not me, are old enough to remember education when it was like this, maybe 100 years ago. Some of us may even remember education when we used things like this, a slide rule, I certainly had a slide rule when I was at school; but I’m very old. I bet many people remember four figure tables and what they were for. Some of us were around when all you had was calculators, or at least when calculators were introduced. There was

1

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a new thing called a calculator; there were going to be cheap apparently, cheaper than a pair of shoes; I didn’t believe it at the time.

These are what many of our schools which were built after the war looked like. This is Heathcote, it’s in Hertfordshire and it’s fairly typical of the schools built after the war, in the large expanse of school building; the original buildings were built between the early 50s and the late 60s. And then in the 70s and subsequently many schools had additional blocks added onto them. [asides] This is an idea of what schools can look like, what school building can look like. They can be inspirational, they can be exciting, they can motivate pupils; and that’s what Building Schools for the Future is all about.

It’s the government’s major investment in secondary schools and special schools [unclear] all the young people. And the government is spending just over £2¼ million per annum to achieve that. And Stevenage is getting the first lump of that cash for Hertfordshire. It’s the first time that we’ve received money under that programme for investment in buildings; about 145 to £150 million in total; 12 million of which is specifically for ICT, Information Communications Technology, as an indicator of how important that is. So this is a very exciting opportunity for everybody, for all people in whichever school they are now in.

This is an exciting opportunity for the future and it’s vital therefore for us to get that right; it’s vital for us to spend that sort of money in the best possible way because it’s a one off opportunity, it’s a one off chance. This is the process that we as a local authority have to go through in order to get the money for Stevenage. We have a process over the next few months, running up until September, because if the government is giving money; it doesn’t give it in a sense without strings, it doesn’t give it without the need to meet certain targets and provided certain information. That’s quite understandable because it’s a large amount of money which is involved. So we have to do these things, we have to set up business case and eventually by 2009 start to build.

That seems a long time, and it is a long time, it’s more than two years away from now, but it is a lot of money and a lot of careful planning has to go into this expenditure. The really important thing though about this is it’s not just about shining buildings such as I showed you on the slide. It’s primarily about transforming teaching and learning opportunities in our schools. It has to start from the vision of what sort of education we as a educated community wants to provide. We need to focus on excellent teaching and effective learning. We need to focus on the commitment to raise attainment, aspirations and participation; and we need schools which lead and serve the community with a range of public services and community provisions. To promote healthy lifestyles, participate in sport, specialisms, so that we can meet the needs and aspirations of all the young people in the town; no matter what their particular specialism or their interest is.

We need state of the art information communications technology, hence the large amount of money allocated for that purpose. So that we can provide personalised study, we can provide community access for learning progress;

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and we need light, attractive and flexible building. If we’re going to be buildings they’re not only for your children, but your children’s children, for many generations. These buildings have functioned for 50 years or more, we expect new buildings to function for at least that period of time. When we try to predict what education or teaching and learning will be like in 40 years time, we need to create spaces and buildings which are as respectable as possible to accommodate change in the needs.

As a County Council we haven’t come up with that vision on our own. We have been through already a process of consultation with stakeholders in the town which includes schools, both heads and governors, community organisations, district councillors, county councillors, a range of interested parties and we’ve also consulted them about how we might deliver that vision; how to turn that vision into a reality.

And the stakeholders of the group have agreed that we need a smaller number of mainstream schools with larger [unclear] and more specialisms. Large enough to be efficient, flexible and provide that range of opportunities while not being so large that they can’t support relationships between students and staff. Stakeholders agree that we need a closer link between mainstream and specialist schools. There are three specialist schools [unclear] which have secondary age pupils and are therefore eligible to receive funding under Building Schools for the Future Programme. So this is an opportunity to invest in them and [unclear]. It also provides us with the opportunity to [unclear] is already very good, it’s one of the best in the country. But we can improve both and we have the capital, investment money to enable that to happen. And we need improved facilities for the education and support centre, that is the children who are not educated in a school at all. Having set out that background context of the funding which is available [unclear] to review the pattern of schooling that we now have as part of that process. [asides]

PD Hello, and good evening. As Lindsay said, why do we need a review, why can’t we use this money and just stay as we are? Well, I think it was explained to you that the government expects alongside of this major investment in the town’s secondary age children that there will be a transformation of education, a step change, in what’s going on for young people of this town. And investment is simply a means to realise that vision, and it’s really important that this once in a lifetime opportunity for Stevenage is done well and the money is used wisely; because we won’t get another opportunity like this. And we need to make sure, therefore, that we get the right number of school places in the right locations for your [unclear].

So what’s happened so far? As Lindsay said, we had a review process, it started in January, and we engaged with those key stakeholders that you mentioned and discussed not only the vision for Stevenage, what will young people need, what schools and aptitudes will they need in the future? But what sort of school organisation is required to be able to deliver that in the future? So discussions with the stakeholders happened over the year and they joined with us, they proposed and we added to that list some options for

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the number of schools, the types of schools, the size of schools that will best give them that vision. That long list was evaluated against four tests, which I’ll show you in a moment, and then our Director decided whether or not and which of those options we wanted to consult you about to see what your views were about those proposals.

And that’s why we’re here tonight, this is the second public meeting at Stevenage we’re having; you’ll see in your consultation documents that there are a range of meetings being held in the town over the next few weeks. I won’t read them out to you, I’ll just give you a few moments to look at those, but they are the issues that our Director will be concerned that we get right in these proposals.

So why do we need change in [unclear]? Apart from one or two larger schools in the vision, we need to make sure we’ve got the right number of places. The government advises us when we’re planning and using Building Schools for the Future monies that we look 10 years ahead to how many students we think we will need to cater for so that we’re not building something in a couple of years time that will immediately not be enough to cater for the number of students that there will be.

So we have a changing pattern of demand in our plan. We’re planning for 48 forms of entry, that’s more than we have at the moment. We have between 43 and 44 forms of entry available in your schools at the moment. So there’s going to be an increase and that 48 forms of entry, and for those of you who are not sure about what a form of entry is, that’s 30 pupils into a year group. That 48 forms of entry includes a 10% margin to allow you as parents to be able to express a preference for another school other than your local school. So we always try to keep a margin available so that you have some choice and you’re able to express preference. You will probably know as well as I do that what we had is an uneven distribution of schools within this town. They are not the same size and they are unevenly distributed and we know that parents in this town are frustrated at not being able to get into what they consider to be their local school or another school of their choice.

We had a lot of new housing development in the town and there will continue to be housing development in the town, and that’s shifting the balance of the population from the South to the north. The new housing developments [unclear] all of those areas are changing the shape of this town. And you will all know that a new development is planned for the west of Stevenage and is part of that [unclear] and the negotiations around that. When that development comes on speed there will be a new secondary school to support that community.

So this is your town, you know it intimately; this is the west of Stevenage that I was just talking about. You will see, up in the north, we’ve got a large area where there aren’t any schools in the immediate vicinity. And schools that people want to go to are not their nearest school. They might be their nearest school in distance terms and a lot of other children get into those schools before they do. And so you will see from our proposals, and you will see from

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this slide, that there is a site within the consultation document at the north of that community which [unclear]. We have a couple of schools very close together in the north and a couple of schools very close together in the south. So we know we’ve got this uneven distribution and your town will change in shape; this is also projected in and around these areas here.

So they’re in the consultation document, but I will just clarify them for you. What are the County Council’s proposals? Well, proposal one is our preferred option, we’re clear about that, that’s what the County Council prefer. But this is a consultation and we really do want to hear what you have to say about it. And that proposal is a pattern of 8FE mainstream schools, we go back to that 30 places per year group, that’s 240 children entering the school in each year. And mainstream schools are less than that, and I expect that for many of you here to night, the most important thing on that slide is, as Lindsay said, this pattern of the fewer larger schools. And our proposal is that Heathcote School would close in that proposal.

There is another proposal, proposal two, and I can explain this. That is a pattern of larger schools, it’s not our preferred option and we’ve put it there because one or two of the sites at this point in time there is a small risk because we don’t yet own the land, but we are confident that we can achieve that. So at this point in time we feel in the spirit of openness and honesty with you, we need to tell you that and just say, if anything goes wrong with either of those sites, we will end up with one school fewer and the remaining schools would need to be larger.

So let me just clarify that because the important thing for most of you here is that even under this proposal, Heathcote School continues to be a proposal for closure. And why we’ve got Marriotts School on the Thomas Alleyne School as either or is directly related to the sites that they are going to occupy. Our proposal is to move Thomas Alleyne School in the north to the new site in the north. So should anything happen about that site, and we’re not expecting that to, then that school won’t be able to move. And maybe we’ll be able to create two large schools next to each other in the north of the town, and so that school would need to close. Equally there is a part of the land next to the Marriotts School site that we will need in order to expand that school. And should anything go wrong with that, and again, we don’t anticipate that happening, then that school would need to close and the other schools become larger; so that’s why they’re either or.

These proposals are not just about mainstream schools, the Building Schools for the Future Programme also provides investment for all secondary age students [unclear] and that means those at special schools as well. And so there are some proposals relating to special schools. For Lonsdale School which is the special school for children with physical and neurological impairments the proposal is to either keep the school as it is and do some improvements to it on the existing site or to relocate that to either the Barclay site or the Marriotts School site; so that the two schools work alongside each other and are located on the same campus.

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The proposal relating to Greenside School which is closer to home for this area anyway, the proposal is that the secondary age children in Greenside School have accommodation prepared for them alongside the Barnwell School in the South. And that the existing buildings for Greenside School will be used primarily for the primary aged children within that school; but that some of their specialist facilities continue to be used by some of the secondary aged children.

For The Valley School, which is the school for children with moderate learning difficulties, and we acknowledge that some of those students have more complex needs as well. We’re generally wanting to get people’s views about a range of options, the spectrum of ideas for that school. It could stay as it is or on the bottom it could close and the students be provided for within mainstream schools in special mediums.

And somewhere in-between that spectrum there are a number of stages, for example, the school could relocate onto either Marriotts’ site or the Barclay site just in the same ways I’ve explained for Lonsdale School. Or there could be another way of doing it, it could be that the school continues, and the students are enrolled at the school but that they are located on mainstream school sites. And the school, the staff of the school, the senior management and all of the staff of the school support those students professionally in those mainstream schools. The children would remain on the role and their exam results would be part of that school’s results. So there’s a whole spectrum for that school [unclear].

Let’s talk about transition arrangements, they are always the most interesting and most difficult to face. Certainly those schools where there are building plans and works to be undertaken, this is Building Schools for the Future, all students, staff, parents and governors will be fully involved in developing those school plans. It’s not that somebody’s giving it to you, it’s that you’re joining to make sure that what’s developed is something of a stronghold. The works will be planned carefully to minimise disruption although we have to acknowledge that any building work has a degree of disruption; it’s how well it’s planned and how well we manage to minimise that disruption. And where we’re building new school buildings we will make sure that obviously no child moves into those buildings until they’re complete; so there will be stability around that.

Now the arrangements for closing schools, we realise that closing a school is one of the most difficult and important decisions that a local authority and community can make. And will need some very careful planning, and not all the questions will be answered today because we do want to work with the people involved to make sure that the transition plans really do work for you. So we will handle them very carefully and sensitively and we really will work hard to ensure that confidence in the quality of the teaching and learning that goes on in the schools due to close can be maintained.

So the staff we will involve and we are involving already school management, staff, governors and their representative organisation in developing those

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transition plans. Quite often they raise more questions at first than the answers that are there. But by raising the questions we work together to come up with a package and a plan that really works well.

This isn’t just an issue for the schools that may close, this is a town-wide issue. We are not talking about fewer students in the future; we’re talking about expanding schools elsewhere and all the headteachers at Stevenage are working with us to make sure that whatever happens to one of the schools or more than one of the schools in the town that everybody shares in with that responsibility for making those transition times work. And if it comes to it, the Authority has an excellent record in working with individual members of staff to affect re-deployment into other positions. We have almost 100% record in doing that, we work extremely hard to make sure that that can happen.

Back to the students, we’ll work with the schools concerned to make sure that the transition plans for students are coherent and have meaning and confidence. And for those children who will have to move to other schools, and will have to bear some expense of additional uniforms the County Council will make a contribution towards that. In some cases, what schools do is they work with parents and they buy in bulk for students so they get better economies of scale and you get more clothing out of the allowances made.

So we’re getting to the point of the evening which is really to hear what you have to say. But before we do that, let’s just remind you about how the decision making process happens. First of all, this is a consultation, we’re really do want to know what you have to say; and clearly you will make your views known to us tonight. This is being recorded and the recordings will be available on the County Council’s website. But you could also send the response forms at the back of the consultation document or communicate us online by email or whichever way you want; the important thing is that we get to hear what you want to say.

The other thing is and what will happen is that it will be our responsibility to report back to County Council on what you say. We have to analyse those responses, we have to analyse the issues and we have to discuss those issues with the County Councils. But what we’re doing, and I want to assure you about this, is every single one of your responses will be made available for all County Councillors to see first hand, so that they get a real sense of what you’re saying and not any filter that any officer is putting onto it. So the process as we’re going through it, the public consultation, this exercise finishes on 7th August. So it’s important that you make sure that your views are known to us by that date.

The Education Panel, which is a panel of the cabinet of the County Council, will meet on 3 October to consider your views. And it will give the Cabinet of the County Council, which is meeting on 15th October, its recommendations, its suggestions for the way forward. The decision making body of the County Council is that Cabinet Meeting on 15th October. And for those of you who are interested both the Education Panel and the Cabinet of the County Council are meetings which are open to the public. They’re not public meetings but

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you can attend and you can listen to what’s going on. If the County Council decides to proceed with any of the proposals in the consultations we will then move on to what is known as statutory notices. They’re pieces of legal framework which we have to publish in the newspaper for a period of six weeks during which anybody can object. And if we have objections then those objections have to go back again to the County Council to be considered again before a final decision is taken on those proposals. [asides]

FS I notice under the slide, the shared vision, it states that you’re looking to offer a diverse range of specialisms including vocational ones. So I wonder why you’ve selected an engineering specialist school to shut?

JD Perhaps if I can deal with that, Justin Donovan, as introduced, Deputy Director and Chief Education Officer. What we’re trying to do in terms of the town as a whole is to make sure that between the schools across the town we’ve got as many specialisms in vocational and other, but mainly vocational areas, as possible. Now, Stevenage is already leading the way on this nationally. It’s one of only 10 areas in the whole of the country that have been successful in bidding for the specialist diplomas which are in vocational areas which start in 2008. This will be one of only 10 areas in the country in 2008 where all five of those that are being produced are available. So it’s really very important to us, and the idea is, each school will have a number of specialisms which will be inextricably linked through to the college and from the college to the university. So that when young people are opting into vocational programmes, they’re opting into the possibility of two, four, six or seven year programmes, not a one-off course.

Now, in terms of the specialisms which are available in this school and others, we will make sure by the time the new pattern of schools is in place that all the specialisms available are spread across the schools. You need to bear in mind that we’re talking here four or five years down the line and every four years or so the school specialisms have to be re-designated. The idea of specialisms is that they’re available for the young people who are in the school at the time and they follow that cohort through. So when we get to the point where the school would close the specialisms in the school would have to come up for re-designation in that period anyway. And what we’ll do is work with the schools and the governing bodies to make sure those specialist courses are available, not just for those individual schools but collectively so that the children can work between those schools in that pattern. I hope that answers that question? I wasn’t sure who it came from. [asides]

FS Just a quick question, if you started all this in January why did we not get a copy of the proposal before we choose what school we wanted our child to go to?

JD Yes, I was talking to a parent earlier on, of course, all parents will be concerned. I’m most concerned about all parents, but the parents who’ve chosen this school to come to from year seven, from September, because you’re quite right, parents have made that decision before these proposals were published. The problem we have is that the admissions arrangements

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and the statutory arrangement for consultation don’t line up. They have two different cycles and they haven’t lined up; and what we will do is make sure that we talk to the parents who have opted to come here for year seven. I think there’s a meeting in July and we’re proposing to ask the school if officers could come along to that meeting and talk particularly to those parents about that issue. Because what we want to do is to make sure the parents who continue to opt into Heathcote in the near future understand that when they opt into the school that we won’t disrupt the children’s programme during through key stage four. So if the children do move to a new building and a brand new school it will be at the end and beginning of key courses. For the year seven children next year, that’s going to be the most problematic and what I will say to you is, we will make arrangements to make sure that that disruption is at a transition point and it’s not halfway through the GCSE exams. And that’s what we’ll work with if these proposals go through. But I accept the point, the timing is really unhelpful to the parents; and I have to say the headteacher and the governing body and the chair of governors have made that point to us very forcefully along with others; it’s a fair point. It’s simply that the cycles don’t line up, you have to cut into the cycle somewhere.

FS I don’t actually accept that the consultation programme did not line up, I think that’s pretty poor. I think the reason we weren’t told about the school closures before October, before we made our choices, was that nobody would have applied for Heathcote; that’s the reason we weren’t told, it’s not that the consultation process didn’t line up.

JD Well, all I can do is say, I understand the point you’re making and I understand your suspicion; but it’s not the case. We have a process which has been described by Pauline which has to start and end somewhere. And we have an admissions process which runs over a period of a year. I accept the point that they’re not well-aligned, that’s pretty difficult; but what we haven’t done is deliberately set out to make that difficult for you. But I do understand it has left parents with a difficulty and we have a responsibility to the parents who’ve selected Heathcote. My point to you is that your children will still be coming to a very good and improving school. [overtalking] And we, as an authority, will commit to make sure that we work with the school to make sure the school continues because we are talking here about a long-term programme; and for most of the children who are currently here they will have left the school before things change. So we will work hard with the school to make sure it maintains the really good programme it’s already go in place; but I understand your concerns. [overtalking]

FS I was just going to say that it you’ve not learned anything from the Collenswood closure and Heathcote will go the same way then none of that will happen.

JD You need to bear in mind that these are very different. I really wouldn’t want people to think this is a similar situation to Collenswood, let’s be absolutely frank about this. No, it’s not, we intervened in Collenswood because we felt the standards in Collenswood were too low, there weren’t improving and as an authority we’d done everything we could to turn the

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school around; and along with the school hadn’t pulled that off. Here what we’re talking about is a good school, an improving school with good teaching. What we’re trying to do is create a pattern of schools across the town for the next decade or so. And the problem is that looking at the changing shape of the town we don’t need two schools right next to each other in the south. We do need a school in the north and we don’t need two schools here. And so the idea of the closure of Heathcote is to create that pattern of schools across the town, not because we have concerns about Heathcote, we don’t, it’s a good school. [overtalking]

FS Hello, unfortunately I’ve been in a position now where my children have been in Collenswood and it closed. They did not experience the help that you just promised; I can guarantee that. You are now disrupting my child’s education again, the LEA is supposed to provide a continuous education; when are we going to see that?

JD First of all, I’m not sure I want to re-run Collenswood, but as you raised it, the children who were at Collenswood who are now at Barnwell have better teaching, they’re in a better environment, the behaviour is better and the standards of the work of those children has improved. [asides] What I wouldn’t want you to do is see this in the same context as Collenswood; that would be very unfair to the staff, the governing body and most importantly the children of Heathcote. The question of why close a good school is a fair question; and basically what we’re saying is, as an authority we’re looking to create a pattern of schools which is right for the town as a whole for the future. And what we’re saying is since these schools were built after the war the residential shape of the town has changed, people don’t live where they used to live and the nature of education has improved and moved on. So what we’re trying to do is create spectacular buildings in the right place and if you look at where the children live and where the housing developments are in the future we won’t need two schools here and therefore we need to close either this school or Barnwell. [overtalking]

FS Hello, I’ve got a number of questions actually. The first one I wanted to ask, if this is a proposal and what would people need to do to make sure that that stayed a proposal? Is there anything we can do to make sure it stays a proposal?

JD In terms of process, what we’ve done is, whenever we have a review like this is to be very clear about what our proposals are and whether officers have a preferred option. What we’re saying to you is, we’ve looked at this in real detail, absolute depth and what we’re after here for the town as a whole is a curriculum model of progression right through and into university. And what we’re saying to you is the preferred option from officers is the model we’ve come up with. Now if a pressure group, if you like, from Heathcote want to change those options and change the proposals you need to come up with a better option. You need to make a compelling case, but that compelling case, to be frank with you, is not said in an emotional point of we love our school and we want to keep it open. That’s a fair position to take, I’m talking about a compelling case which gives us a better pattern and a number and position of

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the school throughout the town. So if you’re asking my advice on what you should do if you want to reduce these proposals, I’m saying to you, to be frank, more than just saying, you don’t like these proposals because the status quo is not a viable option. In fact, to be blunt with you, I suspect, I don’t work for the government, so I don’t know, but if we just kept the same buildings and spent money on them, and the same schools, we would not get the money because it doesn’t stack up. What the government is saying to us is, if you want this money you have to look at a pattern of schools across the town which makes sense 20, 30, 40 years down the line; and I’m sorry to say these buildings don’t. They might well have made sense just after the war, but they don’t make sense now. So my straight answer to you is, what you need to do is, if you like, have other proposals which meet the objectives but which are different to this; and then I would say we would definitely look at those.

FS [asides] Can I ask about parental choice? We chose Heathcote because it’s a smaller school, it’s very much a community school and I don’t have to say it’s a good school because you’ve already said that yourselves. What happens to parental choice? And the other thing I’d like to know is as parents all we’re told from day one with our kids is smaller is better. Smaller classes are better, smaller schools are better; you are pushing us down a route where this going to be 2,500 kids by the time it joins up; that is a massive school. Educationally how can you possibly be an individual in that; how big is it now with the whole of Collenswood as well, 1,500? What are we, nearly 1,000? 2,500, that’s simple maths. [overtalking]

LM That’s not what we’re proposing.

FS That is what you’re proposing because you’re proposing mixing us with Barnwell which is where Collenswood is; where are we all going to go then, it doesn’t stack up?

JD Okay, good point. Basically, in terms of parental choice, I think it’s a very fair criticism, let’s be frank about it, when we make proposals like this there are down sides to them; I absolutely accept that. Our view is for the future this is an exciting opportunity for the town, it will move standards forward and take schools on; but you’re quite right, there is a downside. And one of the down sides of having fewer schools it absolutely does reduce parental choice; if you’ve got fewer schools to choose from then parental choice; that’s a fair point and I accept that. What I’m saying to you though is that we will make sure there is a sufficient surplus across the town so that even though there will be fewer schools there is still some parental choice. Now choice is the wrong word in the sense of when schools are full, they’re full, and we have to have admission arrangements to fill our schools up. And there might well be some parents as is the case now, that will be disappointed. What we are saying though is the schools that we’re creating are bigger and therefore there’s more space in them and there is surplus place. And we think, unlike now where the schools are not in the right places in terms of the shape of the town, when we have schools located where people live and they’re all new buildings, all connected up to the same key

Appendix 1B(i)

stage four programme, all heading to the same sixth form arrangements which is what this model suggests; parents are more likely to select the school nearest to where they live and therefore the schools will grow into community schools. But I accept the point, if we have one fewer school or possibly even two if we’re unable to get the land then that does reduce parental choice; but we will keep parental choice in the system. In terms of the size of the school they will be nowhere near that size, if you look at eight form entry they will get nowhere near 2000 pupils. We need to bear in mind that an eight form entry school is not a big school, it just isn’t a big school. Outside of Hertfordshire our schools are small compared to most authorities; we do have some large schools. But outside of the authority eight form, ten form entry schools are the common pattern and the common pattern because it doesn’t have a big impact at key stage three, I absolutely accept that. But at key stage four, what it does is generate enough children at key stage four to make vocational courses financially viable for schools because they’re much more expensive as you can imagine than say, English and History. By having more children you can have a much more flexible budget, you can invest in those programmes. Stevenage schools are already doing that and do it really well, but we’d like to expand those programmes outside. The other thing it does is generate sixth forms which are also financially viable; at the moment if you’ve got a sixth form which is relatively small and a number of Stevenage schools do, what they do to run them is to take money out of, and to be brutal about it, out of the mainstream school to fund them. Now I think that’s money well spent because I like to see sixth forms in schools; that’s a good characteristic. But by having larger sixth forms what you do is actually have them financially self-sustaining. So what I’m saying to you is eight form or even ten form entry schools are not big. They are bigger than the current schools but they are not particularly big.

FS So basically it’s about finance then really. [overtalking]

JD About 1,400 children.

FS It is 1,400 now as it stands? [overtalking]

MS [unclear]

JD No, we’re not planning to do that.

FS What are you going to do with this then?

JD We’re not planning to bring Heathcote and Barnwell together.

PD Right, what I want to do is go back to that slide if I may; I think it’s important. [asides] What we’re trying to do is to create a better geographical spread of places to meet the communities that will need those places. And so as I said in the south of the town we’ve got two schools virtually next door to each other. Not all the places are full; we have in the north two schools next door to each other and we’re seeking to redress that situation too. We have a community that doesn’t have a school near it and we have some different

Appendix 1B(i)

sized schools around this area. So what we’re trying to do is to create a better geographical spread of schools that are larger, that have enough places for people who live in those areas who will want to go to them with enough room for parental preference to be expressed and some movement. So we’re not proposing an amalgamation of Barnwell and Heathcote, this isn’t that; that’s not our proposal. What we’re saying is, we need one fewer school in the town and you may say, well, why pick on our school; it’s because of the proximity of two schools here. [overtalking] I can understand why you might say that but the school that remains in the South, at the size it will be will need to use both of your school sites to sustain and to meet all the DFES regulations for a school of that size. So the school in the South will operate over both this school site and the Barnwell School site in the South of the town.

FS [overtalking]

PD Because Justin’s just explained to you the vision for larger schools, not too smaller schools running side by side. It will be much better to have one larger school that can take all of those opportunities, all those curricular opportunities, all those vocation education opportunities for the future.

FS [overtalking]

PD Let’s think through the timescale on this.

FS My child is in year six, she’s coming to this school in September, in 2011 she’s going to be in this building, where is she going to be when the schools closes? [overtalking]

JD I just need to answer. [overtalking] I’m just going to try and answer one person at a time. In this area there will be Barnwell, there will be Nobel and there will be Marriotts . [overtalking] And the children who are currently here will transfer to the newer larger schools, that’s what we’re proposing. [overtalking] And what I was saying to you earlier is for the children who will be coming here, it’s the year six children who have decided to come here in year seven and the current year seven children who are most likely to be disrupted. And what we will do is talk to this school, the surrounding schools and the parents of those children to make sure if they are going to transfer to a new school parents know what those schools are well in advance, they don’t move in until the buildings are completely finished and they don’t move during the key stage programmes; so they can move to new, complete schools and start programmes from scratch.

FS [overtalking] [unclear]

JD The earliest [overtalking] time the new schools would be ready, the buildings complete would be 2011 if there’s no slippage in the programme. What we’re planning to do is to invest the money in this part of the town first because we probably don’t have the capacity to get all the buildings going at the same time. So what we’re going to do is do the work on the school sites

Appendix 1B(i)

in the south of the town so that the children are affected here if they join the school and after these proposals go through will get first access to the new buildings. But you’re quite right, if your children are currently in year seven they might find some disruption at key stage four and that’s on the programme. [overtalking] Well, that’s if the programme is delivered on time which we hope it will; and the children in year six coming up are certainly very likely… and that’s why we will work with those parents in particular to give some assurances of what the long-term destinations are. [asides]

FS You made one dreadful statement there, you said, it doesn’t matter because it won’t affect anybody else. What about the people who’ve got siblings that are going come up; they’re going to have to go to two different sites because you can’t keep one site. We’ve been here before with Featherstone Wood, we had to fight you then, we’ll fight you now.

JD I haven’t said it doesn’t matter; let me just finish the point. I do absolutely understand that what we’re proposing here frankly are for the benefit of children who are currently actually much younger than in years five and six because when the children, for example from our infant schools and early junior schools come through, the building’s complete, the pattern’s in place and people know what they’re doing. We absolutely accept the point that if we’re creating this pattern of schools over a four or five year period then there will be disruption for children currently in the system. And we’re sorry about that and what we’re going to do is two things; first of all try and minimise the disruption as best we can by only having children moving into buildings which are complete; so they’ve not living on building sites. And also doing all we can to avoid those children moving during a programme, either a key stage three or a key stage four. But if you’re saying to me in order for us to create this longer-term pattern of schools, it is going to be disruptive to children who are currently in the system then that’s a fair point and what we’ll do is try and minimise and manage it; but there will be some disruption, I accept that point. [asides]

FS Right, can you tell me, are we knocking down the south side of Stevenage? Why are we moving the schools then; why are we making our children travel further and further to school? How are you going to get my child from this side of town to Nobel, Marriotts , Thomas Alleyne, Barclay, wherever he happens to end up?

JD Yeah, it is true also that if you have fewer schools to go to and they’re bigger there are some children that will have to travel further. For some children ironically they will be closer because of the way there’s so much movement around the town. If you look at where children live and which schools they go to, there’s quite a lot of movement; but it is true that some children will have to travel further; that’s quite right. What we would do is we are currently going through a transport review, a home to school transport review. And what we’ve done is delay that by a few months so that we can look at the outcome of these proposals, what impact that has on the travel needs of the new pattern of schools and build that into the review. So we’ve held the whole of the County wide review back partly, not only, but mainly, so

Appendix 1B(i)

we can take into account the outcomes of this review. [overtalking] And what will happen if children live outside of a three mile area, if they have to travel more than three miles they will get free transport. If they’re less than three miles but we agree with you that the route is not safe then they also get free transport. And under the new education inspection’s bill which has just come through we will also be extending free transport for less than three miles but to families on low income. But that’s not something we have planned just to do, that’s a national development, so some [overtalking] children will have to travel further than they are now, that’s true. [overtalking] And if it’s further than three miles they will get free transport. And what we will also do is work with the local bus networks to see whether the current network system needs to change slightly at certain times in the day to get children from one place to another. [overtalking]

FS But we’re still going to have to pay them, aren’t we? My child has a 10 minute walk to school now, will have to get two buses to school and I’ll have to pay for that as well.

JD At the moment that is the case, yes. It remains the case that it’s the parents’ responsibility to get their children to school and there are arrangements in place for us where it becomes our responsibility.

FS [unclear] but you’re taking his school away.

JD Yes, I understand that but what I’m saying to you, the point you’re making I’m agreeing with. If your child has to travel further but it’s not as far as three miles then that is your responsibility.

FS There’s four primary schools on this side of town and only one secondary school.

JD Yes, that’s correct.

FS So there is no parental choice then, is there?

JD Well, as I said before, there is less parental choice by removing one school but we will leave surplus across all the schools in the town to make sure there is still parental choice. And the fact that the schools will be in real communities over a period of time we’re hoping more parents will send their children to their closest school rather than at the moment having to travel further.

FS [unclear]

JD Okay, It’s not a proposal I would want, it would be a very large school. I don’t know if you meant that seriously or not but at key stage four, there is a serious point to it in that the nature of the schools that we will leave behind will have a formal partnership tying them all together; so that at key stage four and particularly in the sixth form children will have a much wider choice of programmes at that age. At the moment that happens really quite well, but it

Appendix 1B(i)

happens as an informal arrangement between schools. What we’re proposing to do is capture that as a formal partnership and get schools to sign up to it so that if staff move on or there are different governing bodies those programmes can continue to run and will be funded. [overtalking] [asides]

JD The extent to which John Henry Newman works within the partnership depends on the school. It’s a voluntarily aided Roman Catholic School… [overtalking] [asides] the great majority of the children in that school don’t live in Stevenage, the come from a wide area and that’s typical of Catholic Schools because the children travel longer distances. Nevertheless the school is absolutely tied up to the project as a whole; the school, for example, has agreed to work with all the rest of the schools in the town in securing redeployment of the staff. All the schools, including that school, are tied into that; and it is happy to collaborate. But the extent to which it collaborates is slightly different to the other schools because not all of its children come from Stevenage; and that’s typical of the other Catholic Schools in the county, but it does work very well with the other schools. [asides]

FS Hi there, I’m even more sort of depressed now than when I first started here. I presumed one thing as well, you keep talking about buildings; do you not realise what motivates children; it’s staff, it’s teaching, it’s the community. They could be taught in a caravan as long as they’ve got teachers that care, they don’t care; I can honestly say that. Now also, as well, I’ve got a child here in year nine, who’s doing extremely well. And, all right, it might not affect Charla; David who hasn’t got severe special needs has dyslexia and dyspraxia; he will start here, I presume. He’s in year five at Knebworth at the moment; in year six, so you’re now telling me that he’ll have to leave at the start of his GCSEs and start getting on a bus and start moving around the town to get to school. [overtalking] Would you do that to your child?

JD What I’m saying to you is that we want this school, because it’s a good school, doing a really good job with the children it’s got; we want this school to continue as it is right up to the point of closure, [asides] that’s our main aim. Now we understand, to make that happen, there are a number of things that we have to do. Amongst the top priorities for us is to maintain the staff because I absolutely agree with you 100%, it is great to have these new buildings, but actually the atmosphere is greater by the community, the staff and the children. And just to let you know, we didn’t start talking about buildings, the number of schools, the size of schools in real depth, until we’d spent some months talking to schools and stakeholders about the curriculum and about the curriculum model and what the children need to learn. We started with the curriculum and then came back to the proposals for the buildings and I think that’s important, so I agree with that point. One of the principles we’d like to achieve is that when children come into Heathcote in the next few years, they are clear about the final destination because we want to make sure all those children have a way through. In terms of hanging onto the staff, we will work hard to give all the guarantees we can. We’re hoping the staff at Heathcote want to take part in what I think is a very exciting project for the town as a whole. We want, as a matter of principle, if we can, for the staff of Heathcote to move to similar schools of the children who have actually

Appendix 1B(i)

moved through and we know we’re going to have to work hard to do that. The kinds of things that we have in mind, for example, are things like as we get near to the school closure, when schools are making appointments, you can make an appointment to this school knowing that in the contract that teacher can then go through to another school in the town. There are some ways of making those appointments across more than one institution. There’s a whole range of things we can do and we will talk to staff about that during the summer term. What I intend to do, and a commitment I have made to the head, as you can imagine, has been pressing the local authority on your behalf, very assertively. The commitment I have given is, I will talk to the staff as a whole before they go away on their summer holidays, so they don’t have to worry through the six weeks with some guarantees and some assurances of the arrangements we want to put in place; because we want to maintain the staff we’ve got here. It’s in the interest of the other schools because they are bigger, they need to recruit staff and therefore it’s in their interest to hang onto the staff that we’ve got in Stevenage.

FS Can I just ask one more question? What will you do if, David will be made to move school? Who will then decide who goes to Barnwell, will we have to go through a selection process, will it be who’s nearest? Because Marriotts’ not near to me at all, I wouldn’t want my child to go to Marriotts. Barnwell’s the nearest, so how are you going to decide; and we got to go through the sieving process? He’ll just be starting his GCSEs and be separated from all his friends, so how is that helping motivate and keep things steady when he’s already got learning difficulties?

JD [asides] Tonight I would love to be in a position to say to you this is exactly what we can do; [asides] I’d like to be able to do that. Now we would like to have these evenings later in the process where we will have some of these detailed answers worked out for you. We can’t delay this process because if we do we jeopardise 145 million; certainly for a year, and might be further. The reason that we can’t give you the absolute detail on the admission arrangements is because we have a new admissions code, it’s legally binding. And I think we need to make sure with the lawyers of what we can do as a local authority, what guarantees we can give parents like yourself which are legally secure. What we don’t want to do is stand up here tonight and say to you, we can give you these guarantees so that your child will know which school they’re going to and these are the arrangements before we’ve tested them in law. Otherwise we’d have to come back at the end of term or beginning of next term and say, I’m sorry, we didn’t get that quite right. So we are looking at whatever we can do and we’re going to stretch the code as far as we can to give you the maximum reassurances and the maximum knowledge of destinations so that children know where they’re going; but we want to make sure we can do that within the code. One thing I can say to you is the admission arrangements have to run, we can’t go outside the law, we do have some additional powers in re-organisation arrangements. What I’m saying is, we’d like to be in a position to have that legal advice well in advance for the meeting in July for the parents who are coming here in September and also in time for the admissions for 2008; there’s a meeting for that in September. Pauline, I think, wants to add to that.

Appendix 1B(i)

PD It’s also worth pointing out to you that we’ve got different proposals here and until we know the outcomes… [overtalking] both of them if Heathcote closes, but it depends on where the places are in other schools. What we will make a promise to you is that we will not publish statutory proposals if it ever gets to that stage without you being absolutely clear what the progression routes are and the process that you would have to go through in order to know where your child will go.

JD Just for the record, because, I think, it’s a very fair point you’re making, I’d have similar concerns. What we’re saying to you is, if you go back to the process where it’s gone through Cabinet and we go to statutory notices; for the record we will not publish statutory notices until at the same time as publishing those statutory notices we can describe in detail the admission arrangements. [overtalking] Well, what we will do is we will come to the meeting for the new parents and explain what the position is; and by that time we will have got it right with our lawyers. [overtalking] So were you are one of the parents who are selective 2008?

FS Yes.

JD Okay, what I’m saying to you is on the evening in September which the school will put on, myself and colleagues will come along and set that out for you in some detail.

FS You’ll have an answer then?

JD We will.

FS [unclear]

JD What we will do is tell you exactly what the procedures are and where the places are. What I don’t want to do is make any comments tonight which then we can’t pursue. And what I’m saying to you is though we won’t publish those statutory notices until that’s crystal clear and we will come to those meetings and set that out in some detail. We would like children to want to come to Heathcote and then move to a new school and know where they’re going. [overtalking] I absolutely understand your concern, but that’s the most guarantee I can give you. [overtalking]

FS [asides] This gentleman in the blue shirt.

MS Yes, thank you very much. I’d like to read this question out because I’ve written it down word for word. In last Friday’s Times Educational Supplement it was reported that Professor Alan Smithers, who’s a Director of the Centre for Education and Employment Research at the University of Buckingham and Special Advisor to the House of Commons and Education and Skills Committee estimates the optimum size for a secondary school is 800 pupils. Please can you explain why Herts County Council believe it is better for Stevenage to operate at schools in excess of 1,200?

Appendix 1B(i)

MS First of all I know Professor Alan Smithers, I’ve worked with him on research in the past and I respect him as a researcher; but it doesn’t mean he’s right. [overtalking] There are a lot of highly respected people who have equal background, equal qualifications, equal experience to Alan Smithers who will say the absolute opposite and will provide evidence for the opposite. For an educational panel report some time ago we looked into this in some detail and actually you can make the statistics, I could stand here tonight and make a statistical argument for large or small schools. Actually when you break it down sometimes small schools appear better because they’re in some very posh middle class areas; there is a link, like it or not, and I don’t like it. There is a link between occupation, social class, there is a link between that and eventual GCSE results; unfair but there is a case. And what I’m saying to you is, in terms of looking at the results of schools for certain sizes that doesn’t get below the skin in terms of their value added and other positions. So I could take you to other people like Professor Sig Prais, a range of other professors that will know Alan Smithers as well and just fundamentally disagree with him. [overtalking]

MS I’d just like to make a point on that; the other people don’t appear to be advising the government.

JD Well they do, you see; because you’ve read that from Alan Smithers the government gets advice from a lot of people, Alan is one of them. They get advice from, for example, the Institute for Economic Social Research, there’s a range of think tanks that can go into Government Policy, Alan Smithers is one of them, but he’s only one. [overtalking] And so are all the other people who give advice, which disagree with Alan. The point I’m making to you is we could have a debate about the size of a school; it’s fascinating but actually the research could be shown in any direction. What we’re saying, in Stevenage, we know that we have a lot of young people in our schools that would like to do a wider range of occasional subjects leading into further education, leading into higher education. That’s true of the whole county, of course; and as a county we’re brilliant at many things, but we’ve fallen behind the times a little bit in terms of occasional courses. If you look at the percentage of young people across the county doing vocational programmes it’s nowhere near where it should be; and that is true in Stevenage as anywhere else. And part of the reason for that is our schools struggle with their budgets to create the funding they need to fund vocational courses at key stage four. They are expensive, they can be anything like 5,000 or 6,000, they can be up to double, if you like, the age, people weighted formula that schools get. So I know Alan Smithers as well, I’ve worked with him in the past, not for a while; but I’ve worked with people just as respected, giving just as good advice which is the opposite to that.

FS [asides] This lady here.

FS Before I ask my question which is related, can I just clarify a point? Are you saying that Heathcote is going to be a full school at the time of closure? So in other words you’re still continuing to intake in year six, seven?

Appendix 1B(i)

JD This is something we will negotiate with the Governing body very carefully. As the local authority’s starting point, what we would like to see is that Heathcote would continue right up to the point of closure as a full a school as possible. And for that the children would then move in peer groups and friendship groups to their new destinations knowing well in advance what those destinations are; which gives them a number of years to work with those schools, to time the curriculum and work that through, that’s our aim. We do understand that in order to achieve that we have to do a lot of work and give a lot of assurances to staff who are obviously very concerned and frustrated and angry; a lot of concerns from parents, but that is our aim, yes.

FS Okay, so the prospective parents that are coming are going to choose for their children to got basically a closing school; so you’re probably going to end up with diminished year groups.

JD There is a danger that the school would reduce in size before it closes. We would like to keep that reduction as low as we possibly can and we know there’s financial implications for that and we’ll work with the school. But our aim is that this school should continue right up, so we have an orderly transfer of children in groups, in friendship groups, in tutor groups to their new destinations, preferably with some of the existing staff. I know it’s ambitious but that’s what we would try to work towards.

FS Okay, well my question is, at the fear of being outvoted here, I actually don’t live in Stevenage, I live in one of the surrounding villages, Datchworth. Our closest school is Barnwell, I couldn’t get my daughter into Barnwell last year so we made a choice for her to come to Heathcote in year seven. This was before we knew that Collenswood was closing, so what’s going to happen is that people in the surrounding villages will not ever be able to get to their local school because it’s going to be absorbing the people from this area that would be going to Heathcote at the moment. So as you quite rightly said, in the south of Stevenage, Barnwell can’t take everybody in the south of Stevenage, so people from like Datchworth, Knebworth, Aston, Benington, all our surrounding villages not only will we not have any choice but we probably won’t even get our nearest school. And what’s been happening increasingly in the villages is that we get the schools that have places left over than people don’t want to go to. So how are you as a County Council going to tackle that admissions issue?

PD I’m sorry if it feels for you that I’m repeating myself, but what we’re doing is we’re adding places into other parts of the town. [overtalking] I do appreciate what you’re saying; we will be adding places into the centre of the town and over time, and I appreciate we’re talking over time, there will be a redistribution of people who will see schools as their local school and will get into those schools. So there will be a redistribution, but I do take your point about people living further afield and the need to be very, very watchful of what the impact of that will be on those people. We believe that people in the villages outside continue to find places in the school in the south, if they wish to, but we will keep a very close eye on that.

Appendix 1B(i)

FS Well, as long as you appreciate the fact that if the admission rules stay the same, i.e. on distance, we are always going to be the furthest away.

JD Just so we’re on the record, I think that’s a really good point actually because families who live on the fringes, as you say, don’t get quite the same level. I think what we need to do is to undertake some detailed modelling. We know where the families live, we know where the places are, we will do some work on that during the consultation process and see what the implications are. We have the software that will help us do some modelling, I think we need to do that; that is a good point, it’s one we hadn’t thought of.

FS Thank you, my point was also regarding the villages, we live in Knebworth which is very conveniently actually missed off the bottom of your Map. Knebworth is one of the largest villages in Hertfordshire; we have a very large primary school with two form entry; and more than half of those children come to Heathcote School. Knebworth is also facing housing development and, no doubt, there will be an impact on the school size there. I just wondered if any of that has been taken into account when looking at the demographics on the southern side of Stevenage?

PD Yes, you’re absolutely right, we’re very much aware of Knebworth and all of our projections and forecasts for pupil numbers in the future include that town and all the other areas around in what we call our planning area. And, yes, your children and the projected numbers of children from Knebworth have been taken into account in that people place planning. [overtalking]

FS Hello, I worked at Collenswood, did for seven years, very proud of it; and I now work for Barnwell, East Campus. And whatever you decide and whatever any of us say, you’re going to do what you want up there because that’s the way it works. So what my question to you is, what happened at Collenswood is that when you told us the school was closing, really good teachers started to leave to go and get jobs with good prospects. And then poor teachers came in, teachers couldn’t speak English, the children can’t understand them; we have supply after supply. So what are you going to do to ensure that my child who chose to come to Heathcote is going to get a good education by good teachers?

JD That is something we need to work very carefully on; I think there are two big differences though. If you’re a member in staff in Heathcote, there are three big differences, I think, actually between that and the Collenswood situation. First of all if you were a teacher in Collenswood you were already pretty exhausted because it was a difficult school, which was going downhill over a period of time. Secondly, the difference is that in Collenswood we felt as an authority, to be blunt, that we needed to close that school quickly. And therefore staff were put under pressure, I accept that, [asides] so the timing is the second difference. Here there isn’t a panic for staff, we’ve got time to work with staff over a number of years to secure their careers. The third big difference, and I think this is the most important one, in the future for teachers this is going to be one of the most exciting places to come and work in the

Appendix 1B(i)

country. There’s no good shaking your heads; [overtalking] I accept the concerns over Heathcote but going into Collenswood as a new teacher during the closing period was a difficult thing to do; I accept that point, and I think we managed it really quite well. I would have to disagree on that point, here what we’re saying is if you’re am ambitious young teacher or a successful teacher Stevenage as a community of schools if going to be one of the best places in the country to come and work. There isn’t anything quite like what we’re proposing here; [overtalking] think about what we’re proposing. From a teacher’s point of view they’ll be coming to a town where all the schools will have specialisms; all the schools will have certain autonomies which will set them aside from the authority. There will be a model across the town, the only place that comes close to that is Manchester where there are three schools.

FS Can I just say though that we’re already being told that teachers are leaving Heathcote.

JD The point I’m making to you… [overtalking] is that if you’re a member of staff at Heathcote I understand there will be concerns, frustration, irritation; it’s a different context. The town as a whole will offer a lot of opportunities for teachers at Heathcote.

FS [overtalking] But they’re leaving already some of them.

JD And what we will do and we’ve already written to all the staff in the school, signed by all the headteachers from Stevenage to say that collectively the schools in Stevenage will want to work with the staff here at Heathcote as part of the Stevenage project. So I accept the concerns, but I think it’s unfair and inaccurate to compare this context with Collenswood. Collenswood was a difficult school, struggling, this is a good school and we want to make sure it’s part of a very exciting future for Stevenage.

FS Can I just say, there’s no difference, you’re closing down another school and the children suffered; this is all about the children. And at the end of the day the children in Collenswood suffered badly and some of them still suffer; I worked there, I’ve seen it.

JD If you’re saying to me that this is similar to the Collenswood situation, I just think you’re fundamentally wrong; I completely and utterly disagree with you. I agree [overtalking] that there is some pressure on staff. In terms of Collenswood, again, you’re wrong, I did go into Collenswood before it closed, I spent some time there, spoke to the children. [overtalking] When you’re wrong I need to tell you you’re wrong; I did go to Collenswood beforehand, I have been back to the campus afterwards and I have to say to you that why I disagree with you is you’re underestimating what Barnwell has done with that situation. And more to the point [overtalking] the achievement of the children on that site; there’s a remarkable difference in the atmosphere, the behaviour, the attendance, the quality of learning is significantly different on Barnwell East than it was at Collenswood; and I think it’s a shame not to recognise that. But the point I’m making to you, this is not Collenswood, there’s more time, it’s

Appendix 1B(i)

an exciting project and we want to maintain as many staff as we possibly can; and we’ll work hard to do that. [asides]

FS Hello, you said earlier that you’re actually being open and honest with us and that you value the view of public consultation. So can you be honest now and say what made you decide to let Barnwell stay open and merge with Collenswood and close Heathcote, which has got a lot of excellent teachers and is definitely not a failing school?

JD I understand that and we’ve thought about it carefully. If you start from the point of view of a proposal that we want one school here; about eight forms of entry, not two small schools. Then you have to decide Barnwell or Heathcote; Barnwell is already broadly the size that we need it to want to be so it’s less disruptive to a school which already has been significantly disrupted. So it’s a difficult choice, I absolutely accept because both schools do a really good job but if you’ve got a school which is broadly the size you want the school to be and it’s a school which has had significant disruption in the very recent past then we felt that Heathcote of the two schools was the one to close. It’s more complicated but those are the key points of why we came to Heathcote rather than Barnwell. The other thing we did think about is could we locate this school in the north rather than Thomas Alleyne, but in the end you’d have children from here travelling right across the town and that didn’t make sense; so those are the two things we looked at, but that’s why Heathcote not Barnwell. [asides]

FS I’d just like to say, I don’t agree with your earlier point that Marriotts and Nobel are in this area. And my question is, why can’t you keep Barnwell as it is the size school that you’re looking for and keep Heathcote open as an 800 or whatever it is school that is a good sized school and give the parents the choice whether they want a smaller school or a larger school instead of closing it down?

JD You need forget for the moment which schools currently exist and think of Stevenage as a blank piece of paper. If you were to start to build schools in Stevenage from scratch you would build one large school in the South; you’d have one in the north. Ignore all the schools to start with and create a pattern of schools which are the right place, the right shape, the right size; you would end up with a pattern that by doing this we will create. So the point I’m making to you is, it’s very unfortunate that it involves the closure of any school, particularly a good school. But what we’re looking for is 10 years, 20 years, 30 years down the line and that’s the pattern of schools we’re looking to create. And if you disagree with that fundamental point, that’s a point that we will record, we’ll take back, and we’ll make sure that when the decisions are made we will make clear the fact that not everybody agrees with that fundamentally. A lady here said, what do you have to do to stop it? Basically if you take the fundamental proposal of the shape and nature of the schools we’re trying to create across the town as a whole, what we’re proposing really is rational. If you disagree with that over a model then that releases other options, but we believe in the model that we’re trying to create.

Appendix 1B(i)

FS But you don’t know in 20, 30 years time that there won’t still be parents that want an 800 school and not a 1,500 school. You don’t know that, you’re taking that choice totally away from them.

JD Well, to be fair, we do know that parents…

FS How do you know that?

JD Can I just finish the point? We do [overtalking] know that parents do now want schools which are small and are likely to want schools that are small in the future. We also know that other parents are quite happy with larger schools, bearing in mind eight form entry schools are not large schools; in the national picture they are certainly not big schools. If you went elsewhere in the country parents would wonder what the conversation is because that’s what they have in place. But I absolutely accept the point that there will be parents who will prefer to have smaller rather than larger schools. That’s a point that we know is going to come up, and it’s come up tonight. We will make sure that goes back and we’re expecting to be grilled by elected members on the overall rationale of what we’re trying to do and no doubt the size of the school is something that we will get grilled on. So I accept the point that people will disagree with what we’re trying to do, but I suspect we would never get everybody who lives in Stevenage to agree on the shape, pattern and number of schools; [overtalking] I don’t think we could ever agree on that. [asides]

FS You know I’ve been through this so many times with my children, and as for what you’ve just said about the Collenswood site, you may have given Barnwell all the money but the Collenswood site have not had the money; the backup on that site, have they? Because pupils on the Barnwell site have gone home and told their parents, oh, it’s great now because we’ve got all the TAs and that; they’ve got nothing on that Collenswood site.

JD Sorry, that’s very unfair, that’s just not the case. The money that we’ve put into the Barnwell site is significant and clearly when you walk into both sites you’ve got a bigger and a smaller site. I accept there will be more staff on a bigger site than on a smaller site. [overtalking]

FS I had to phone you up about the damage that was going done at that school.

JD [overtalking] Teacher pupil ratios, the number of the support staff are very evenly spread. Senior manager are there and I’m not prepared for people to under-estimate the fantastic job that Barnwell have done for the children of Collenswood; they’ve done a tremendous job, [overtalking] but some children might not like that. [overtalking]

FS Sorry, I’ve got another part to say. You’re saying about the new headteacher who’s taken on this new school; who decides what teachers go into that new school?

Appendix 1B(i)

JD Sorry, which new headteacher, which school?

FS Well, you’re saying about this new super duper school you’re going to do.

JD No, no, that’s an important point. We are not creating new schools in Stevenage, we’re not doing that. We are expanding existing schools or relocating existing schools.

FS So who’s going to have the choice of the staff like last time because he took in who he wanted and he got rid of the ones he didn’t want.

JD Yeah, there will clearly be a recruitment process, we will try and keep that as simple and straightforward as we can; and clearly that recruitment process seems to be in place. What we can say to you is that all the staff that wanted to remain in a Hertfordshire School and even those staff who were unsuccessful to move into the new enlarged Barnwell School; all those staff who wanted to remain in Hertfordshire remained in Hertfordshire and we got them all the jobs. We had no members of staff in that sense made redundant; we worked very hard to achieve that.

FS But the thing was, who’s staffing over a lot of the good qualified teachers; you lost some really good teachers from Collenswood? And I’m worried, I’ve just moved my children to this school, I do not want them going through that again.

JD [overtalking] I do accept, we did lose some good staff, absolutely. Without repeating, this is a different situation; if I’m a member of staff in Heathcote, there’s far more to encourage me to stay in Stevenage than there was if I was in Collenswood because you’re part of a very exciting project; lots of opportunities. All the schools have, as I say, written to every member of staff saying, we’ll take collective responsibility for the staff as a whole. I absolutely accept the point that staff are anxious, they’re angry, they’re frustrated, absolutely, I understand that. And some staff have been there a very long time and as I say have done a brilliant job. And what we will do is work as quickly as we possibly can with those staff to put as many guarantees in place and look at a local authority to say, what can we do to entice, to encourage, if necessary to bribe staff to stay in Stevenage and commit to what is, I think, a very exciting project. But, you’re right, there is a danger of that, but as I say, we do have a 100% track record, of all staff who want to stay with us through all the review we’ve done have got a job. But they might well be some that will go and you need to bear in mind that there is a turnover of staff anyway over the next four or five years. [asides]

FS Thank you, you’ve said on more than occasion this evening, that this isn’t a failing school and everybody in this room obviously knows that. This is a strong, sturdy, successful school and it’s thriving very, very well. And you’ve also stated that you really want to do as much as you possibly can to ensure that all of the staff in this school have a future in Stevenage. Have you considered how the teachers may feel as part of your proposal is including the

Appendix 1B(i)

relocation of Thomas Alleyne and everybody already knows that that school has serious issues keeping its staff? Has issues with its students, it has falling roles and yet they’re going to seemingly get a new build, new facilities, are we now just tipping money down the drain; s this not the better school to have the new facilities, we’ve got the infrastructure to support it.

JD To be frank, I’m not actually going to get drawn into comparing schools and schools, I’m just not going to do that for two reasons. First of all, all the schools in Stevenage have got key strengths, all the schools in Stevenage are improving. One of the strengths in Stevenage is that the children in Stevenage are doing better and better. The children who are currently in year seven in Stevenage, for the first time in the history of this town, as far as I can make out, and certainly for the last decade are above the national standard. And that’s been a lot of work through the primary phase and those children are now in our secondary schools and that’s working really well. I’m not going to stand here and defend or not Thomas Alleyne other than it’s also a good school doing a good job. This is not about selecting the strongest or weakest school, this is not about that. We were very concerned about Collenswood, and that’s why we intervened; we are not concerned about the schools in Stevenage. I would send my child to any school in Stevenage, I’d be delighted to do that; [overtalking] and including here, I can stay to you honestly if I lived in Stevenage, because I believe that we can manage this really well. The point I’m making to you is this is not about which is the best school, therefore how much money we should spend on them; it’s about what shape, nature, pattern of schools as a whole do we need in the future. And if we need a school in the north of the town, which we do then, then it’s a case of do you relocate Thomas Alleyne or Barclay because it’s a similar situation where there are two schools where we only need one. And when we looked at both sites the site which we think is better to redevelop and has a better starting point is Barclay, and so that’s why Thomas Alleyne was the school we decided to relocate. Not because it was a better or not so good school as everywhere else but because the sites were such. The other reason why we picked Thomas Alleyne was because most of the children who go to Thomas Alleyne, if you look at where children live and the schools they go to tend to be from the north of the town; so that was our choice. It’s nothing to do with which school we think is better or weaker; we are confident in all the schools in Stevenage, they’re all improving.

FS It’s just a funny way of showing it.

JD I accept, yes.

FS In the document everybody else seems to have a choice except for this school. There’s nothing in there that says anything nice about Heathcote.

JD No, I accept that.

FS The stakeholders that you have interviewed along the process, you document says you’ve interviewed students. I’d be very interested to see what the students said and how many you really did interview. But the

Appendix 1B(i)

stakeholder group that I feel that you’ve missed out in all of this process is the parents of current children in the years one to five in primary schools. We’re sat here making decisions because we’ve got children in this school and we feel passionate about that, but those poor people have got absolutely no idea that in three, four years time they’re not going to get the schools that they think they can get their children into like the lady said about Knebworth.

JD Yeah.

FS Their choice is going away, they haven’t been told, in fact if they’ve seen anything they’ve probably seen the nice, glossy spin document where you show a picture of a school that’s never going to exist in Stevenage. They probably got the nice glossy, they never got the black and white that tells them the hard facts that Heathcote won’t be here. Why are we not including those people in our consultation process, they are vested interest?

FS I hear what you say. The consultation document has been made widely available and boxes have gone into every primary school. Yes, that consultation document it’s on our website, we’ve distributed it to libraries, doctors’ surgeries, citizens’ advice bureaus, pre-schools, we’ve done as much coverage. In fact, we were in one school last night and one of the primary parents said, I’ve ended up with half a dozen of these via my primary school. So it’s clearly in the primary schools and the parents are getting it. We’ve publicised these meetings in the press in Stevenage; we’ve put adverts in the papers so we really have widely distributed information about this. And all of our primary headteachers were included as stakeholders in those earlier discussions; so the primary colleagues and parents should know about it. [asides]

FS A couple of points, I’m not sure why you’re saying that we only need one school in the South because obviously Barnwell is full for this coming year seven and so is Heathcote so obviously there is the demand. The other point I just wanted to ask was about the 140 million BSF money. As I understand it, that’s reliant upon you purchasing and getting planning permission for the Thomas Alleyne site and the Marriotts site as well. What’s the proposal if you don’t get either of those or you don’t get both? As I understand it, the Thomas Alleyne site, the owner has refused to sell it.

LM Okay, shall I just start off, the £145 million isn’t dependent on anything of that sort. The £145 million is an indicative allocation to us for Stevenage based on pupil numbers. So the money is related to the pupil numbers that we have in the town, not on purchases of sites or sales of sites or anything like that. So that’s the sort of starting point, the sort of quantitative money; the issue is how it’s spent, isn’t it? The issue is which sites it’s spent on? And I think the point that you’re making, as I understand it, there is a possibility that we might not be able to proceed with proposals for either Thomas Alleyne or Marriotts or both. Now clearly we’ve dealt with the either or options in our second proposal in the consultation document. If we don’t get either of the sites, the very slight possibility that we don’t succeed with both of those

Appendix 1B(i)

things, then we would have to re-consult because we would have to work out some new proposals; that’s the honest answer.

FS So the money’s not dependent on those two sites then?

LM No, it isn’t.

FS And how about the County Council’s contribution, I was under the impression that the County Council had to give 10% towards the scheme as well?

LM Not exactly, no. I think where that’s come from is that we’re in the fourth round of funding for Building Schools for the Future, so there are three realms of funding in the country that are further forward than ours. And I think the experience of those authorities that are further down the process than we are, and I think Jo Twine, the Programme Manager, is here who has worked with other BSF authorities that are further on than we are. I think the experience of those is that there is often a gap of about 10% between the cost of what the authority wants to achieve and the money that we have available. That’s where that 10% comes from, there is no rule about it being 10% but historically it seems to have worked out at about that.

FS And that will be County Council’s responsibility?

LM That would therefore if that happened here that would be a County Council responsibility. Now our members at a point when the finances are more closely and definitively worked out than they are now would need to make a decision about how much beyond the government funding they would be able to contribute. So there may well be some decisions to be made in a year’s time or whatever; I’m speaking loosely with the timetable because it’s still a bit fluid, but let’s say a year’s time. Members will have to decide the extent to which either they put extra money in or we have to adjust, curtail, the building programme to keep it within budget.

FS Well, I could probably guess that the amount the County will put in is the amount they get for the sale of the site that Heathcote is on, that Thomas Alleyne is on and probably Pin Green as well; so presumably that’s where the money’s going to come from which is why this whole evening, as far as I’m concerned, has been about money. You talked about shiny schools, nice new schools, which is great but as far as I’m concerned, what goes on inside those schools is the most important thing and you’ve glossed over that; this is about buildings, land and money.

LM No, I don’t think we’ve glossed over it, I think that’s where we started from. We started from a vision of education for the future. It’s not about money, we don’t have to accept the £145 million at all. We can say, okay, let’s not take the money, leave it exactly as it is and we’ll continue to have buildings that are increasingly not fit for the purpose, increasingly not appropriate. Yes, of course, you can teach children in a caravan as I think a lady mentioned over here. It’s extremely difficult to carry our science

Appendix 1B(i)

experiments in a caravan, I think. It’s very difficult to provide food technology facilities in a caravan, it’s very difficult actually to do decent indoor games and sports provision in a caravan and so on. I think, yes, of course, the relationship between the teacher and the learner is the fundamental thing, nevertheless you do have to have facilities which are appropriate and adequate for the things that you actually want to undertake, for the activities that you want to undertake. So I think that is important, but we don’t have to take the money, we can just say, okay, give the 145 million to somewhere else and we’ll just continue to use the increasingly decrepit buildings that we’ve got; sure, we can do that. But if the thing is about money we can do that, it isn’t about money, it’s about trying to do the best for the children and to take 145 million or whatever it is off the government to improve things here, that’s really what I think it’s about. [asides]

FS First I have to say that really was one extreme to the other, wasn’t it? You either do what we do or we have absolutely nothing; but that’s not my point. My point is, did you look at any other way of spending this money and can we look at another way of spending this money? I mean, Mr. Donovan told us that if we want to save Heathcote, told the lady over here, that we have to find another way. What about if you use this money to build a sixth form college in Stevenage? Several times this evening you’ve spoken about how expensive a provision of sixth form education is. What if you took that and put it on one site, you would save all this bussing the kids round the time and they don’t get the choices they want. I’m willing to accept that, and they don’t. If you had a sixth form site everything would be available in one place, everybody could do every subject they wanted to do. You wouldn’t have this, you can’t do drama because you can’t get across there and back here for philosophy or whatever; you wouldn’t have any of that. Have we not considered spending the money in another way then, did you look at a sixth form college?

JD Yeah, it is something we looked at. I’m not sure whether people remember this, certainly the schools were involved, three years ago now there was what was called a strategic aerial review which looked at [unclear] in education across the whole of the county. And one of the proposals in that review was to reduce the schools in Stevenage to 11 to 16 and build a sixth form college in the town; that was one of the proposals. And it got virtually no support from any of the people that were consulting us, that’s the first thing. The second thing is that if we said to the government we want to get involved in Building Schools for the Future our response to that is to build a sixth form college, they wouldn’t give us the money. And I think this is fair enough, if the government is going to spend 2.2 billion a year across the country, where are they going to spend it? We have to demonstrate to the government that we’ve looked across the whole of the town and we’re going to say to the government for the next 30 to 40 even 50 years Stevenage has got a pattern and number of schools which is appropriate to its evolving shape and size. The other issue, there’s a lot of debate about sixth form colleges and sixth forms and actually, again, it comes back to the gentleman here; if you look at the statistics you can make them work either way; you can argue for and against them. In terms of standards there’s not a huge difference. One of the

Appendix 1B(i)

problems with sixth form colleges is the schools surrounding them have difficulty recruiting specialist teachers particularly in areas like physics and maths and those areas where if you’re a teacher that has a career ahead you tend to want to go to school. Certainly when I was a teacher one of the things I did was always teach in schools where there was a sixth form because it really stretches you professionally; and where schools don’t have sixth forms they struggle. The other problem is, if you’re in a school without a sixth form what you tend not to have is teachers who are used to teaching A level. And that’s difficult for the aspirations of the kids in year 11 because if you’ve got a sixth form, if I’m teaching maths to a year 11 set and I know that I’m going to try and get them into my A level group next year you link the two syllabuses together. You say to them, look, if you do an A level next year, [unclear] is a key concept, let’s spend a bit more time on it. So in terms of the impact on the school there are some issues there. Having said that, I go back to my original point, to be fair in terms of standards you can make the statistics [unclear] the way. So we did look at the sixth form college, we decided that we’ve consulted on that before, had virtually no response to it; it isn’t the wider solution we would want. And the other thing is we think these proposals give us our cake really and allows us to eat it in the sense that because the schools will be tied together by a town-wide trust which kind of breaks away from us as local authority, it gives the sense of independence to the group of schools; the children who have access to the sixth form across the town.

FS They still have a travelling problem though, don’t they?

JD Yes, there is, but you’ve got to remember that Stevenage is a very compact town. That is a problem in these parts where it’s difficult; but in Stevenage it’s very quick transport and young people can move.

FS It’s still not quick enough to get you back if you’re period one for this and period two for that.

JD That’s true, that’s why in order to achieve a sensible, collaborative sixth form the schools collaborate on their timetables to make sure that journeys are kept down to a minimum.

FS No, they choose not to do it, that’s what they do. I’ve just been making this choice with my daughter who’s in year 11; the choices have been limited by where.

JD Actually that might be true of your daughter.

FS No, it’s not just my daughter actually, her year.

JD In fact, that’s incorrect, well, it is across the town as a whole, [overtalking] if you look at the figures in terms of student choice the level of collaboration, the number of young people choosing to take their sixth form courses elsewhere has been increasing along with the results. As young people have a wider choice of A levels and get it, they’re more committed to those subjects and the results are starting to move. So again, I think, it’s

Appendix 1B(i)

unfair to undermine the current sixth form arrangements; they’re about as good as anywhere you’d find in the country. During the area wide inspection Stevenage was put up as a model of national best practice. What we’re saying is these trust arrangements will capture that best practice and wrap a formal contractual arrangement around it. Because at the moment it does rely on, if you like, the goodwill of the schools; and as the personnel changes those arrangements might form. So we have looked at it and we’ve decided that’s not something that we’re going to put forward. But again, if you think that’s a better way; make that proposal and we’ll feed that into the process.

FS Can we do that, can we make a proposal?

JD Oh, yes, absolutely, yes.

LM Can I just add a couple of things? Picking up two things, one is the all or nothing thing. I know it wasn’t a question, but it’s a fair point.

FS But it’s the way you saw it.

LM It is, I’m happy to respond to it; and the reason I say that is getting the 140 odd million from the government is dependent on us putting together a proposal that gets the money. In other words we can’t say, okay, give us 10 million to do that or 15 million to do that, it is actually an all or nothing thing. We either get approved for the whole package or we don’t; because that’s the way it works.

FS Can the package not be…

LM [overtalking] Yes, but the package can be adjusted, it could. But, I think, another reason why in a sense, as Justin said, that it wouldn’t work if we just put all the money into building a sixth form centre. And the reason for that is that money’s, of course, designed to help the whole secondary age range.

FS I wouldn’t suggest all the money for a sixth form college by any means. I would probably suggest on an existing site; no, I wouldn’t suggest that at all. What I’m asking you is could the sixth form college be in place and the rest of the money spread around? We all accept that we need more money on ICT and buildings, these weren’t designed to last as long as they are. All I’m asking is that, can it not be used in that format?

LM I think, quite probably not actually, Jo’s shaking her head, do you want to say something, Jo?

JT Only that the money is defined very, very clearly for secondary education and if it is a college it comes under the Learning and Skills Council’s remit and is designated as an FE College.

FS [unclear]

JT Absolutely, because it’s not in a school. [overtalking]

Appendix 1B(i)

JD Just one more point, we keep losing site of what we’re trying to achieve across the town. The other thing which is very unusual about the partnership though, it’s not just between the schools. North Herts College has been a fantastic partner in developing this arrangement and the Learning and Skills Council is about to spend large sums of money, many tens of millions, on the Stevenage, the North Herts College. And what we’re trying to do is take our 145 million; the millions that the college will be using to develop a post 16 provision and merge the two. So it might well be, we can’t guarantee this yet, but it might well be, for example, if a school has a specialism in construction or engineering or one of these specialisms, we might well be able to secure it so some of the college funding is used to deliver FE programmes on the school site to add to that specialism so that young people can progress without having to move out of the town or into the college. So the model that we’re creating is something that we think is really very important and we did look at a sixth form college, we tussled away with it. And the other point is, as I say, it went down very badly last time. [overtalking]

LM The thing is, you were saying, yes, this concentration is designed to capture new ideas and new options as well. And that’s why you’ve got, not a huge space on here, but it can be supplemented in whatever way you like with extra sheets or through an email or through the website. We are interested in capturing other ideas and if there are other ideas that will run, that will work, then obviously we will look at those and give those the consideration that they deserve.

JD And we’ll make sure that elected members have access to all the ideas, each individual idea will be available for them. We will put a report which hopefully summarises the key points, but each individual point will be available to members before they make their decision. [asides]

FS Earlier on you said, the only reason you’re shutting Heathcote is because it’s too near to Barnwell. Why can’t you move Barnwell West to Barnwell East and keep Heathcote where it is?

JD I’m trying not to repeat, but I think I’ll have to, it goes back to our original map of Stevenage. What I’m saying to you is, is you ignored all the schools in Stevenage at the moment and started with a complete blank piece of paper, we would want a school of about eight forms of entry roughly where this school in Barnwell is. And then the other schools of round about eight forms of entry would be located where those other sites are apart from the north of the town where we need to have provision further up; and Pauline will just add to that.

PD There are some very practical considerations here, you say, why can’t you have a school on the Barnwell East site? It’s just not big enough for the size of school that we have said we’re trying to create in Stevenage. Now I hear what you say, some of you say you don’t necessarily want a school as big as 8FE, but our proposals are based on a vision for 8FE schools; and the old Collenswood site isn’t big enough for an 8FE school, this site isn’t big

Appendix 1B(i)

enough for an 8FE school. The Barnwell site isn’t big enough for an 8FE school which is why we need both sites here and we can’t put an 8FE school on the old Collenswood site. [asides]

MS In the interest of time I’ll cut out a number of the minor points that I’ve made. The first one, I think, is the most important which was made by Karin, which is, you are restricting parental choice; you’ve agreed with that. In fact, parental choice will be down to one school in the south of Stevenage serving the whole of the south of Stevenage and the villages. The second point that you followed up was on travelling; you said the county would be paying for the travelling of any student who would be travelling more than three miles. Do you realise that from the very southern most point to the very northern most point of Stevenage is barely over two miles. You seem to be making contradictions right the way through and what worries me most of all is that the whole of this consultation process which you keep on emphasising is a consultation process gives us the impression that this is a fait accompli. [overtalking]

FS Yes.

MS There seems to be nothing that we can do or say which you don’t either agree with and dismiss or simply say it’s fundamentally wrong. I’m finding it very difficult to compose myself because I just feel so very angry about this. My son and my daughter both came here and did their GCSEs here; the elder daughter went to Collenswood and didn’t do quite so well. But the two who came here both got a very good set of GCSEs; my middle daughter then went on to Northampton University and got an honours degree there. My son has just been accepted at Northampton. Again, why are we closing a perfectly successful school community in favour of building big, shiny, buildings. I quote you, we are trying to create spectacular buildings. Can I also quote you again, I believe you’re fundamentally wrong, when you’re wrong I need to tell you, you’re wrong.

JD We understand, of course, that when we make proposals like this we will get people who fundamentally disagree with us. I absolutely understand that point and I respect your right to disagree and to say so. There are times when we’ll have to agree to disagree, Lindsay’s quite right, and, I think, you would under-estimate the work of the headteachers throughout the town to say this is just about buildings. As I say, there was no discussion about buildings until we talked about the curriculum and [unclear] for the future. Having said all that personally I don’t see why the children and young people of Stevenage shouldn’t be going to spectacular buildings, why not? Why shouldn’t the children in Stevenage have spectacular, beautiful, flexible schools with 21st century technology, good dining areas, good sports facilities. Why shouldn’t the children in Stevenage, to be frank, have the best schools in the country; and that’s what we’re looking to do. And there is a price to pay if we are going to create spectacular schools, I don’t think we should shy away from that. I would worry if the schools we create aren’t spectacular, and I don’t apologise for that. What I’m saying is though, and I keep saying, it’s not just about replacing the existing buildings with spectacular ones, it is about

Appendix 1B(i)

creating a pattern across the town. I absolutely accept the point, because you’re right, by having fewer schools you do reduce parental choice, there is a downside to these proposals. Some children will have to travel further, there will be a slight reduction in parental choice. What we’re saying is, in the long term, what we’ll end up with is a really good package of schools across the town with a great curriculum which leads automatically and routinely into post 16 higher education within Stevenage. But I accept the point that along the way people, and you’re clearly one of them will fundamentally disagree with what we’re proposing, and it’s your right to say so. And we will make sure that the level of disagreement is reported back. [overtalking]

MS In answer to your question, why shouldn’t children have big schools, do you remember being an 11 year old, entering your secondary school and how scary an experience that was and how the sixth form appeared like towering giants. And here you’re talking about doubling the size of the schools that we went to in order to install these spectacular shiny buildings. I wonder how long those spectacular shiny buildings will stay like your dream?

MS Okay, well, hopefully they’ll stay that way for a long time. The other things our new buildings will do will be they’ll be cheaper to run, they’ll be environmentally more friendly, they’ll be more efficient and more effective which will free up funding for schools to spend on teaching and classrooms. There’s an awful lot of reasons for wanting new buildings and I hope when these building open that the people of Stevenage take absolute pride in what we’re going to try and create. And the point I’m making to you, and again we’ll have to disagree on this, that’s fair enough, eight form entry schools are not big schools. Compared to the schools we currently have they are bigger, but in terms of the national picture there are some fantastically successful schools including in Hertfordshire which are eight forms of entry and bigger. And, I think, in the end there is an argument you had on that, but I would just disagree with you. I think that an eight form entry school can be very welcoming; it depends on the culture, the atmosphere, how children are welcomed to the school. And sixth formers don’t have to look scary, I would disagree with you. In most of our schools the sixth formers are a model to look up to; they can be used to help children to read, they help in our special needs departments. I’m very proud of the fact that our sixth formers work very well with our younger children; but I accept the point that when we’re proposing something like this there will be people who disagree with this, and you clearly do and I accept that. [asides]

S I’m in year seven and can you guarantee that my education, for example my GCSEs, won’t be jeopardised through all this unnecessary change?

JD The guarantee I can give you is two-fold, one we’ll do absolutely everything in our power to make sure you have a really good GCSE experience and do the best you possibly can. The other guarantee I’ll give you is that we will talk to pupils like yourself once we get through this process about exactly what you think you need to make that happen. And we’ll make sure we do come and talk to you like we came and talked to the pupils at

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Collenswood; we’ll make sure we come and talk directly. What we’d like to do is talk to the school’s council, but there are other ways we can do that. So we’ll do everything in our power and if you like when you get to do your year 10, 11 programme, contact me and you can tell me whether you’ve delivered or not. But we’ll do everything that we possibly can to make sure we do. [asides]

FS I’ve got a suggestion to make and a question to ask. The suggestion is that the next time you do anything like this could you please not do it during the year six, key stage two SATs. My son was very, very upset when he heard the news and it was right in the middle of his sups week.

JD That’s a fair point, we’ll take that back. There’s never an easy time but I accept that it’s not necessarily helpful to the year six kids.

FS Thank you. The question I’ve got is, you said earlier that they were going to use this site as a part of the new Barnwell School. In that case, why couldn’t it be then called the Heathcote School as the new school and keep the staff at this school?

JD Well, yes, because what we’re looking to do is to keep Barnwell, not Heathcote for the reasons I said earlier. What we’re saying is that Barnwell is broadly the size we need, we need to get it onto a single site rather than have a split site and, yes, it will be this whole site; that’s why we had to choose between closing Barnwell, closing Heathcote. What you’re kind of proposing is an amalgamation of the two schools, right. [overtalking] I’m not quite following.

FS You said that you were going to use this site…

JD Yes.

FS …as part of the new school.

JD Yes.

FS And you’re probably going to add new buildings to this site and use the grounds as well.

JD Yes.

PD We will be using both the Barnwell and the Heathcote sites.

FS So it is a split site school; because Barnwell’s right over there, it’s quite a way to walk to it; it’s definitely a split site school?

PD The two sites are actually very close when you look at the bottom of their playing fields. There will be different ways of achieving this and we will be working with people to work out what the best way of achieving it is. But you can have, for example, all the buildings on one site and all the playing

Appendix 1B(i)

field on the other; and the judgement is where you do that. That’s still the detail that we’ll work through under the Building Schools for the Future process. But the two sites will be needed, but in terms of pupils and students getting from one site to the other, the likely outcome is that all of the built environment is likely to be on one or the other of the sites, and all the playing fields and sports facilities on the other. And therefore the movement of students will be for the sports curriculum and that there is easy access through the bottom of the playing fields to get from one to the other; that’s the thinking at this point in time. [overtalking]

FS You said earlier all the money that’s going into ICT, if this site is just going to be used as an annex of Barnwell my daughter will start here in year seven in September, is this school going to get any of the money for ICT? Is it going to get any of the shiny, brand new equipment and the light flexible buildings that you were talking about earlier?

JD That’s a fair point; basically the children who are currently in the primary schools are the children who will benefit in the end from these new buildings. It will take a number of years to erect them and what we’re trying to do is have a building programme which means that they are taking place so the children who are currently in all the schools in Stevenage, if you like, certainly from years eight and nine, all the children throughout the town in the secondary schools probably will not benefit from this. This is a long-term project; the children who will benefit are the children who are currently in primary school.

FS But this school’s going to close, so you’re not going to tell me that you’re going to pay out hundreds of thousands of pounds into a school, brand new ICT equipment, and then close it?

JD No, we won’t.

FS So my daughter who starts in year seven will not get any of the brand new equipment.

JD But the point I’m making to you, that’s true of all the children throughout Stevenage. [overtalking] I know you do, but what I’m saying is, the new buildings and new infrastructure won’t be in place until 2011 and it will take two or three years to work its way through. So you’re quite right, the children who are currently in this school, the same as all the other children in the schools won’t benefit from this which is why we’re trying to make sure that the building programmes are taking place away from where the children are and then they move eventually to the new buildings. But that’s true of all the children in Stevenage. [asides]

MS I’ve sat and listened tonight through the whole session, my main objective in turning up here tonight is to understand… my lad is in year seven, what sort of level of education he’s going to get over the next four years? The lady over there made a very valid point from Collenswood and the young lad made a very valid point about looking after his interests. Where I feel is

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you’ve really scooted round the actual question, you spoke about talking to the teachers before their summer holiday. You spoke about collective responsibility of the Heads around Stevenage, who is actually going to look after our interests? It’s very incestuous to think that Hertfordshire County Council will look after our children over the next four years; making sure they get a decent level of education. We hear stories, day in, day out, our children coming home from Heathcote, our children like going to Heathcote, they learn well at Heathcote. And they’re coming home, and even now it’s quite difficult keeping hold of a decent level of teacher. We keep hearing stories of supply teachers coming in, fitting in gaps, it happens in every school. I have this vision over the next four years of erosion of good quality teachers who will leave, as we all would in our own industry. Whatever we do in our day-to-day activity, if we know we’re in an environment where it’s going to close over the next four years we can put our arms round people and say, don’t worry, your job will be safe in four years. We all appreciate that the good teachers will leave and we just see our teachers having an endless stream of supply teachers; who is looking after our interests? Will [unclear] be coming in and managing this school very closely over the next four years? Can he give us assurance of continuity of education; will the headmaster still be here in the next four years; where is the commitment?

JD I understand the dangers that you’re talking about because they’re real dangers. The problems you’re suggesting are real dangers that could happen. I can only go back to what I’m saying is, the guarantee I can give you is that we will do everything we can to work with the school to keep it running as it currently is because we believe it’s a good school. The children do like coming here, they do well, we are talking four years or more down the line, four years minimum; that’s a long period of time to manage this carefully. What we have to do is give some really good guarantees to staff particularly before the summer holidays so that they don’t sit there worrying for the whole six weeks, they can think, at least I’ve got a future, which ties them into a very exciting professional project across the town. We do need to work with parents; that goes back to the point we said right at the very beginning, to say, we will ensure your children don’t move mid-programme. We will work with you in terms of admissions so that parents still can send their children here knowing what the transition point will be. And we will do that as quickly as we possibly can.

MS Where is the measure; we will sit here every year looking at league tables?

JD What we, as an authority, will do, we have a system to monitor, challenge, support and intervene in schools. And we would allocate to the school and the other schools a team of people to work with that. So the school will have a dedicated HR Officer, dedicated person to help work on the curriculum, dedicated person to work with admissions, so there’s a resource that the school can draw on to plan and work carefully through the four years. And also, through the re-organisation procedures we can put additional resources into Heathcote. So if the numbers do fall slightly, and the budgets don’t quite, we can invest in the site. So the only guarantee I can give you is

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that we will do everything in our power to make this a good and vibrant school right up to the point of closure. As I said before, I do accept the point, there are some real dangers, and we need to move very quickly through the summer. Where we’ve got to be careful here is the level of detail that we can go into during this consultation process; what we can’t do is pre-empt the outcome of this and put plans in place which then can’t be pulled away. So what we will do is on the same time we can’t wait until a decision in October, so we will make decisions, we will work strategies through but we won’t take decisions which can’t, if you like, be undone if cabinet decide against these proposals. [asides]

MS Just going back to your earlier point on the size of the school, and I appreciate there’s two sides to the argument. One about smaller schools, 850 being the particular school that was mentioned earlier. And the 1,500 strong school that you’re talking about, for all of the schools of Stevenage it strikes me that a decision has already been made on the size of the school before the consultation process. Why on earth did you not ask the people of Stevenage and every single one whether every single child in Stevenage needed to go to a 1,500 strong school?

JD You’re quite right, these proposals are based on a size of school. And we have spoken to heads, governors, stakeholders, other people about this; and that’s the agreement we’ve come to. What I’m saying is similar to what I said earlier on, if people actually through the consultation process feel, we don’t want eight form entry schools, we will take that back and build it in; it is a consultation. Somebody talked about this as being fait accompli, you need to bear in mind two things, if we weren’t serious about listening to the points we wouldn’t be recording them, we wouldn’t have somebody from the independent private sector to facilitate and we certainly wouldn’t have large numbers of these meetings. What we would do if we wanted to get over this quickly, pack hundreds of people in, have one of these nights pretty well every night of the week between now and half way through July with groups about this size because we want to listen to what people are saying. What I am saying to you is, there are some givens here and one of the decisions we’ve made at policy level is we want to go to larger schools for the reasons I’ve set out. And if people disagree with that we’ll take that back from the consultation and feed that into the decision making process. But you’re quite right, as officers, we feel eight form of entry schools is the way we want to go for the reason I’ve set out.

MS The question of whether you’ve spoken to governors, I’m a governor of this school and I know other governors are here this evening. I haven’t been spoken to about the size of school and I don’t believe that the people of Stevenage have been given an opportunity to voice their opinion. And even with the consultation document that you’re talking about at the moment there is only two proposals.

JD Yes.

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MS And both of those are for more than 1,500 children in every single school.

JD We have invited the governors and headteachers to work with us during the stakeholder process and there’s been a lot of involvement in that. We can bat this back and forward, you are right, the proposals we are setting out here are based on the fundamental view that what we need are eight form entry schools to generate the curriculum model that we’re looking to develop to secure good sized sixth forms, to create efficiencies within the system so that schools can spend money on classrooms. That is a decision we’ve come to and that’s what we’re consulting on. And if you disagree with that, say so, as you are tonight, and in the form and we’ll feed back in the process.

MS Certainly the evidence shows that those schools are both difficult to manage in terms of the staffing but also in terms of discipline; the children become a cog in the machine.

JD No.

MS It’s true, you need to look at the information that is published about that size of school and the detrimental effect that it has on the children’s education.

JD What I’m saying is I could present you with lots of evidence on both sides of the story.

MS So give us the choice.

JD We can talk about statistics and research, actually you can make it meet either argument. Actually the quality of the school in the end comes down to its leadership, the quality of teaching, the breadth and enrichment of the curriculum, the way people talk to you; it’s not about the size of the school. The size of the school does change the way in which the school has to be managed, the way in which the school has to be organised but there isn’t a direct impact, big schools equals bad behaviour, that’s not what the evidence says.

MS No, but there is proof to suggest that is the case in some cases.

JD What I’m saying to you is, I can take you to some of the best schools in the country which are four forms of entry and some of the best schools in the country which are 12 forms of entry. It’s not about their size, it’s about the way they’re run, the planning and the detail. The size changes the nature of the school and changes the way in which you have to run it; and there are advantages to both sides. What you can’t do with the small schools is generate the breadth of the curriculum which we want to generate at key stage four.

MS That point I agree with, yeah.

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FS [asides] Thank you very much. [overtalking]

Appendix 1B(i)

Heathcote 14-06-07 

  Speaker key JW Jane WiltonLM Lindsay MartinJD Justin DonovanPD Pauline DavisM? Male speaker from the floorF? Female speaker from the floorFL Floor in general. JS        Welcome to this public consultation this evening. My name is Jane Wilton and I work with a company called Accent who are an independent market research agency. We’ve been asked by Hertfordshire County Council to facilitate the meetings round this BSF with you, from schools here. And the reason for me being here is that I’m independent and that I’m here really to make sure that your views are heard and that the consultation is run in a fair and proper manner. So the way the evening is going to run is that there will be a presentation first of all, by the panel here, led by Lindsay Martin and then after that I’ll open the meeting to questions. Now you can see I’m actually wearing a microphone and you did hear me speak into it. That’s not because I can’t necessarily make you hear by shouting but it’s in order that we record it. And so there will be a transcript of this meeting on the website and possibly a recording of it too. We’re not sure technically whether that’s possible but I think people are trying to see if it is. So I think without much more ado we can go into the first part of the meeting which is the presentation. But can I just ask you please to check your mobile phones. Can you make sure they’re turned off and not on silent because apparently they interfere with the equipment and we get lots of buzzing? Thank you very much; I’ll hand over to Lindsay now to start the presentation.  LM Thank you Jane. Hope you can all hear me and I’ll just allow you a little time to deal with the mobiles. Obviously if you’ve got babysitting arrangements and need to be contacted in an emergency please do leave them on silent but for preference turn them off because they make a nasty bleeping noise in the system. So welcome to you all this evening. To some of you probably for the second time as I see a few familiar faces around. I’m going to say the same things as last time so if you’ve heard it before bear with me because there will be other people who haven’t. So as Jane has said this is what we’re going to do this evening, I’m going to introduce my colleagues and then I’m going to talk about Building Schools for the Future, which is the context within which this review is taking place. My colleague will then talk about why we need an area review and what our proposals are and then the main part of the evening is over to you to give us your comments and to ask your questions which we will do our best to answer. So who’s here on the County Council? Can I introduce Justin Donovan on my far left, your right, who is Deputy Director of Children, Schools and Families and the Chief

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Education Officer; Pauline Davis, the Area Planning Manager in charge of the detailed work on Stevenage; I’m Lindsay Martin and I do what it says on the screen. So, Building Schools for the Future. Well, this isn’t the future, is it? This is the past. And I guess there isn’t anybody here old enough, even me, who is old enough to remember schools as they used to be 100 years or so ago. But this picture tells us what it looked like. But I guess there are people here who are familiar with some of the equipment that was around say 30, 40 odd years ago. Grant Thornton’s slide rule. I certainly used one when I was at school, I don’t know if any of you know what a slide rule is. Do you? Do you know what a slide rule is? No, you’ve never even seen a slide rule have you? No. But a calculator like this, calculators, I remember when they started and I’m sure there are many people here who remember the introduction of calculators, four figure tables and so on. And these are the buildings, the rather elderly buildings now, that that education took place in and in which much education still takes place in now. This isn’t actually a school in Stevenage, it’s a school in another part of Hertfordshire but you will recognise the sort of building that we’re talking about. Built in Stevenage between the early 1950’s starting with Barclay, up to the late 1960’s with The Valley Secondary School which is now The Valley Special School with obviously, later editions. But the original buildings were all built between the early 50’s and the late 60s. And they’re all in that steel framed structure with these beams up here, characteristic beams. We have very many of these buildings here in Hertfordshire and they’re all of that sort of 40, 50 year old age. But schools can look like this, they can be modern buildings, they can be interesting and attractive buildings, and they can be fit for purpose in other worlds they can be designed for the way teachers want to teach and the way learners need to learn. And you won’t see I guess many school buildings that look like that in Hertfordshire at the moment. In fact you won’t see any because we haven’t built a secondary school in Hertfordshire since 1975. So what is the Building Schools for the Future? It’s the government’s major investment in secondary and special schools, aimed to transform educational opportunities and outcomes for young people. And it’s worth more than £2 billion annually. A very large government investment. And the first wave of that money in Hertfordshire is coming to Stevenage. About £145 million worth, including £12 million for ICT, information and communications technology, as some indication of how important that particular dimension is. It is obviously an exciting opportunity for Stevenage to get that level of investment for all the pupils in Stevenage, no matter which school they are now in. And it’s vital for us to get that investment right. We have a once in several lifetimes opportunity to make a major investment in schools. So there is a very heavy responsibility on us to spend that money as wisely as we can or we’re not giving future generations of pupils the sorts of chances and opportunities that they deserve. And this roughly, this is a bit boring, I’ll go over this rather quickly, is the process you don’t get hundreds of millions of pounds from central government without a lot of strings attached and in this particular case we have to submit quite a lot of paper work for approval over a period of time. We started it in April, a couple of months ago, it runs right through to next March before we are able to set the procurement in process. What that means is start the process of getting a contractor to do the building work, which won’t start until let’s say 2009 or thereabouts. It’s a long drawn

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out process because government wants to put lots of checks into the process of spending that very large amount of public money. But I’m talking a lot about buildings and a lot about money but actually that doesn’t come first and it hasn’t come first in the way we’ve been planning for this. What comes first is this vision of education for Stevenage that all school heads have been involved in formulating, as have other stakeholders in the Stevenage area. And I’ll quickly run through what that vision is because it’s important that the vision comes first, and the buildings come afterwards - a focus on excellent teaching and effective learning. I’m sure this is a whole set of things that nobody I suspect would argue with. A commitment to raising attainment and aspirations by participation. Schools which serve and lead the community with a range of public services. Commitment to the promotion of healthy lifestyles, participation in sport. A diverse range of specialisms including vocational specialisms. The central importance of ICT so that we prepare young people for what they’re going to leave school for and the world of work that they will enter. And of course, light, attractive and flexible spaces. The sort of spaces that young people want to be in and find stimulating, that teachers want to be in and are effective for use. But the point about them is to deliver learning and teaching. We don’t build schools just to produce architecturally interesting buildings. We produce schools because people need to learn and to teach in them in surroundings which enable that to happen in the best and most effective way. Now most stakeholders, certainly a majority of stakeholders that we consulted, agreed on these things, that we needed a smaller number of mainstream schools with larger sixth forms and more specialisms, big enough to be flexible but still small enough to support those key relationships between students and staff. Closer links between mainstream and special schools, even closer links with North Herts College. The links are already in Stevenage very good, probably better than anywhere else in the county for working links for schools and further education. But we can strengthen them still further; they can be strengthened still further. And we need improved facilities for the education support centre, which is in temporary and very unsatisfactory accommodation. So, moving on from that to the area review process in Stevenage – and I’ll hand over to my colleague Pauline. Do you want this kit?

PD Good evening everybody. As Lindsay said, let’s explore why we need an area review. Well, first of all the money. The money is only a means to an end. The money is the means to realise that vision that Lindsay was just talking about. And it’s quite a lot of money. We’re not going to get that degree of investment in your schools for a long, long time in the future so it’s important that when we spend it we spend it wisely. And it’s important too that we create the right number of school places to meet the demand for them from your children and also to have schools in the right locations. So let’s have a look at what’s happened so far with this review. We started the review in January. A wide group of stakeholders came together, a mixture of head teachers, governor representatives, Borough Councillors, County Councillors, college, primary head teachers, a whole range of people came together to discuss that vision, to formulate that vision. To say well, what is it that young people will need to be able to do in the future? And how will their teaching and learning begin to look like in the future. And therefore what sort of

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education system, what kind of provision would we need? And they joined with us in coming forward with some potential solutions, some options for making the right number of places in the right location and of the right type. We had a long list of options and we evaluated them against four tests that were devised by the Director of Children, Schools and Families to make sure that when we’re considering future options we take a fairly holistic approach to it. The Director then considered all of those suggestions and decided which of those he would want to get your views on and that’s why we’re here today at a second meeting at this school and we’ve had meetings at other schools as part of a public consultation process. I’ll just give you a couple of seconds to read through those four tests. You’ll see they cover not only places but about education standards, it covers building design and cost and as I say we’re fortunate to have so much money potentially available to us in Stevenage for this and also we need to make sure that transition arrangements are good. So, let’s have a look at that issue of the right number of places for the future. In 2017 we project we will need 48 forms of entry. For those of you who are not sure what a form of entry is it’s a group of 30 students entering into each year group. Why 2017 you might say? The government say to us you should plan for ten years ahead. So we think we need 48 forms of entry and that includes a surplus of places of around 10% and that’s to ensure that there is flexibility for you as parents to express preferences for schools other than perhaps your local schools and to enable you some opportunity to achieve them. We know that the places currently are unevenly distributed between schools and the areas in the town. We have different size schools, we have schools side by side, and we have whole areas without schools in them at the moment. And we know that recent housing developments have changed the shape of Stevenage. And that there are more people living in the north of the town now than ever before, whole areas of new housing and less intense occupation of housing in other areas. And just to mention to you that a new secondary school is also planned for the very large development which town planning is going through for the west of Stevenage. So as and when, if and when that development comes on stream, new schools will be provided within that very large distinct community. Let’s have a look at the map. I’ve just talked about the west of Stevenage. That’s the west of Stevenage. We’ve got whole new areas of the town up here that have no provision. And we’ve identified a site right at the north of the town to have a new school building, a school in that area to serve that new community. As I say, we’ve got schools very close together and a whole range of things going on within your town. I’ll come back to that map in a moment. So let’s have a look at the proposals for mainstream schools. And I know if you’ve come here tonight you’re likely to be interested in the proposal that affects this school. The County Council’s preferred proposal is to create a pattern of eight FE mainstream schools. That’s 240 places entering into the school in each year group and that’s the list of those proposed eight FE schools. You’ll notice there that what we intend to do is move the Thomas Alleyne school from its current site to that new site in the north of the town. The important thing for you here I’ve no doubt is that one school will need to close down in that scenario and the proposal is that it’s the closure of this school. So if I nip back to that map, what we will have is a school serving this whole area up here that currently has no provision. We’ve got a Roman

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Catholic school there that serves the whole town of course; we’ll have one school here to serve this area here. We’ll have a school there and a school there that will serve not only this area here but because at Marriotts school we intend to build a new building at the south end of the land of Brittain Way, there will be a new entrance on the southern side so that opens up places amongst those two schools for this whole area here. And then a school here to serve this area and some of the outlying villages. I should also say that it’s not intended in the future that Barnwell School continues to operate out of the former Collenswood site. Now there is a second proposal in the document that you will have received. That proposal is there simply because at this particular point in time we are not 100% there in terms of the land required for either the expansion of Marriotts or the creation of the new school in the north. That doesn’t mean to say that we have any doubts about that happening, the land owner in the north has agreed to sell the land to us and we’re confident about the Marriotts site but it would be wrong of us to tell you that all the documentation is signed at this point in time. And because of the timescales it’s necessary to warn you of that minor risk and to say what would happen if one or the other of those sites for some unforeseen circumstance didn’t come through. That would mean that we would have fewer schools and they would be larger and in that situation Heathcote School would continue to be proposed to close and depending on which site we’re talking about that we’re not expecting to but should it run into difficulty the corresponding school would need to close as well. Now I know that you’re probably here because of Heathcote school but the document does include some proposals for special schools and I will briefly go through those and I can answer questions if you want us to concentrate a little bit longer on that. For Lonsdale School, the school with children with physical and neurological impairments, it can either stay where it is and have some improvement or it can relocate to one of those two mainstream school sites. For Greenside school which is the all age school for children with severe learning difficulties, the school already have a working relationship with Barnwell and the proposal is that accommodation is provided for the secondary age children alongside the Barnwell school to enable better collaboration and that the primary age students remain in the existing building so that they have far more space available to them rather than housing all the children in that building. For the valley school, the school for secondary age pupils with moderate learning difficulties, and we know some of them have more complex needs, they can either stay where they are right the way through to a spectrum of closing that school and having special needs units for children with moderate learning difficulties in each of those mainstream secondary schools. They could for example simply locate to another mainstream school instead of staying where they are or they could maintain responsibility for all the children and the children will be on the role of The Valley School or the children would be dispersed among other schools and the staff would professionally support their development from The Valley. So, important things for you as parents no doubt are the transitional arrangements. First of all let’s talk about building plans and work. We want all of you to be involved in the development of school projects. We clearly, when we’re doing building works in any site will plan that so that disruption is kept to a minimum and obviously, where we’re building new buildings we won’t be moving the children into them until they’re complete. For closing

Appendix 1B(i)

schools and that’s particularly relevant here, we’re absolutely sure that what we need to do is handle this very carefully and sensitively. A proposal to close a school is one of the most important and difficult decisions that the County Council would ever take. So we’re conscious that we need to be very careful about the way we do that and what we want to do is work with you, with the school and the staff should the proposal and the development proceed, so that you can be confident about the quality of the teaching and learning for your children in that period before the school closes. For staff it’s important that staff continue to be involved and school management teams, governors, in that development of the transition plans because they will know what will work and we want them to be involved. And we mustn’t forget that this is a town wide issue. We’re talking about a whole change for the town and all of the schools are involved. You will see that there is expansion in other schools therefore everybody working in the schools at the moment, whatever the proposals for them, we want them to be involved and they want them to support each other in this period of transition. And we will facilitate redeployment of staff if that becomes necessary. We have an excellent track record of supporting staff and helping them move to other positions should they wish to. So for students, what we want to do is to work on clear transition plans. What we will promise you is that we won’t issue statutory notices, and I’ll explain what they are in a moment, we won’t get to a statutory notice stage unless there are clear and concise transition plans for you to understand so that you know if you have a child in this school for example, just what their progression routes and what the plans for them would be. We will also commit that we won’t move students in this school, or any other school for closure, part way through a key stage. And for those of you who’s children could be moving to another school the County Council makes a contribution to the cost of any new uniform and what we normally do is work with the school and the school identifies the uniform requirements and gets some economies of scale in bulk buying and supplies them to you. So the important thing of tonight is to listen to what you have to say and to answer your questions. But before we do that let’s just be clear how the decision will be taken and when that will happen. First of all it’s absolutely essential that you tell us what you think and that you ask the questions and we will answer them the best we can at this point in time. But please tell us what you think, write to us, fill out the form on the back of the consultation document, go onto the web, send us an e-mail. We don’t mind how you tell it to us but what we really do want is to hear what you want to say, the reason being that we have to pass all of your views on to the County Councillors who will be taking the decision whether or not to proceed with any of these proposals and they need to be informed by your views. So we’ve got this public consultation exercise, it finishes on 7 August. What my job is, is then to get all of your responses and identify all of the issues that you’ve raised during that consultation period and report that first of all to the Education Panel. And that’s a panel that advises the cabinet of the County Council and the Cabinet of the County Council is where the decision is ultimately made, of their views based on the outcome of this consultation. The Education Panel meets on the 3 October and the cabinet on 15 October. And you will see there that both of those meetings are open to the public. It doesn’t mean it’s a public meeting where you can just get up and stand up and want to speak. You can come along and watch the

Appendix 1B(i)

proceedings. What normally happens though is for schools for example who are affected by one of the proposals it’s normal that a representative from the school in whatever way they wish, has an opportunity to speak to that Cabinet. But it’s usually one representative or so for the school, speaking on behalf of the school. If the cabinet of the County Council wanted to proceed with any of those proposals and they constitute what is known in law as a prescribed alteration, forgive the language, it means an alteration which the government determine is significant enough to warrant a further legal process and a school closure is one of those, we would have to publish what’s known as a statutory notice. And it’s an advert in the paper to say the County Council intends to do this on that date and this is what the transition arrangements will be. They last for six weeks and anybody will have a right to object. And if anybody objects then we have to again, feed back those objections, back to the County Council for it to make a final decision based on some of those views, those objections that have been made. We’re expecting that decision, when I made this slide I thought it would be the end of 2007, I have to say it’s probably now going to be January and I just want you to know that. So at this stage I’m going to stop talking and allow you the opportunity to ask questions. Thank you.

JW Right. We will now take questions from the floor until nine o’clock and I will be closing the meeting at nine o’clock. What I want to draw attention to is that we understand the strong feelings and know how difficult it is and that you want to express all of them, but can I please ask you not to all shout at once and to take the questions one at a time. Mostly because, apart from the fact that nobody can really hear anything and you don’t get the right answers, the other thing is that it won’t get recorded and part of the whole business of this consultation process is to have this meeting as a record so those things can be heard by the councillors on the tape or read in the transcript. To that end Katie over there will be actually passing a microphone to the people who are actually speaking. What I would like to say is that we don’t have hours and hours, there’s quite a lot of people here, I’d like to get everybody in who has a point of view so please just try and make a couple of points or a couple of questions and then we’ll move on. I will ask the people that haven’t spoken to speak before I come back to people who are raising another issue. And I will try and come round to everybody and I will come back to people if it’s at all possible. So we’ll just do what we can. Right, so let’s take the first question then. Thank you. From the front here.

F? You’re quite right, we were here last time. We were a bit shocked last time to find out that we wouldn’t actually be moving to Barnwell, which is what we had assumed, wrongly obviously, and that the school would actually close in four years time and our children would be dispersed across the town. Those that are still here. My issue really is that in four years time the school will not be as it is now. You cannot preserve this in aspic until then. A school isn’t just about teachers, it’s about everybody who works here, from the admin to the support staff, it’s a whole school issue, it’s a community is what it actually is. And it’s a community we chose to send our children to as a smaller school. What I want to know is, I have two children and I have three years left in this school. I have one who is about to go into sixth form next

Appendix 1B(i)

year and her little sister will follow her. That’s three years. They’re actually doing incredibly well and that’s due to the school, they’re doing spectacularly well, and my fear is that they won’t reach their potential because who’s going to teach their A levels, who’s going to do that? You’re not going to keep the staff here unless you’re going to give them stonking great big huge golden handshakes, are you? The staff here have a lot of experience, they need to move on with their careers, everybody does, you would yourself and in their situation I can’t blame them. If you’re deputy head at a school and an opportunity comes up somewhere else you’re going to go – I’ll have to take that. We’re going to lose our quality staff, we’re going to lose our community and we’re going to lose our support staff and our admin staff and all the people that make Heathcote what it is. And I truly do not understand why you want to close a good working school. Your maps pay no attention to all of that great lump from Knebworth and Datchworth that are coming here. Your map would appear to be wrong actually. It would appear to be that you’re shoving everything over that end of the town and only leaving us with Barnwell. I am absolutely appalled that you are still considering it. [clapping]. But I’m not actually finished, Mr Donovan. Could I just ask you, would you be prepared as an authority to give us a written guarantee that our children – what did you say, transform outcomes for young people – could you give us a written guarantee that our children’s education will not suffer? That my girls will leave this school with the A levels that they’re capable of getting if they’re given the good teaching that they’ve got so far, which they won’t have when they have supply teachers. And I have to say that a lot of the supply teachers the children can’t even understand. Would you do that? Would you give us a written guarantee that our children’s education is safe in your hands?

JD Okay. Quite a lot in there so I’ll try and cover as much of that as I can. I mean, the first thing to say – we need to be absolutely straight with you here – absolutely understand that if you are a pupil in Heathcote at the moment or a pupil in Heathcote at the moment, there isn’t a lot in this for you. We’re going to have a great difficulty convincing you this is a good idea because what we’re looking to do here is create a pattern of schools across the town for the future. The kids who are really going to benefit in Stevenage are the kids who are currently in years three, four, and five. And I understand that point. So that the children who are currently in the schools are not going to get the same benefits as the kids who are coming through. I understand that point but if you’re going to create a different pattern of schools in the town for the long terms future based on the future not the past, because remember these schools were built in the pre-war years. The shape of the town has changes, the population has changed, and the technology has changed. Then there would have been some disruption and I accept that point. In terms of working with this school to move forward what I will do is give you the commitment that we will do all we can to maintain the school as a vibrant school. The key point on this is – I absolutely accept the point in terms of securing staff. Now over a four or five year period there is always a turnover in staff, I understand that point. What we need to be able to do if staff do go that they are being replaced with staff who want to stay in Stevenage, not staff who are just supply teachers. All of our schools across the county have got some part time teachers, some supply teachers, but I understand the point.

Appendix 1B(i)

What we don’t want is a school which is coming up to 2011 full of supply staff. What we will do is two things, one, try and convince as many of the good staff in Heathcote to stay. And some will want to stay and some won’t and we understand the frustration and the anger and the reason that we think they might well want to stay is because actually Stevenage over the next five or six years is going to be a really exciting place to be. It’s going to be all new or significantly new schools, schools independent from the authority, a trust across the town so that there’s collaboration at key stage for the sixth form. There’s nothing like this anywhere else in the country that we’re planning to do here, they’ve come close to it in Manchester but not... So we’re hoping that some of the staff will say, well actually the town of Stevenage provides me with a very exciting career over the next five to ten years if they want to participate in that. Now we have to make those staff who are worried about their jobs and I would be worried if I was them as well, we have to make it possible for those staff to actually plan that. So we will be coming forward fairly quickly, certainly early next term and I’ve talk to the staff myself about the summer break about some of the things that we might be able to put in place. So for example, because you need to bear in mind that you’re not talking here about a reduction in school numbers, we’ve got the similar number of kids, slightly more kids actually, so we’re not – we don’t need to shed staff, we want to hang onto staff. And there’s lots of things you can do. So for example making appointments when they become available in schools when they are expanding, make those appointments early from Heathcote staff so that they know they have a job to go to in the following... There are lots of things you can do like that. And yes, we might have to consider financial incentives for people to stay. So we’ll do all we can to hang onto the staff to keep that community going. Not just teaching staff but non teaching staff as well. But I understand the danger and I understand your concern. What I can do is give you a guarantee we’ll do everything in our power to make sure that the school does continue along the lines...

JW Excuse me. Could you hold on for the mike? Do you want to just come back quickly on that and then I’ll move on to someone else.

F? But you’re not actually prepared to guarantee that my children’s education is safe in your hands at the moment. It doesn’t feel safe, Mr Donovan; I have to say to you it does not feel safe.

JD I understand that. You made that point at the last meeting and I understand that. What I am saying to you is that I couldn’t give you a written guarantee for any of our 76 secondary schools.

F? But the risk isn’t yours to take.

JD Because secondary schools vary in terms of quality and what they’re doing. What I can do is give you a guarantee that we’ll do everything in our power to work with the school to make sure it works its way through and is a vibrant school right until closure. That’s the guarantee I will give you.

Appendix 1B(i)

F? Then I think you will be failing because you will not be transforming the opportunities and outcomes for my young children here.

JD I accept the point that for the children who are currently in the schools in Stevenage, not just here but all across Stevenage, the children who are currently in the schools are not going to benefit in the same way as the children who are coming through. If it takes four or five year to actually build the schools and put them in place then that’s a whole cohort of children going through. But we have to start this at some point so that some children will benefit from what I think is a really exciting pattern. But I do accept the point that the children who are currently here and will face a lot of the disruption are not the children who will benefit in the same way as the children in the future.

JW Thank you. Right. Could I just go to that lady over there and then I’ll come back to you?

P? Ever since I’ve attended school everything has seemed to go wrong. From an early age I didn’t get my choice of primary school, my parents chose Ashtree but we were told they had to send me to Bandley Hill. Then my parents had to fight to keep open that school which resulted in the change from Bandley Hill to Featherstone Wood. In the build up to the school change we lost many excellent teachers who left the school. When I was in year four I had three different teachers in one year. I will never forget that year because the influx of teachers meant constant disruption and change to our learning syllabus. When I was in year six I was the only child in my class who got three level fives but I was also the only child who did not get any of my three choices of secondary school. I was given Collenswood. I hated the idea of attending Collenswood but I knew in myself that if I wanted to I would be able to achieve what I wanted at any school. I loved it at Collenswood in the end but then another boundary crossed my path. It was Barnwell. Once again I said I’d stay there and give it another try but no matter how hard I worked my [unclear] vastly went downhill and I know from being informed by my friends who still attend there who I’ve kept in touch with that it still is today. From September 2006 to January 2007 my grades dropped from above average to average and it wasn’t my fault. The frequent change of teachers and the new way of teaching has really hit home to not only me but also to other students. In January I left Barnwell and started at Heathcote and I have to say that it’s one of the best things I’ve ever done. Now I’m proud to say that my grades have picked up once again and personally I think it’s thanks to the amazing teachers at Heathcote. My journey through school has been messed around enough as it is. Please don’t mess it up any more. What’s going to happen to the poor children in the future? Why make other children suffer in the way that I have done. At the end of the day, as parents and teachers said last week, it’s not the shiny new flashy classrooms that we need to learn in, it’s the care and effort put in by the wonderful teachers that we already have. As a student I know that it’s all I need to [unclear] and the improvement in my grades in the past five and a half months at Heathcote has proved that to me.

[clapping]

Appendix 1B(i)

I do absolutely understand the point that disruption to children and when we reorganise schools it can be disruptive and it can make an impact. What I’m saying to you is in fact it is disruptive and what I’m saying is we will do all we can to minimise that disruption and I think that’s all we can do. In terms of the children that you’re referring to in terms of the children coming through what we’re saying to you is that in terms of this program what we’ll have for the next 40 years or so in Stevenage are schools which are in terms of the buildings better than any other and a set pattern of schools, which reflect where the children now live because the pattern of school where they are currently reflects where people used to live and not where they now live. The residential shape of the town has changed. And I know this is about schools and I absolutely accept your point, schools are about communities, children, staff and the ethos and I’ve seen some brilliant teaching in some fairly poor classrooms. But you know there comes a point where the buildings are just not fit for purpose any more. The technology has moved on, we’ll be investing huge sums in new buildings which are purpose built for the curriculum of the future, where children will be able to opt into a much wider range of vocational programmes, which will automatically go on into post 16 courses and the rest. So I absolutely accept – it’s a similar point – we are actually here trying to create a pattern of schools and if you like a vision, for the young children of Stevenage to grow into. And I know the people that are being disrupted at the moment want benefit from that in the same way but that’s what we’re trying to do and we’ll try and keep that disruption down to a minimum by making sure buildings are complete before children move, making sure if children do move they don’t move during key stages. By doing all we can to maintain all of the staff who want to stay in Stevenage and actively, nationally recruiting staff from outside of Stevenage who would like to come here because of what we’re doing. I mean, what we will do once we get through this consultation process is get some national coverage of what’s going to go on in Stevenage so that teachers from across the country will want to come here and teach as well as hanging onto the teachers that we’ve got at the moment.

JW There’s a lady here that’s waiting. Thank you.

F? Have I got this right that Barnwell East will be closing, do we hear tonight? Is that one of the things that you’ve just said? Which is old Collenswood, is that right?

JD Yes. Barnwell [unclear] Collenswood site was always a temporary measure because when we closed Collenswood because of the standards there that was always just going to be a temporary measure for a few years. And so in terms of Barnwell, Barnwell will not continue to use the Collenswood site in the future. That was always the case.

F? But what will happen to that site?

JD Eventually when it’s not needed it will be sold off, unless the council needs to use it for other purposes.

F? What will happen to this site, what will happen to Heathcote?

Appendix 1B(i)

JD I’m sorry, this is your territory Lindsay, but the Heathcote and the Barnwell sites will come together so that they will be one site across the two.

F? But hang on, wasn’t it three weeks ago that apparently on a Barrett site that this land was going on, this land is already going to Barrett’s; three weeks ago it was on the website apparently.

LM No. No, never heard of that I’m afraid. Absolutely not.

F? Well lots of other people have heard of it.

LM Well, I haven’t.

F? If you’re closing the old Collenswood site, apparently if we’ve got other proposals we’re allowed to put them forward, you’re closing that site, why not leave this one open and then close Marriotts? Why are you closing us down instead of Marriotts? And I understand we’re not geographically in the right place on the map. But on your map you haven’t even put Knebworth on there. And the villages have now chosen this school as their school so Knebworth, Aston, Datchworth, their children come here. Where are their children going to go when Heathcote’s gone? Are they going to have to go all the way over to the new school?

PD No, that’s not the intention at all. The children from the villages will if they want to and expect to, attend the school in the south. What we’re doing is we’re redistributing the pattern of schools but we’re also increasing the size of the schools. Now you will realise as some of you already here live near the old Collenswood site for example and because of the closure or Collenswood more students from that area of the town are coming further south to the schools here. But in the future Nobel School will expand, Marriotts School will expand, there’s be a new school in the north, so all those people in the north of the town have had to come further south into the middle of the town to take up school places won’t be taking those places. More students from the centre of the town and the Collenswood site will be able to access places at Nobel and Marriotts and that will create enough places here for all the people in this area and from the villages. A lot of the students in Barnwell School in particular, and some of the students at this school are former students who live and would have gone to school around that Collenswood area, which would then have a great choice and more places available to them in other schools.

JW Did you want to make a point? You had your hand up but I can move on here.

F? It was just to do with the slide about consultation. You want to know what we think; you want us to write to you, you want e-mails etc. If we all do that, does anything every change? Can this decision be changed? If everybody says, this is a really bad idea, you’re sacrificing my daughters, and I’m really unhappy about it and we all say, no, we don’t want this to happen,

Appendix 1B(i)

this cannot happen to this school, will anything change? Because if it won’t it’s a waste of time.

JD Okay. A couple of points on that. Firstly this is a consultation process. It’s not if you like a referendum. So if lots of people say, we don’t like this, in that sense it’s not a kind of count the votes, it’s not that kind of consultation. And so there have been changes made across the county where there’s been a lot of stiff opposition to change and people have said pretty universally, we don’t want it, but frankly have not brought forward any compelling counter arguments and counter suggestions and those proposals have gone through. But there are a number, one in three or so, which officers make in public meetings like this, which when they go through the next stages of the political processes, do change. I’ve got examples here in Stevenage not long ago when we were proposing primary review through a three form elementary primary school not so far from here. There was a lot of opposition about that and cabinet said look, we want your officers to go back and have a re-think and that’s why we’ve two and a one form entry school federated on that site. So there’s still three forms of entry there but there was a compromise and to be fair that’s working very well. So there are occasions, more occasions actually than people give the credit for, where the thing is changed. So the consultation process is important. The other thing I’d say is to be fair about this, we wouldn’t be in Heathcote four times with small groups like this if we didn’t want to listen to what you had to say. Even if we end up disagreeing. We could end up with just one evening because these are quite difficult evenings as you can imagine, they’re very polite but these are not easy meetings for officers. We could say, let’s do it once, pack the hall out, take the difficulty and then move on. We wouldn’t be out, and we three are virtually out every night between now and halfway through it. I’m not looking for sympathy, I know I won’t get any, but we wouldn’t be out night after night after night here and in Letchworth if we weren’t genuinely listening. Yes, but also Letchworth, we have a review going at Letchworth at the same time. So we’re here some nights and Letchworth others. Pauline was at Letchworth last night. We wouldn’t do that if we didn’t want to listen to what people are saying. What I am saying to you is that we do feel we’ve got a compelling case for children of the future in Stevenage to have fewer larger schools, less space here, more space in the north so people feel able to go to the schools in their own community and I think rather than just say, we don’t want to do what you’re doing, my advice to you is if you want to change this is by all means say that, but suggest another way forward and a different solution and those will then get spoken about. The other thing we can do is, very often when schools close a kind of a pressure group forms and groups come together. If that’s the case we can arrange for a representative of that group to talk to the education panel direct. The other thing we will do, every single form you fill in, letter you write and e-mail you send, we print out, even e-mails, in hard copy and they’re made available to all the elected members. So as Pauline says, she will write a report which tries to capture the overall feeling and from the first meeting here and now the second meeting we’re fairly clear what the feeling is, we will capture that. And you will be able to test that and say, well, hang on a minute that’s not quite right because you can go back to the individual comment and you can say to members, well, you didn’t

Appendix 1B(i)

read this letter; you didn’t read that, so all that’s available. So what I’m saying to you is this isn’t a referendum, we’re not counting votes in that sense, although we do count responses and say how many were for and against. It’s a consultation in terms of what are people out there really thinking? They do make a difference. Not every time, I’m not saying if you make enough noise it’s going to go away, that’s not how it operates but there are changes made as a result of consultation.

JW There’s a lady there.

F? We come from Aston, our son went to a school in Walkern where there’s currently about 75, 80 children through the whole school. So to come even into this size school was quite a big step really. It took him about a term to settle down. He was actually really quite ill because he had no other friends coming here. I actually wanted to talk about the size of schools because you talk about changing the size of schools and I don’t really feel that eight forms of entry or ten forms of entry are really of benefit to the children. I wonder why the government are deciding now to make these super size schools. I feel education, as the lady said earlier, school is not just about education but there’s a moral issue, there’s a community issue. There’s social skills, relationship skills, authority. There’s just the whole range that the children are learning through these years and I don’t feel that at this size school that can occur. I don’t feel that the children are going to get the support that they need. There’s just too many in a school. There can never be a whole school assembly. I doubt you’ll get a year, maybe a year assembly. But with that amount of children I wonder what the benefits are to our children to be in these sizes.

[clapping]

JD It’s a very key issue because the proposals we are making here are based on eight forms of entry schools. And so if as a community you don’t agree with eight forms of entry schools because you’re never going to agree with the pattern because it is based on eight forms as a minimum. Couple of things I’d say on this, first of all we did carry out a lot of research, not for this review actually, but for in fact the Stevenage Primary review because there was a lot of discussion there about the fact that elementary schools are huge. And while we did the research we carried it out cross phase and had a look at that. And actually I could show you a convincing statistical argument to support schools of any size I chose. The evidence is slim in terms of standards and some of the great and the good will come out and say, the best size school is six forms, some will say eight, some will say twelve even. So the research is very unhelpful. What I would say to you though is that the size of school doesn’t seem to make the impact people think it does on if you like the attitudes and the feeling of being part of a community. What it does is change the way the school has to be organised. So first of all eight forms of entry is not a big school, it’s bigger than many of the schools in Hertfordshire but across the country that is not a big school. Lots and lots of schools are eight forms of entry; some or ten some are even twelve. And some of our highest performing schools in Hertfordshire are eight and bigger schools. But

Appendix 1B(i)

what it does, it changes the way the school has to be managed. So you have to think of the children as being part of a year group and you have year assemblies. I would say one of the reasons you couldn’t have a whole school assembly in some of our schools is the halls are too small. I don’t want to get too many bad looks from Lindsay but I would want an eight form or entry school to have an assembly hall big enough to get them all in. And with a stage and with lighting. So one of the things we would argue for is to have all the children in the hall at the same time so we can have proper assemblies. But also children to meet in year groups. Other schools, some of the larger schools, because eight form of entry isn’t particularly large, but some of the ten, twelve form entry schools across the country organise themselves into houses. So children are grouped even in form groups of different ages and the older children have a buddying system to look after the younger children. So it’s the way in which it operates. But certainly children who come from very small primary schools into a secondary school, a very small secondary school, often find that daunting. And what we need to do is make sure we’ve got some proper induction arrangements. So the reason we’re going for eight forms – what I’m saying to you is in terms of all those reasons you’re talking about, it changes the way the school has to be set up and managed rather than stops that happening. The main impact, the main reason we want to do this is that the schools are big enough, have a big enough key stage four cohort, enough children in key stage four to be able to afford relatively expensive vocational courses so that more children can do vocational courses to a very high standard if they want. In 2008 Stevenage will be only one of ten places in the country where all five of the new specialised diplomas will be delivered. And there will be 12, 14 of them over a period of time. And what we want to make sure is that as those roll out the schools in Stevenage between them can offer all of them. And they can only afford to do that if the cohorts are big enough because they’re quite expensive. You have to have smaller groups because of all sorts of reasons and you have to have expensive equipment. And they are usually twice the cost of the age weighted pupil formula. So we want to generate six forms which are also financially viable. You need a sixth form or 200 or so, 250 really, to make sure you can run it, offer the A levels you want to offer and without taking money out of key stage three. So the main reason is we want to have a really good curriculum at key stage four and to do that we think eight forms of entry schools will do it. Now we can deliver that with ten forms of entry, we’re comfortable with that as officers. We would rather keep it at eight forms of entry for two reasons. One, the point we made earlier about spreading, having local schools in local areas, and the other to be frank is if in 10, 20 years time the Stevenage numbers expand yet again in the future the sites if they are ten forms of entry will be quite tight and so if it is eight forms of entry and in 10, 20, 30 years time suddenly there is a baby boom that works it’s way through Stevenage, we can increase those sites if we had to in the future, with ten forms it would be difficult. Not impossible but difficult. So that’s the position we’re in.

JW Thank you. The lady here in the black.

Appendix 1B(i)

F? I’ve got three children and one son at the moment that’s in year nine, he’s doing GCSE’s in September. I’ve got another daughter who has to choose her school who was hoping to come to school with her brother in September and then I’ve got another daughter who’ll be coming in 2010. So in other words I’ve got three children that you can’t guarantee that their education is going to be as good as it could have been. I’ve already tried, even though I like this school, I’ve already tried to transfer my son to another small stable school where I know that the teachers aren’t going to all leave during his GCSE course and of course there’s nowhere in my choice of school, from where I live. I live in south Stevenage. And due to the post code change my choice was already limited but we went round and we chose this school above Barnwell because we preferred this school and now you’re saying that everyone in south Stevenage’s choice is going to be one school because of area. I’ve also heard that the rules are changing, it’s going to be a lottery, is that right? And I don’t know, in September, is that right or is it going to stay as it is now?

JD No. The lottery has come up before. Not in these meetings but people have e-mailed me about this. There’s some confusion about that. We don’t like to use the word lottery, we use the word random allocation; it amounts to the same thing. In effect it is a lottery. But the only reason we use that is as a tie break when people have opted for single sex schools.

F? Which I’d like as well but I can’t get because of where I live.

JD As we say there, when there’s no way of separating out from distance and all the other things when we’ve still got more children than we’ve got places, then they’re randomly allocated. But that’s all we do. There is a local authority that has random allocation throughout but that’s down on the south coast.

F? So that’s not happening with us at the moment. Fine. So when I take my daughter round to look at the school, when it’s supposed to be an exciting time and she chooses which school she’d like to go to, which she’d already done because she wanted to go where her brother went and where she felt comfortable and where she felt safe, she is now going to a school – the option is Barnwell or this, there’s no guarantee that this schools funding will stay the same and what will happen. So I won’t put this school down in September if there’s no guarantee that the school’s not going to close so how are you going to get intake to keep this school running because I just won’t put this school down and I won’t send her to this school if it’s going to close. And then my child who’s coming in 2010 is also going to be affected. And the other things is you’re knocking all the buildings down at Barnwell, are you? So they’re not going to be like this, you’re building a brand new school like you are at north Stevenage at Barnwell, are you? So they’ll be inspired like you told us about the vision. Or are you adding on to these sort of buildings at Barnwell? That was my other question.

JD Okay. Shall I pick up the first point? I would love to be in a position to tell you tonight exactly what the arrangements are but we can’t do that yet

Appendix 1B(i)

because we’ve got to go through the consultation process. What we’re doing at the moment is consulting on principle of what the pattern of schools will look like. So we’re actually consulting – these will be the schools in Stevenage, here’s their size, and that’s what we’re consulting on. In terms of the admissions process what we’re planning to do is to come along to a meeting of the parents of children who have already opted to come to year seven next September and talk to them about their particular point. And also come along to talk to parents in September who are thinking of choosing Heathcote.

F? Would like to choose Heathcote.

JD And I understand that when we get to that point we need to put some fairly firm issues on the table. What I can say for the record and you can hold me to, because we’ve just started the consultation process – there’s a long way to go...

F? But we won’t know the result of the consultation process when we put our children down.

JD I know but at least the public meetings need to have run their course, we can analyse that and so we’re in a better position after the meetings. But the kind of things we’ll say to parents is that first of all we’d make sure that if the children are going to move part way through their five years of education then we’ll make sure that it’s either at the end of key stage three or at the end of key stage four.

F? I’m telling you now, I’ve spoken to hundreds of people and they’re not going to. They’re all going to get their second or third – well we won’t even put it as a choice unless we’ve got a final answer one way or the other so you’re going to be in big trouble.

JD Let me just finish the point. So we’re going to say to parents that that’s the case. And the other thing that we will do is make sure that the children who come into Heathcote in the next year or so, some may well, especially if their siblings are already here, what we will say to those children and parents is that we will organise it so that they know where their children are going to go in the long term as much in advance as we possibly can. I suppose what I’m saying to you is I would love to give you chapter and verse tonight but I can’t. What we will do is give much more detail once this process has run and certainly we won’t issue any statutory notices to close Heathcote until we can be clear what those arrangements are.

F? So if I put Heathcote down, like obviously things do change, like the hospital that they spent 6 million on and then scrapped, so if you say this school is closing and I then send my daughter with her brother can you promise me it won’t change in a couple of years time that the finance is withdrawn like the hospital. Because I’m a nurse and I know all about that as well so the same thing could happen couldn’t it?

Appendix 1B(i)

JD Well, the thing about the funding here is it’s a different funding regime and bear in mind that the funding will be allocated to us in 2008. And so the 145 million is secure.

LM I think you meant the funding, did you mean the revenue funding to run the school rather than the capital investment.

[inaudible]

LM And they never built it. I see what you mean.

JW Can you use the mike?

F? If I don’t send my daughter here in September to this school that she wants to go to then you guarantee that in two years time she’s not going to be at a school she doesn’t want to be at and that the funding is withdrawn either by a change of government or by the present government withdrawing the funding.

JD I can’t guarantee the admissions process to any parent anywhere in the country because we have admissions arrangements and they just run. What I can say to you is the money, the 145 million that we’re talking about here, is secure funding. And obviously, what will happen is – Lindsay is better placed in this – we will agree what’s called an outline business case with the DfES, with Partnership for Schools and others, which set out exactly how we’re going to use the funding. But the allocation of money is in 2008 so this time next year it will be committed. Where it is more difficult is the idea of this is it rolls out across the county, across ten years and the next area to look at in terms of this is in Hatfield. Now that’s fairly secure but we’ve got other areas of Hertfordshire that are right down the end of the batting order. What we can’t do there is guarantee the funding will last that long. And what we’re doing is each time we go into BSF – we’re taking each wave at a time. So this wave is secure, we’ve got the funding, and we certainly won’t start moving children around or closing schools until the money is absolutely secure, I can assure you of that.

JW Could we go to the gentleman in the blue?

M? I feel really sorry for the children who’ve got children here already and certainly for this young girl who’s been messed around so much, but the children who’ve got children coming up to go to Heathcote I can absolutely guarantee that you’ve got eight forms of entry of people that won’t put Heathcote down and logistically the new buildings are not ready yet and won’t be ready for years so how do you get around 240 kids that don’t put Heathcote down as a school, because they’re not going to put it down?

JD I’m sorry, I don’t quite follow that.

M? The people that would for the next year put down Heathcote, who would normally put down Heathcote as their main school, as their first choice

Appendix 1B(i)

are not going to do it. If this school is closing they’re not going to do it for a few years. So what do you do with 240 kids that are not going to put down Heathcote as a school?

JD It isn’t 240 is it, because the planned admission number to this school isn’t...

M? Well, however many it is, forms of entry into Heathcote, are not going to put down that school but the other buildings are not going to be ready for three or four years.

JD Well the way the admission process works is that obviously they will put down other options instead of Heathcote.

M? Well, we’ve got less options surely because other people that are feeding those schools are already choosing those schools.

JD Nevertheless the preference forms give you spaces for three preferences, as parents you will put three preferences down, presumably you will not put Heathcote if you don’t want to, you’ll put other schools. If you don’t get into those other schools, into any of your preferences, then the system will place you in the nearest school to where you live that has a place available.

M? But the numbers don’t add up because they people that are putting those other schools down as choices today are still putting those choices down. So in effect people that have children that wanted to come to Heathcote have now got less choice.

JD Yes. If they don’t want to come to Heathcote then they have one less choice than they have before, because they could have chosen Heathcote. They still can of course but what you’re saying is that they don’t want to. So they have effectively reduced their choices by one.

M? And the people that live in the villages as we do, don’t have a lot of choice in the first place.

LM That’s absolutely right. It is the way the admission system works, you are able to express preferences.

JD Can I just answer this man because it’s an important point. In a sense we can’t disagree because if we reduce the number of schools by one, we’ve reduced parental choice, absolutely. The fewer schools, the less choice. It’s a fair point.

F? Can you not give the villages a different area? I mean, we’re kind of forced to come to Heathcote anyway. So if we put all these other choices that we’re not going to get then you’re just going to do the lottery and say, well there you go, you’ve got Heathcote. Can you not open up the options for the villages, the admissions process? Can you not extend it so that we do get some form of choice?

Appendix 1B(i)

LM Well, we’re not offering a lottery because as Justin said the lottery only applies in very restricted circumstances.

F? Okay, but you’re deviating from the point. My point is can you not change the admissions process? And if not why not?

LM It is possible for the County Council to consult on a different admissions process. It has the opportunity to do that annually. It’s already done the for the 2008 entry because that consultation process takes place quite some time before the actual intake because people are obviously making their choices some time before. So the earliest year that the County Council could consult on new admission arrangements would be for the entry of 2009.

F? Do you not think you should have taken account of that in this whole big process? We’ve got it all up in the little diagrams, it’s well, we’re doing this in this box and this in this box. Surely it would have been prudent to have done that as well?

LM Well, I think it’s more complicated than that actually. Whenever you change the admission rules you may advantage some people and disadvantage others. In other words there are a limited number of places available in any one school. You have a planned admission number, each school can take a certain number. The issue is how do you allocate those places if more people want them than there are places available?

F? It’s called planning.

LM Yes. That’s right. But if you think about it, what I’m seeking to explain to you is that if you change the rules by which you allocate those places some people may gain and some people may lose.

F? But there’s a huge raft of parents that are going to lose because you’re closing this school.

LM Well, if we were to change the admission arrangements there may be a lot of people who would lose out in other ways. And for other schools because there is always a knock on effect of changing admission arrangements between schools. So when you benefit some you don’t benefit others. That’s why where the numbers are very restricted like single sex schools, we only have a relatively small number of those schools in the county, we have to try very carefully to allocate those very limited places in as fair a way as possible. Hence the introduction of random allocation, which although it is called a lottery it does at least ensure that every person has an actual chance of getting a place and that seemed to be the fairest way of doing it.

F? But that was just for single sex, what about mixed sex?

Appendix 1B(i)

JD Lindsay, can I make another point? Firstly if there is a groundswell of people that says we would like you to go back and think about whether you change your admissions process during this process, people will go away and look at that. But there are two things to bear in mind, firstly as Lindsay said, because it’s a year in advance the year will be 2009. They other point is you were fair to say why didn’t you do that in at the same time as this? We can’t do that because we can’t go out on a statutory consultation to admissions on schools, which might not actually get built. What we’re doing at the moment is consulting on a pattern of schools. That’s it. We’re consulting on a pattern, the number, location, and size of schools. And also some patterns of SEN provision. Now we can’t consult on admissions process until that’s been resolved. And so you can’t run the two side by side. But I understand the point.

JW Could we move on please? Thank you. The lady here who had her hand up.

F? I’d like to pick up on a number of points that everyone has made along the way but first I’d also like to make the point that proposal forms have been sent out to people, supposedly widespread and distributed throughout Stevenage, I do question how widely spread – you could perhaps give us some details on that. People who have currently got children at the schools of Barnwell, Heathcote, whatever, have had these packs sent out, one to each household. A number of people who have children moving up who were selecting to move up to these schools in the following September term, did not receive any packs at all from what I can understand. Or certainly they came out much later than the others. Again, we go back to I think if I remember last time when we met, the point to make here is that you can complete as many proposal forms as you have people in your household. You have been sent one, you can complete one per person. If you have four people in your household you complete four. That’s not a case of trying to get in the numbers as you were saying, to just stop it in it’s tracks, as much as anything it not only gives you a consensus of opinion but it allows more people to put forward their other alternative proposals, which is the point of this. You are actually trying to get people as you say, vote on a pattern of schools, but when questioned about, well, does that mean that Barnwell will have a new build, we can’t answer that yet. So it’s chicken and an egg. How can anyone actually make a decision like that when they don’t know what is actually being on offer?

JW Do you want that point answered first?

F? No. I’ve learnt from experience to get it all out first.

JD Should we just pick those two up because we’re going to lose track.

PD The consultation document was widely distributed. Every student in a secondary school received a copy. The schools sent out copies to each of the families to make sure that they went direct to parents and not home with children and lost in satchels and such like. We sent multiple copies to every

Appendix 1B(i)

single primary school and asked them to publicise it widely amongst the parents in the primary schools. We have distributed documents, posters and such like through community outlets like doctor’s surgeries, citizen’s advice bureau and suchlike. We put adverts in the paper. I think we’ve got 27,000 documents in circulation at the moment. So yes, there are plenty of documents out there and I’m sure that there aren’t many people in Stevenage that aren’t now aware of this publication and information.

F? Does that include residents, did residents receive copies?

PD What we normally do when we make proposals is we also make sure that the houses around sites that might be affected get copies. And the reason we’ve done that is in the past when we haven’t, people who live in some of those properties who don’t have children, say they are disadvantaged because they don’t get to hear of it either. Because unless a child brings one home or they get sent one via a child, they don’t get to hear of it and yet they might be affected. In a different way to a parent or a child, admittedly. I’d just like to answer the question about Barnwell and I’m sorry if you didn’t think you got an answer. Barnwell School, at this point of our thinking, and it’s for confirmation through the BSF process, we aren’t expecting there to be a brand new school building for Barnwell School. We are not expecting it, no. The only new school buildings, completely brand new school buildings that, at this stage, subject to confirmation, that we expect is the new school up in the north. No choice about that, it’s a farm at the moment, and Marriotts School, simply because their buildings aren’t capable of being expanded or aren’t good enough to be expanded and equally the roadwork around the school buildings at the moment isn’t good enough to sustain that. And we need to build a new, bigger school at a different end of the site and open up a new entrance for it.

F? I actually work at Barnwell, I’m in the catering division. I’ve seen the effects of having an extraordinary year seven this year, from the residue from Collenswood coming through. We can’t cope with the dining room facilities, we can’t cope with assemblies. I believe Mr Westergreen-Thorne, when the consultation regarding Collenswood or should I say Barnwell East went through, he said there were sufficient classroom sizes to cover us for at that point two years, which would now be a year, before building work was required. So just to pick up with the children that supposedly would be coming through in the following years from Barnwell East, we already need extra building. So what exactly are we saying may happen here? Are you saying this site may still continue to be used and we’d be operating split sites? You talked about one cover-all school and that’s impossible given the residential areas between them, to build it into one large school.

PD I appreciate the point that you’re making. Neither the Barnwell site here nor this site are big enough for an eight form entry school and so both sites will be needed for that one school. Now exactly how that’s going to be built is still something that we’ll be working through because the government’s BSF process says develop your educational provision and then develop your building projects. We don’t want you just to build buildings we want you to

Appendix 1B(i)

decide what you want to achieve in those schools first. But common sense seems to indicate at this stage that the buildings that the pupils will be taught in and achieve their day to day education are likely to be on one site and the other site will be used for playing fields. And although there are houses in between, at the end of the playing fields they are very close together with very easy access between the two. And so the children will come to one site for their day to day education and they will use the playing fields at the other site. That’s the thinking at this point in time and it seems a logical way forwards.

F? So at what point would you actually stop taking submissions to this school? To allow it, like Collenswood, to follow through so it could actually be converted while Barnwell is...

PD We’re not likely to be able to do building work on every single site in Stevenage at the same time. There’s going to have to be some sort of sequence. And what I said earlier on when I talked about transition plans and I said we wouldn’t move young people into expanded buildings and new buildings until they were finished, we wouldn’t be doing that with Barnwell and using this site until after this school closed, if that was the proposal that was chosen.

JW Could we move on? Have you got one more point, just one? I’ve got two or three people that are waiting that’s all. We can always come back. There’s a lady over there next to the gentleman in the white shirt. Thank you.

F? I’d like you to clarify firstly for me, as part of this consultation process the decision to move to the eight form entry, is that included in the consultation? Have we a right to object to that part of this process? Because fundamentally...

JD If you fundamentally disagree with the idea of eight form entry schools you can object to that, yes. On the form. If you say we like the size of the schools as they are, we don’t want eight forms of entry, you can put that on the form, yes.

F? And so realistically, since you seem to be so sold on the idea, what chance have we actually got of bringing that really and truthfully into the consultation process?

JD Well, that will be for our elected members to decide. We as officers will be putting our case of why we want eight forms of entry school, bearing in mind it’s not unusual elsewhere in the country. I accept it’s unusual in Hertfordshire but that’s through historical decisions. The schools were built the size there are in the pre war years and what we’re saying is the world has move on since then. And so in Hertfordshire we would like, where possible to move to at least eight forms of entry for the reasons I’ve mentioned in the past. Now if the elected members have a lot of people saying that’s not a good idea then that will be debated in full and we’ll be put under pressure to justify that position. And so if you fundamentally disagree with the rationale of what we are doing then yes, you can say that on the form. And just to pick up

Appendix 1B(i)

the lady’s point on the forms, she’s quite right, everyone in the household can send the form in and if you want extra ones you can get it photocopied or we’ll give you extra forms. And some pressure groups have had a standard letter which they’ve handed out to everybody and they’ve changed it and signed it and sent that in by the hundred. So we will do that. And bear in mind that does demonstrate if for example you felt lots of people didn’t like the idea of eight forms of entry and you encourage lots of people to say so, what’s likely to happen of that is that officers would be challenged on that. So in that sense it would make a difference to the debate. What I said before is that this isn’t a vote, just because people disagree with eight forms of entry doesn’t mean that members will say no. But as I said there are lots of occasions where members have listened to the consultation and told us to go away and re-think things.

F? That part of the decision process, the eight forms of entry won’t necessarily be quite so relevant to current students, it’s far more relevant to students in years three, four and five, and they do not know about this process and the impact in that context. They haven’t grasped that, your communication hasn’t made that part of it clear.

JD I’m not sure but I think the document does set it out as eight forms of entry very clearly and those documents have gone to our primary schools.

F? Years three, four and five haven’t been getting it. If we’re lucky year six has got it because they were being affected.

JD Well, we can talk to our primary heads again.

F? Those in the lower years haven’t got this and don’t really understand this because kids in year three now, they’re looking at coming into eight form entries, their parents will most certainly want to voice an opinion. I can’t believe they wouldn’t.

JD Okay. Well what we’re saying to you is that we have put lots of the documentation out into the schools and if we need to put more out then we’ll do that. We have put it in the press, we have put it on websites, we have put posters up. We have put it in community areas. As Pauline was saying we’ve got over 25, 27 thousand copies of this document in circulation. I’m not sure we could have publicised it more widely than we have but we can talk to the primary schools about that and talk to them about distribution.

F? Thank you. Can you just go over the point with the junior schools, was it Longmeadow did you say, that last year there was a compromise, or two years ago, there was a compromise in their consultation process? I quite missed that point, what did you say you arrived at?

JD Yes, we as officers went out to evenings like this, and we were proposing for that part of Stevenage a three form entry all through school, so it would be a very large primary, certainly for Hertfordshire it would be our largest. Parents didn’t like the idea and we had some quite heated debates

Appendix 1B(i)

and people made their position well known. And in fact at the education panel meeting there were so many people who wanted to come that we held it here in Stevenage in the theatre so that people could come in and it was an interesting day. And members were persuaded that the pressure groups and the consultation threw up some fair points and asked us to go back and re-consult, which is what we did. And what we did, during that re-consultation some quite interesting ideas emerged if you like, from groups like this, and what we did was have three forms of entry on that site, but two schools, two completely separate schools, two uniforms, two head teachers. One two form of entry, one one form of entry, so parents had a choice between a larger or a smaller school. But we combined them so we had an overarching single governing body so that they could bring the budgets together. So it was a compromise and it’s worked really quite well. So just to use that as an example of a consultation process where we ended up with quite a different solution to the one we were proposing in the first place.

F? So why isn’t that the proposal for Heathcote stroke Barnwell? Two schools overriding one governing body and therefore giving the people the choice of a slightly smaller school to still have it. Make Barnwell not eight forms of entry, take it back to six or seven. And leave it as two schools the same as that arrangement you’ve got with those two junior schools.

[clapping]

JD What we want to do as officers is recommend to members and to the public a solution which we think works best and not start with a compromise position. Rather than say, well, we don’t think people will like this so we’ll start with something else. And also that’s not something that arose through the process so far. If people want to make that comment and say, well go away and look at that again and ask members to do that then again, put that into the consultation process and we’ll look at that.

F? You mentioned the money might run out, can I ask that Stevenage go to the back of Hertfordshire rather than the top?

JD Well, you say that jokingly and a number of people have said that. We could have put Stevenage last but to be blunt we want to start in Stevenage because there’s been disruption, the schools here are working very closely together and we think the children in Stevenage ought to start with some of the best possible schools available. So we could have started somewhere else but we felt Stevenage was the place to start. I don’t think – if that’s a serious suggestion put it in – but we think the kids in Stevenage in five to six years time will be going to some of the best schools anywhere in the country. And the point I made right at the beginning, the lady down here, I was making that point that the children who are currently at those schools won’t benefit from those best schools in the country, because it takes so long to procure them and to build them but I do think you shouldn’t lose sight, as a town, as a community, that Stevenage actually is envied by the other areas in the county and they would love to go before you. But we feel that we would like to start

Appendix 1B(i)

here. And I think it is important, I know it’s not about buildings, by why not have some of the best buildings in the country here in Stevenage.

JW I’ve got a lady here who’s going to speak and I just want to check, hands keep going up. Okay, there’s four. Thank you, I’ll get round to you in order.

F? It’s about the buildings. Did you just say that actually the only new school will be the one at Great Ashby or whatever we’re calling that one? That’s the only new school?

LM No. What Pauline said was there would only be two completely new buildings.

F? I thought you said one.

LM No. Two completely new buildings. One on the new site at Great Ashwell and one on the Marriotts site, because the school needs to be relocated to a different part of the site with a different access and the buildings are not capable of expansion. All the others will have major remodelling and refurbishment. So they will have major works done to their existing fabric plus new build blocks, section, whatever you want to call it.

F? What you’ve just spoken about seems to me a brilliant compromise, why can’t we have that here, why can’t we have Heathcote and Barnwell and then you hit the marvellous thing of parental choice. You tell us you can prove to us that bigger schools are not necessarily bad and sometimes very much better but what you’re not allowing in there is parental choice. As we discussed last time there is no parental choice in that for us. Could we ask that we have that, please.

LM I understand what you’re saying. Let’s be clear about the difference between that federation of primary schools and the situation we have here with these two schools. If you remember what Justin said, our original proposal was for three form entry primary schools and combining the two federated schools of a two and a one, provided that three. Now at the moment the target for this area is an eight form secondary school. If you combined, federated, Heathcote and Barnwell, you’d end up with 13 forms of entry not eight. So the numbers don’t add up in the way they added up in the primary proposal.

F? But you tell us you’re still going to keep this site, it’s still going to be used. As pure simple parents none of this is adding up to us. You’re telling us that you’re going to close this school, our children will go somewhere else. You haven’t actually said where specifically.

FL To Barnwell.

F? No, it’s not to Barnwell. You said it wasn’t to be to Barnwell, didn’t you?

Appendix 1B(i)

LM Put it this way, we aren’t increasing the number of places at Barnwell, Barnwell is already an eight form of entry school. Where we are increasing and where we are expanding the number of places is in Marriotts and Nobel and building a new school in the north. So all of those sites, and Berkeley also, will go up to eight forms of entry. So all four of those sites, that is Marriotts, Nobel, Barkley, and the new site in Great Ashby, all of those will have more places than they have now.

F? So our children won’t have the choice to go to the school nearest to them. Can I just suggest though...

LM That’s not necessarily true.

F? We already have parents in the room now, saying that they are not going to choose this for their children, they already have children here, their siblings are here, they’re not going to come here. Nobody is going to choose Heathcote. You’re not going to choose a school that is closing. You have in effect saved yourself a lot of trouble because what you have done in effect is kill the school. Because if the places still exist next year when you do this, we’re going to get the dregs aren’t we? We’re going to get all of the disaffected, nobody is going to choose it. I, hand on my heart, my children are over the moon happy at this school, I am over the moon happy with their results, if I had another child now I would not be sending them here because you are going to close it and you’re going to send them – you don’t even know where. And I think you have killed the school. You’ve saved yourself a lot of trouble.

JD Can we just, in terms of admissions, what we’re saying is at the moment children who live further north in the town are having to come to schools in the south because their schools are too small. What we’re saying to you is that we’re expanding those schools so that the children who live at that part of Stevenage will be able to get into schools in their own community. That will free up schools at the south of the town for the children that live here. Because you need to bear in mind that what we’re doing is leaving behind across the town as a whole, a surplus of about 10%, so there will be slack in the system. There will be more places across the town than there are children. And there’ll be more places than there are now. And what we’re saying is that children and parents who live in those particular parts of Stevenage will be able to get into the schools near to them and therefore there will be more spaces available in the south for people who live in the south.

F? One last question. Where will our children go?

LM Can I add something to what Justin has said? It makes it – and I’m addressing your question, before you get too frustrated, I understand that because it is quite a complicated issue. The way the admission system works is quite complicated. We have to try and bear in mind that the admission system works afresh from each year. All the places that are available are

Appendix 1B(i)

allocated every year. As a new round of allocation. So what it sounds like I guess, is if this school was to close, and Barnwell is currently an eight form of entry school, and therefore not expanding, and all the new places are on the four sites that I mentioned, it sounds as though all the people currently would have to go to all of those schools. But that’s not necessarily the case because all the Barnwell places, as well as the places on all the other sites, are all available for the admissions process each year.

[overtalking]

LM Well, actually what you were saying is that nobody will put Heathcote down so I was dealing with the year seven issue. I go back to my point about the other places being available on the other sites. Those are the places which are potentially available for people in year groups higher than year seven intake. That is Marriotts, Nobel, Barclay and the new site in the north. It doesn’t have to be split up, we would not go to the statutory state of the process without specifying what the transitional arrangements are. So in other words it would be quite possible for the County Council as part of the transition arrangements to specify that pupils currently in Heathcote school will be offered places in one or more specific other schools. We can do that.

JW This gentleman here, you’ve been waiting a long time. I am conscious of the fact that time is ticking on so if we could just try and make a point and get the answer.

M? The proposal is for eight form schools, then you went on to say about nine or ten and ten would be quite tight. On the bottom of that screen it says, the following schools would close, Heathcote School, Marriotts or Thomas Alleyne, should they not get their sites. What I’d like to ask is why is Heathcote School still closing if you close either of those two other schools as well? Surely that pushes it up to ten form school and reduces choice.

LM That’s absolutely right. Which is why that’s not our preferred option. Our preferred option is a system of eight form entry schools. However, if for whatever reason we are not able to make use of the sites that we want to, and there is a slight possibility of that, we would have to use the smaller number of remaining sites, which would mean larger schools and therefore as you rightly say even one school less to choose from. But that is not our preferred option.

M? But why is Heathcote still closing then, why are you pushing yourself up to ten form when keeping another school open would keep it down to eight?

LM Essentially what we’re trying to do is provide a distribution of places that fits the demography of the town. We have looked at how many children flow through the system, both primary and secondary, in the south, the middle and the north and indeed to some extent the west, the new west of the town, and we are trying to match the distribution of places to the demand for them. We have looked for example at the number of forms of entry in the south of the town that leave the primary school system and the same for the middle

Appendix 1B(i)

and the same for the north of the town and we have designed a distribution of secondary school places that matches that output from primary.

M? Yes, on top of that, I can understand the north end of the town has got bigger but the south end of the town hasn’t got any smaller and in addition there is new build happening in the south of the town. So how can you say that the numbers are getting less down here when there’s new build anyway.

PD When we looked at the projections and where the pupils will come from, there will be an increase over time. And the increase over time is because of new housing. And most of the new housing is projected to be further in the north of the town. That doesn’t mean to say there aren’t some new housing developments all over the town but predominantly the bulk of the new housing will be in the north of the town as we tried to explain in the consultation document. If you ignored all the new housing that was due to be coming the underlying population trend in Stevenage is actually going the other way, it’s going down, it’s only the new housing that’s increasing the pupil numbers. So it follows logically that in some of the traditional areas of Stevenage some of the population is fundamentally declining, and they’re ageing too, but also where the extra pupils are going to be in the future is going to be in the areas where all the new housing is going to be. So there is a shift from south to north and that’s just a fact.

M? Can I just say then – is what you’re telling us that nobody in the south of the town at the moment is going to have any more children? The number of houses hasn’t got any less. People will die and more people will move in, and the numbers will return.

PD Okay. It’s interesting that we’ve had this debate time and time again. Especially when Justin mentioned some of the primary reviews. You’re right. When people move into their houses they get older, they move out and then potentially families come back in again and people often argue, especially in a town like this, that there are a lot of people who haven’t got children in an area and what’s going to happen in a few year’s time is they’re going to move off or they come to the end of their life and they are replaced by families. And yes, that will happen to a certain extent. When we’ve looked at this, and there is quite a clear trend on this, Stevenage – although it was a long time ago, as a new town, when you look at the dynamics of a new town you expect a large boom in population to start with. And over a long period of time that will gradually settle down to the same sort of population levels as other more established areas. Stevenage hasn’t quite got to that level yet. There are still more Stevenage than you would otherwise expect and what you’re doing as a town is you’re just gradually coming down to that average level. So I can understand what you’re saying but in effect there won’t be as many people in an area necessarily as there currently are. Even though in some households there will be a turnover and some two person households will turn into say four person households. But overall that effect is either stable or just about declining.

Appendix 1B(i)

LM The evidence is that new housing tends to have in it than established housing. More young families tend to move to housing, to new areas, it’s just a pattern that we have observed and that is the sort of evidence that we have to take into account.

M? People can only move to those houses if they can buy them. Some people have to move to council houses, which are down this end of the town.

LM Sure, I understand that.

JW Could we move on? There’s a gentleman at the back, or was it a lady who had their hand up? Have you been waiting a long time?

F? Yes. I have. I’d just like to pick up a couple of points. The one is this lady’s point about the consultation, and you really need to make sure that you’re consulting with the people that are going to be directly affected, which is not necessarily the people sitting here. My son is due to start secondary in September and we have just gone through the application and admissions process, not got the result we wanted, and we were told that there was a consultation on the randomness, we live in Knebworth. Now I, hand on heart can say that there was no consultation that we were aware of on the random allocation process and it directly affected us this year. So please make sure that you contact the people you need to. The second point is, I live in Knebworth, Heathcote has been quote the chosen school for Knebworth for a number of years. What are you proposing now for the chosen school for the children from Knebworth to be?

PD The County Council doesn’t prescribe chosen schools for different communities.

F? Well if you have a look at the admission process and the booklet that the County Council gave out, there were no schools where Knebworth applications and admissions were granted, except for Heathcote and the single sex Hitchin schools. And that’s the County Council’s admission booklet.

PD Right. But in the future.

FL No. Our children.

PD Okay. I’ll come back to your children in a second. In the future when there’s a different – if there’s a different pattern of schools and a different number of size of schools then people in whatever community that they live in will apply for schools that are available and the places that are available.

F? So which schools will the be for next year, for Knebworth children?

PD For next year, all the schools in Stevenage that currently exist will continue to exist next year.

Appendix 1B(i)

F? There is a whole issue of admissions which I guess you people aren’t the correct ones to point out, but you do need to bear in mind that Knebworth people will need to know what their chosen school is. My son is starting school here in September. You’ve said that no children will be moved during a key stage, I think it’s irresponsible of you to accept children into this school this year, when they will be transferred, and I’m sort of supporting most of the views here that the proposal will be accepted, he will be moved at the beginning of his GCSE course and I think it’s irresponsible of you to accept children into the school when they’re going to be disrupted at one of the key points in their educational development.

[clapping]

JD We would rather not disrupt the children at all of course. What we’re saying is that if we know that the children will be completing their GCSE courses on a different site we’ve got two to three years to make sure all that works very well. And there’s a whole range of strategies that we can put in place. And at the meeting with the parents who have accepted a place or been allocated a place here in year seven, we will take you through that in some detail. And there are lots of ways of doing that in terms of aligning the curriculum, having some consistency in terms of staffing, keeping friendship groups together. There’s a whole range of things we can do. We would rather not do it, I accept that, but we wouldn’t be pressing ahead with this unless we were confident that we could make that work. The problem we’ve got here is that the cycles for admissions, BSF, don’t align, because we’ve got different cycles for different reasons. And so kids who, I mean, I’m concerned about all the disruption. But the year group I particularly want to focus on is this coming year seven group. And we will talk to parents and the children themselves in some detail about that, to get that right. I think there’s a meeting in July. I’ve got the date in my diary. So we’ll come and we’ll talk about that in some detail. Check with me at the end.

M? First of all a government working party of educationalist were sent to Canada to look into the reasons why schools of 1,600 to 1,800 pupils are failing in Canada. They looked into this and the reason these schools are failing is because of the lack of community within the school and the lack of individuality felt by the children. And this has just been published as their findings. What I would like to know is how you’ve got so much confidence that the investment in this country or in this county, sorry, is justified. And my second point is, this area of Stevenage has a very high proportion of social housing unlike the northern parts of the town. It is being targeted at the moment by the local authority and the government for a decent homes scheme to encourage young families to come back to this area of the town and to settle, which would indicate to me that two schools in this area are required. Thank you.

[clapping]

JD If I pick up the first point and then Pauline the second. It goes back then to what I was saying earlier. First of all I personally wouldn’t – I mean, I

Appendix 1B(i)

accept the point that Canadian research and I’ve seen the summary only and I think it’s been reported in the TES. I think it’s dangerous to compare the English educational system with Canada. We normally compare it with America. We’ve got different teaching styles, different examination arrangements, the whole system is different. So I would be much more comfortable looking at research, which I could show you, in various countries, which would show the opposite. Holland for example is moving from a national system of very small schools of 400 to 500 children, to very large comprehensives of about 2,500 to 3,000. So the towns have got one school on sites across the whole of the... And that’s based on research in other parts of Europe. So I think you can use research to make your argument any way you want really.

M? Holland are looking to combine their schools into one area because of land space.

JD No. I know about Holland because I was involved.

M? Sorry. There was a bit article in the building magazines quite a while ago.

JD There might be an issue about land space but the reasons for the Dutch changes are not to do with that and I can say that because I was involved in some of that research, which fed into the Dutch system. And those people have come here to look at what we were doing. We were learning from the Dutch system in terms of vocational education post 14, which is probably the best certainly in Europe, probably the world. So I don’t think it’s helpful to look abroad. It’s interesting and it provokes discussion but I could show you lots of research which demonstrates schools of about 800 are the thing and other research will show you 1,400 to 1,500. What makes a difference is the way they are led, the quality of the teachers, the resources, the support from parents. In the end the things that you would think will make the biggest impact, those are the biggest there is. And in Stevenage, you’ve got to bear in mind the strength of Stevenage frankly at the moment, and has been for some time, is the sheer quality of teaching in Stevenage. Not just in the secondary schools but in the primary schools. It’s worth pointing out that the children in the current year seven have got the best set results that any cohort of children at Stevenage have every got. They’re above the national standard, they’re better here than they are in the country in the current year seven. That’s down to good teaching. And the point people were making earlier about hanging onto good teaching, I think from the authorities point of view that’s our – we’ve got two key priorities, one sorting out where children will be and keeping that disruption to a minimum, and secondly working with staff to try and commit as many of them as possible to stay and work within the Stevenage project.

JW The gentleman here. Then I’ve got a lady there and then I think that’s going to be just about the maximum number tonight.

Appendix 1B(i)

M? You’ve talked quite a lot about the new schools actually benefiting people in three or four years time and it’s not going to benefit us. I don’t think we’re really concerned about whether it’s going to benefit us, what I’m really concerned about is the fact that you’re really quite willing to compromise the education of our actual children at this point in time. And part of that is that there were a couple of questions asked earlier, or points raised, I don’t think they were actually answered; you talk about the children who are currently in the school, I’ve got a daughter who’s just finishing her GCSEs, I’ve got a daughter who’s actually going to do her GCSEs and I’ve got a son who’s coming up next year, the children that are actually in the school, you still haven’t actually said how they are going to be allocated places. Whether they’re going to be allocated places randomly according to what schools are available, or whether as spaces come up in other schools you decide you might move people out to other schools into places closer to them and move people from here into schools like Barnwell who are close to them. So I don’t think there’s been any actual answer so far as to where you’re actually going to move children to and on what basis you’re going to move children. And secondly there was also the point about next year’s intake. Not the year that’s coming up now but the following year where people aren’t going to put Heathcote down as a school. And from that you are going to get people who, on your own admission rules, aren’t going to get the school they want and it’s going to be the people who’ve got no choice of school who are going to be coming to Heathcote. I still can’t see how you’re going to maintain the standard in the school as you did before.

[clapping]

JD On the point of what’s in it for the kids who are currently in secondary schools. I absolutely accept the point. I mean, clearly we want to talk to those children, learn from what they experience from schools so that the new schools coming this way are influenced by the children who are currently learning in Stevenage. But I absolutely accept the point. What we’re saying here is we’re not making proposals for the children who are currently in the secondary schools in Stevenage. That’s correct, we’re not. We’re making proposals for children who will come through in the future. These are proposals of the future. I accept that point. That’s exactly right. And I also accept the point that in order to get to where we need to get in the future the children who are currently in the schools may well be disrupted. And what I’m saying to you is I accept that point, and what I’m saying to you is two things, one, we’ll do everything in our power to minimise what that disruption is, and secondly we’ll then do everything in our power, once we know what that level of disruption is, to manage it and to work with it. By putting additional funding into the school, additional resources, additional energy. So I do accept the point that we are making proposals for the future and that has implications.

LM You’re quite right when you say where will the children go we haven’t answered you. We haven’t answered it. And there are some reasons for that and I will explain what they are. We have a number of proposals here, which will result in, if they go through, either one or more than one school closing. Until we know which proposal is going to be enacted, which proposal is going

Appendix 1B(i)

to be taken forward, we can’t say exactly at which alternative school places will be available because there are different options on the table. One option is just for the closure of Heathcote, one option is for the closure of Heathcote and or Marriotts and Thomas Alleyne. So until we know which of those closures is happening we can’t say exactly at which schools children will be offered places at. But what I can say is that if by the time we get to the statutory period, ie the period in which we are publishing a statutory notice for a specific change, if at that point either all the children at this school will be offered a place at one other school, in which case we will then say what that one other school is, or if it’s more than one school we will say that all the children at Heathcote will be offered a place at one or another school and that the admission rules will be run to allocate people to either that school or that school through the allocation rules.

M? But are you talking about admitting children on an individual basis or in peer groups or friendship groups or whatever, to those schools?

LM Well, if all the places for Heathcote pupils are at one other school then clearly they will all go in their existing friendship groups, peer groups and so on, because they’ll all be moving to just one other school.

M? That’s going to be unlikely, isn’t it?

LM If on the other hand – well, it depends whether we’re producing eight or ten form entry alternative school. Because obviously the availability of places in any one other individual school will be different if there are eight or ten forms of entry. If however, the pupils at Heathcote are divided between more than one other school, it wouldn’t be more than two, then obviously, there will be some breaking up of friendship groups. But of a limited nature because we will be allocating places in just two other schools rather than one.

M? So you’ll guarantee that individual children won’t be allocated to other schools on a one by one basis? They will be in large groups.

LM If they’re all going to one or two other schools, yes, they will go in large groups.

M? There’s an if there. You’re saying that there is a chance that the children from the current school will be moved on an individual basis to places that are available at a school rather than in groups.

LM No, I’m not saying that. What I’m saying is that all the children here will go to either one other school or two other schools, or be offered places at either one other school or two other schools. That’s not an individual infill because it’s in groups. Even if it’s two other schools that’s going to be a very large number of pupils going to each of those schools.

M? So it’s going to be quite a way down the line when your actual schools have been expanded to take these extra year groups.

Appendix 1B(i)

LM Yes. Yes indeed. Because the pupils will remain in this school until that happens, if they so wished.

M? I’d like the other question answered about how they’re going to guarantee the new intake from next year onwards is going to remain the same if people aren’t going to put down Heathcote as a first choice school?

LM Yes, I guess that’s a question about viability of the school both in terms of teacher numbers and so on if the numbers go down a bit. And I think I’d prefer if Justin dealt with the issue of teacher support and curriculum support.

JD We’ve got to be careful here because what we’re doing at the moment is consulting on a pattern and size and nature of schools. Once we’ve agreed on what that pattern is then we can start doing some of the detailed planning. Because clearly if we were to say to you tonight, here are the detailed plans we’ve got, when Heathcote closes, you’d be quite right to say, well hang on a minute, this isn’t a consultation, you’ve got it all sewn up. We haven’t got to that detail yet because that is not the position we’re at. We’re at the position where we’re looking at the pattern of schools. If, if the number of children in Heathcote comes down and it becomes a small school then there will be implications in terms of finances because after a certain point in terms of numbers of children the finances become tight. Within our financial regulations we have ways of putting additional funding over and above the formula, into a school through a transitional period. And so, yes, it might end up being a smaller school before it closes, but we would make sure that we would put those additional resources into place. What I’ve said to you is that we will do everything in our power to make sure that we’ve got good quality teaching, good curriculum in place, and a viable school. That’s what we will do. And once we’ve got agreement on what number and location and pattern of schools there is, then we’ll do some very, very detailed planning on that, we’ll have a dedicated team that will work with the school in the coming years to make sure that happens. But until we’ve got an agreement in the autumn from our politicians that that’s what we want to do that is the kind of detailed planning which starts to pre-empt the outcome of the consultation.

JW I’m sorry, we have actually run out of time. But I realise there are people who haven’t had a chance to speak and people who wanted to speak again. There are, I believe, two more sessions here so there will be an opportunity to come back, having absorbed what’s been said tonight, and come back with further questions. I’d like to thank you very much for the way that this has been handled this evening. I think it’s been very helpful because there’s been a lot of exchange of views and ideas. And certainly from my perspective your views have been heard very strongly and will be recorded as such.

F? Can you confirm where the transcript from last week’s meeting can be found because we’re having difficulty locating it?

Appendix 1B(i)

JW We’ve just actually sent it off to the service that we use to produce it. It takes about a week for the turnaround. If you go to the consultation response page the web is there. In about a week’s time it will be there.

FL [unclear] dates.

JW They’re called reserve dates because you have one consultation then you have reserve dates if you have a lot more people. There are two more in the diary. 2 July and 11 July are the dates for the further two meetings. Thank you very much. Goodnight.

Appendix 1B(i)

070703 Heathcote School 123 

  Speaker key JW Jane WiltonLM Lindsay MartinPD Pauline DavisJD Justin Donovan

UM Unknown male

JW Good evening ladies and gentlemen, my name is Jane Wilton and I work with a company called Accent and Accent is an independent market research company and we’ve been asked by Hertfordshire County Council to help them with the consultation process, and I think it’s important to stress that we are independent, I am independent, I am here to help make sure that the consultation’s run in a fair and proper manner and that your voices are heard, as I hope, the panel’s voices are heard as well, in answer to your queries. Can I just ask you, if at all possible, to turn off mobiles, and not on to silent unless it’s really urgent because it interferes with the recording, which as you can see, I’m wearing a microphone and the panel are wearing microphones and we are recording this whole evening’s consultation. There will be a transcript of this evening put up on the website when it’s been done, it will probably take a couple of weeks or so, and so therefore if the mobile’s affect the recordings, we won’t be able to hear what you’re saying. So, we’re going to start the evening with a presentation which will be given by Lindsay Martin, initially, and after that, we will come to the open part of the meeting, where your questions will be taken by the panel, so I think we will kick off with Lindsay and the presentation. Thank you.

LM Okay, Jane, thank you very much, and welcome to this third consultation at Heathcote School on behalf of the county council. I think yes, it does work, good, excellent, as Jane has said, this is roughly what we’re going to do this evening, I’m going to introduce my colleagues, talk to you a bit about building schools for the future, my colleague Pauline will talk about why we need an area review and what our proposals and then the main part of the evening is over to you. So on my extreme left and your right is Justin Donovan, Deputy Director of Children, Schools and Families, and Chief Education Officer, Pauline Davis, Area Planning Manager who has done the detailed work on this review in Stevenage, and I’m in the middle. So, building schools for the future, the context in which this review is being undertaken and forgive me if you’ve heard this once or even twice before, because I’m going to be saying much the same thing I’m afraid, but for those of you who are here for the first time, this is the context within which the review of places, secondary mainstream, secondary special, is taking place, in Stevenage, and I doubt that any of us here remember education as it was 130 or so years ago, in the Victorian classroom, but that’s what it looked like, and I think they’re all girls, it’s a bit difficult because it’s a bit of a grainy picture, but I think

Appendix 1B(i)

it’s a girls only class, but it makes a point about what it was like in those days. Rather more recently in my lifetime, um, we used equipment like slide rules, I certainly used a slide rule when I was at school, an early calculator, early Sinclair calculator, in that particular case, I’m sure if I remember these things there are at least some people in the audience who are as old as me who remember these things as well, and a lot that don’t, of course, remember these things either, but this just says something about the way education has changed pretty dramatically, certainly in terms of equipment, over one lifetime, i.e. mine, yours perhaps, from a slide rule or calculator machine like these to the powered computing power of a palm top, the difference is really quite incredible, and who would have predicted in the 60s or whatever, when these were being used, where we would be 40 years later, in terms of the equipment that’s available to young people, and indeed, teachers. And these are the sorts of buildings that that education was carried out in, these post war buildings that you can see all over Hertfordshire, including Stevenage, this isn’t actually Stevenage School, it’s somewhere else in Hertfordshire, but most of the schools, you will see, including the one we are in now, don’t look a lot different from these flat roofed window ward post war structures built in Stevenage in early 1950s at Barclay to the late 1960s in the valley, with, of course, blocks and additions subsequently, but the original buildings were all built between the early 50s and late 60s and are increasingly not fit for purpose for a modern education system.

This is an exemplar design of a new school that department, it was at the time, the Department for Education and Skills, now the department for Children, Schools and Families, you may have noticed in the news at the end of last week, commissioned a number of leading architects to do some exemplar designs of what a secondary school could look like, and these external and internal pictures of the modelling work that architects have done, you won’t see any schools that look like that in Hertfordshire, at least not yet.

So what is the programme itself? So the Building Schools for the Future programme is the government’s major investment in secondary and special schools, secondary aged special schools, investment in buildings primarily, but not exclusively, worth £2.2 billion per annum, which seems a very large sum of money, but when you consider that Terminal 5 at Heathrow, shortly to be completed, cost £4.3 billion as a single project, that then puts even these large sums of money into some sort of perspective. The first tranche of that money to come to Hertfordshire is coming to Stevenage, roughly £145 to £146 million, including this earmarked, £12 million specifically for information and communications technology, as an indication of how important new technology is to the future of the education system and the way people learn and the way people teach. Altogether, it represents a very exciting opportunity for all pupils in all schools in Stevenage to work together to create a new shared vision for education, to be delivered through this investment. It’s also, of course, pretty important to get it right because the current buildings we’re in were built 40 to 50 years ago and are still going strong. The new buildings that we build as part of this project also need to last a long time, many generations of children need to pass through them, so it’s pretty

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important that we get this investment right and we spend it in the best possible way.

But, there’s always a but, a large amount of government funding doesn’t come without quite a lot of red tape, strings attached to it, this is certainly the case for our project, for all projects funded this way, we have to submit a whole series of documents for approval, by central government, the first will be submitted in April, the second, we have to submit around September and October, and finally, our most detailed business case, in about February to March of next year, and only when all those documents are approved, will we be able to start the procurement process, that is, go to the market to find a private sector contractor who will actually deliver all the building work which needs to be done. That procurement process, tied as it is to European red tape, as opposed to just British red tape, um, takes as you can see, quite a long time here, from the Spring of 2008, into late 2009, and only after that, will we be able to put the first spade in the ground, or however you start a building project these days, I’m sure it’s more sophisticated than a spade in the ground, but you know what I mean, we won’t be able to start building work until late 2009 or even early 2010 depending on how well this process goes. That’s really quite a lot about money in buildings, but it’s not really about that is it, buildings are only the means to an end, they’re not an end in themselves, we don’t build wonderful schools and then think, oh, gosh, we ought to put some children in this, it’s the other way round isn’t it? We have children who need to learn, we have teachers who need to teach, and we need to provide them with the best possible built environment for that to happen. Buildings are enablers, they’re not ends in themselves, so where we started, uh, was with discussion, with stakeholders in Stevenage, principally schools, but not exclusively, on what our shared vision for the future of teaching and learning, in Stevenage, and indeed, across the county, should be. And we came up with these things that I think are pretty unarguable, I don’t think anyone would really take exception to any of these. A focus on excellent teaching and effective learning, commitment to raising attainment, raising aspirations, increasing the participation, improving employability, schools which lead and serve the community with a range of public services, a commitment to healthy lifestyles, active participation in sport, a diverse range of specialisms, including vocational ones, linked to the employability I mentioned on the previous slide, I’d mentioned already the importance of ICT, to provide more personalised study programmes, and community access to learning programmes, and last but not least, light, attractive and flexible spaces, in buildings fit for the future. It’s important that we design buildings that are going to be sufficiently adaptable to serve well over the next 40 or 50 years. It’s pretty impossible, I suspect, for us to predict where the palm top might lead to in 40 or 50 years’ time, just as the slide rule to the palm top, what will the palm top lead to in 40 or 50 years’ time, I think if anyone knows the answer to that, I suggest they invest in it now and make a lot of money.

So, what do we need to deliver a vision like that? Again, we consulted a range of stakeholders, and most stakeholders, not all, but most stake holders agreed that we needed fewer mainstream schools, larger sixth forms, and more specialisms, big enough to be efficient and flexible, but small enough to

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support those all important relationships between students and staff. They agreed that we needed closer links between mainstream and special schools, and Pauline will go through our proposal relating to special schools in a later slide. They agreed that we needed to develop even closer links with [unclear] college, even closer because they are close now, they are well developed now, but they can be developed even further. And they agreed that we needed improved facilities for our Education Support Centre, that is the centre that educates children who are out of school. Currently in very unfit accommodation, in fact a double mobile classroom on the edge of a primary school site, entirely inappropriate, so Pauline, rightly anticipated by getting to her feet, how well we have organised this, the next slide is hers, why we need an area review, so I’ll pass you the stuff.

PD Thank you. Hello everybody. Okay, so why do we need this area review? As Lindsay said, this is about an educational vision, and that the investment is just an impetus to achieve that end, but it is a lot of money, and it’s important that we invest that money wisely, this is about the future of secondary provision in Stevenage and it’s going to have to last for some time, so we must get it right. We need to make sure that what we [unclear] developing schools, building the right number of places, for the young people that we expect to be in the channel in the future, and also to make that provision in the right location [unclear] So what have we done so far? We started talking to people back in January, Lindsay mentioned these stakeholders, head teachers, secondary head teachers, primary head teachers, governing body representatives, borough councillors, County Councillors, college head people, and whole range of key players in the education service within Stevenage, and we started talking to them about this vision, about what young people might need in terms of their skills and aptitudes in the future and then going through, well, if that was the case, what sort of an education provision might they need to be? And they came forward and joined with us to put forward some ides as to what the possible options would be for organisation of secondary provision within the term. We then evaluated those proposals against all criteria developed by the Director of Children, Schools and Families, and I’ll show you those in a moment. They then considered that evaluation, and decided which of those options he wanted us to come and talk to you about to get your views about, and that’s what we’re doing here today, this is one of a number of meetings as part of our public consultation exercise, I’m sure you’ve all had a consultation document, you will see that that [unclear] August, and that’s what we want to do, to give you an opportunity to have a couple of seconds to look through that list of the form tests, you will notice it’s about achievement, not only about places, it’s about achievement, it’s about building design and it’s about transitional arrangements. So it’s quite a holistic package then. So let’s have a look at this changing pattern of demand in your town.

The government, when we’re planning to build new schools for the future, that we need to plan for ten year’s hence, that’s because they don’t want us to build buildings that immediately have to be expanded the very next year. We have a need for 48 forms of entry in 2017, that’s our projection, a form of entry, for those of you who are not sure of what that means, is a group of 13

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[unclear] coming into school in each [unclear] That 48 forms of entry includes some surplus, that government recommends that we allow between 5% and 10%, to make sure that you as parents, have an opportunity for expressive reference [unclear] reasonable chance of getting it. It also allows for any unforeseen circumstances at the time of projecting those figures.

We also know that for schools within Stevenage, the places that we’ve got in those schools are unevenly distributed, the schools are of different sizes and they’re in places, at the moment, where not all the children live, but I’ll show you that in a moment on the map. Certainly recent housing developments in the north east of the town have changed the pattern of [unclear] in places and more housing projected just to carry on with that trend, and while we’re talking about housing, it’s just worth noting, that if and when the major development west of the A1(M) happens, there are already plans and agreements for a new secondary school and some primary schools, to serve that fairly distinct and separate part of the town. So let’s have a look at this map, we’re talking here about the big development west of Stevenage, other new areas of housing potentially going out further north, you’ll see in the map, this is the map in the consultation document by the way, you will see that we’ve identified a site for a small building, a new secondary school building, up in the north of the town, because you will notice that there’s this rather large town here, for which there is no local [unclear] provision. What we have in the town are two schools, virtually side by side, in the north of the town, and two schools side by side in the south. Now, I’ll come back to what the proposals are in a second. So let’s have a look at the proposals for mainstream schools first, and I know that that’s probably what most of you came here tonight to look at. The council’s preferred option to have a pattern of schools, a geographical spread of schools, of [unclear] schools across the town, and that’s the list of schools that the county council is proposing, it should be those eight [unclear] and you noticed I talked about that new site in the north of the town, and the proposal is to move the [unclear] school to that new site, therefore breaking up those two schools very close together up in the north of the town. What you’ll notice here and of most importance to you, is that in that pattern of [unclear] Lindsay talked about fewer, larger, schools, the proposals, that under his proposal he put [unclear] and that’s because we have two schools that are virtually next door to each other in the south of the town. We have another proposal there, and it’s a fallback position, and it’s only a fallback position, because the two schools, we don’t yet own the land, that’s a bit of a chicken and egg, because we can’t buy the land until we know what the proposals are going to be and vice versa, but nevertheless, what we are saying is, there are two areas, obviously the new school in the north, the new school site in the north, we’re not expecting a problem with that signage, if there is a problem that we can’t overcome, then clearly, Thomas Alleyne wouldn’t be able to move there, so this four fact position is that Thomas [unclear] circumstances. In the centre of the town, we need a bit more land to rebuild Marriotts School, and open up a new access to the south of that school, and if we hit a problem that we can’t resolve, then that school will close under this scenario. You will notice, importantly for this school, that the [unclear] of school closure is a feature of [unclear].

Appendix 1B(i)

For special schools, we’ve had a range of proposals, and you will notice here that there are no preferred options for special schools, because we want to hear what people say about this. The long term special school for children with neurological and physical impairments, there are two options there, the school could stay on its current site and benefit from BSF investment there, or it could relocate to either the Barclay or the Marriotts School sites, those are the two sites that will be big enough to sustain both a mainstream school and a special school on the same campus.

The Greenside School, which is a school for people with severe learning disabilities, the school buildings themselves are fine, they’re just aren’t enough of them, and they’re not as conducive for secondary age pupils than as they might have been, so the proposal is to build some accommodation on one side of the [unclear] school buildings so that the primary age children can spread into the existing school building with all the facilities there.

For the Valley School, we genuinely hear about what people have to say about the possibilities for the Valley School, the Valley School could stay on its current site, and benefit from BSF funding there. It could, just in the way I’ve explained with [unclear] relocate to another school side, again, you will see, the Barclay or Marriotts site up there. The school could continue as an organisation will all the pupils who are enrolled there and the staff belonging to the Valley School, but with the young people being located in other schools and being supported by that professional network of staff across the town. Or, we could close the school and open up special [unclear] units on each of the mainstream sites, bearing in mind that each of those might need to have a particular specialism to cope with particular needs. A range of options there, there is no preferred solution, we genuinely want to hear what people have to say. But for you tonight, what you really want to know, is what the transitional arrangements are likely to be. Certainly in terms of building plans and work, we want students, staff, parents, governors involved in developing school projects, there are plans in place to engage people in that so that we share in the development of not only provision for schools but also involved in the development of those building projects, and clearly, what we do know is that building work can be disruptive, there’s no getting away from that, and what the name of the game is to minimise that disruption, and where we’re building these school buildings, what we will say is that we won’t move young people into those buildings until they are complete. With closing schools, and for some of you here tonight, I’m sure this is important, we need, obviously to be aware, that this is quite a difficult situation for you as parents and we need to handle that carefully and sensitively as we can, at appropriate points, and clearly, you will want to feel confident, that if your children are here for the duration, then you want to be confident in the quality of the teaching and learning that goes on here during the transition phase.

For staff, certainly we want to involve the school management and staff in any transition plans for them, but they also need to be aware that we’re not reducing the number of places in the town, we are expanding other schools as well and we want to keep staff working in Stevenage, it will be an exciting place [unclear]. So I just wanted to reassure you that this is a town wide issue

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edition and other schools will be involved in the transitional arrangements for staff at any closing school, and if it becomes necessary, the county council has an excellent record for facilitating any new deployment that might be required.

For students, we will work with the schools to develop clear transition plans. What we will say to you as parents, is two things, first of all we will not move your child during a key stage, we will give you that commitment, and also, to promise that if we get to the point, if the county council decide to pursue the closure of a school, at the time we publish notices, statutory notices, we will make clear to you what the transition plans for children will be, we will make that clear to you at that point, and if your child has to move school and you have the expense of a new uniform, the county council makes a financial contribution to that, and we found the best way of achieving that is via the schools and they will work with you on that. So before we just get to the most important point of tonight, is actually what you want to say, and answer your questions, let’s just have a look at how that transition will be taken.

Certainly, we talked about this as a public consultation, we genuinely want to hear your views, please do so, either here, through the recording tonight, or on the response form at the end of the booklet, or by email, or any way you want to tell us, we need to hear what you’ve got to say. It’s going to be my job to make sure that we present your views and the issues that you’ve raised to the County Councillors who take those decisions. The Education Panel would first see those issues, on the 3rd of October, and the Cabinet of the County Council, which is the decision making body of the council, will meet on the 15 th

of October, and the Education Panel will pass on to the Cabinet their views about the outcome of the consultation. The County Council doesn’t just rely on our interpretation of what you’ve said, they will have the tapes of these meetings, the transcripts, and we make every single one of your contributions available to them so that they can read them first hard, get a real flavour of what you’re saying. Those meetings, you will notice are open to the public, they’re not public meetings, but you can come along and see what happens, what we normally do, is when a school is affected by a proposal, the school is allowed to have a slot at the meeting to make representation, it’s one representative talking on behalf of the school. We usually leave the school to decide who and how that representation is made. If the Cabinet decides to pursue any of the proposals, for example, a school closure is significant enough, we would have to then go and publish what is known is statutory notices, they are a legal sort of adverts in the local newspaper, that says what the County Council proposes to do, and by when and what the transition arrangements are. Those statutory notices sit for a period of six weeks, during which time, you all have an opportunity to [unclear] and if any one person objects, then that objection and those objections have to be referred back to the County Council to reconsider, in the light of those comments, and take a final decision. When we put this together, and that’s intended to be by the end of 2007, the government had changed those final decision making arrangements, and I hear say that that’s now likely to be in January, because of those changes, so I think you’ll be relieved [unclear]

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UF We are now at the open part of the meeting and we will be talking questions from the floor until quarter to nine, at which point the panel will be available, excuse me, I’m just going to introduce the opening session and then we will come to questions, okay? That means that you will actually have a chance to talk to the panel individually about any individual concerns about your children, particularly. What I would like to say is that everybody here understands that the proposal arouses strong feelings and we do want to hear your views, and I particularly, am here to make sure that your views are recorded on the tape, so that the County Councillors or anyone else who wishes to listen to those views can hear them. So to that end, I would ask you not to shout out, not to call out, but to put your hand up, if you have a question, I will come to you, I will try to get to everybody, there’s a lot of people here tonight, and I will do my best to make sure that everybody has an opportunity to speak. If there are people who haven’t spoken and people who are, you know, wanting to put another point, I will go to the people who haven’t yet spoken so that they do have an opportunity. So, without more ado, Katie is at the back there with a microphone, and so if you put your hands up, I will actually come to you to get your questions answered.

UM [Unclear] time frame on this meeting [unclear] If you could put a time frame on it, I think would be very helpful. The first part of my question, I want to know what you are doing to retain staff. I have a son in Year 10, going forward to do GCSEs next year and I want to know what reassurances you are going to give, the fact that he hasn’t a sort of constant stream of supply teachers coming in and out.

JD Shall I start on the grounds that I haven’t yet spoken. Two things, in terms of the time frame, I think it’s reasonable to set a time to finish the meetings, and what we’ve done is have lots of meetings, I know there’s a lot of people here we’ve seen twice before, and so I think we have to stop at some point, and I think it’s quite reasonable to set a time, especially as people are out every night. In terms of staffing, I think the thing to bear in mind here is that we’re talking about long term proposals, we’ve got four or five years down the line to get this right, and absolutely, there are two things at the top of our list of things that, once this, because what we’re doing at the moment is consulting on the shape, pattern and location of schools, and there are two things right at the top of our list once that consultation is completed. One is, making sure that parents know where their children will be, so there are transitional arrangements in terms of admissions, so that people aren’t second guessing that, and the second is making absolutely sure we secure the best possible staff, not just here in Heathcote, but in all the other schools in Stevenage where also, there will be some disruption, not as significant as Heathcote, but still disruption. The other thing we need to do, from a local authority point of view, is to try and convince as many staff as possible in Heathcote to remain within the Stevenage project, because we believe it’s a very exciting place to be over the next four to five years and certainly a very good place to be in terms of one’s professional career. What we will be doing is, at some point, certainly if I can, and I’ll talk at the Chair of Governors ahead about this, certainly if I can, talk to staff again before the end of this term so that colleagues are familiar with what we’re proposing over the summer break.

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It’s a whole range of strategies to try and convince staff to stay and there’s a lot of strategies that we can do to make that happen. The other thing is that we are confident that once we’ve agreed what the shape of schools will look like in Stevenage in the coming years, Stevenage will become a very interesting focus nationally, and lots of people who live within striking distance of Stevenage may well want to come and teach here, because they’ll be teaching in some of the best schools anywhere in the country, it’s a very exciting curriculum map here in Stevenage, progression routes through to further education, higher education, and certainly, as a young teacher, I would have loved to have come to a place like Stevenage in the future and teach. So we will have strategies in place to try and convince as many staff to stay, we will have strategies in place to try and convince as many staff to come, so that over the next four to five years, Heathcote is a secure and viable school to be. I would say, we are expecting, I would be surprised if the numbers didn’t drop slightly as Heathcote moves forward, and what we will end up with are classes which are relatively small, compared to classes elsewhere in Stevenage. What we will do is make sure there is sufficient funding in place to make sure the full staffing levels are maintained.

UM Can I just respond, I don’t think you’ve answered the question, I have to say, I come from an industry [unclear] I come from an industry that’s actually littered with companies who’ve run off money, they’ve had undue trouble trying to persuade staff to stay, so [unclear] so I’d love to hear from you what strategy you have in place for staff retention.

JD And what I’m saying to you is, that at the moment we’re consulting on the number, shape, size and location of schools. What we will do, is once we’ve consulted on that, and we are talking about four or five years time, what we will then do is put into place very detailed arrangements and there are lots of things we can do, depending on what the final arrangements are and what the pattern is. What we’re not doing at the moment is consulting on that, and what we’re not doing is winding down, if you like, the overall, if you like, industry of teaching in Stevenage. The number of children in Stevenage is going up slightly, therefore the number of jobs for teachers in Stevenage is going down, and what we do have is a very good track record in Hertfordshire to make sure that every time we do have school reorganisations like this, we have a track record where 100% of teachers who would like to stay in the area and teach, we will arrange for that to happen, and we will be able to say to teachers, if you want to stay in Stevenage, if you want to be part of what is a very exciting professional project, over the next four or five years, we will work together to make sure that your career is secure in Stevenage. Now, when we’ve said that in other reorganisations, we’ve been able to deliver that, 100%. Of course, some teachers will move on, teachers move on anyway, and some teachers may well move on because of the reorganisation, but other teachers will be attracted to Stevenage because of the future in Stevenage that we’re planning. It’s a very exciting place to be and to come and teach.

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JW Thank you. I have about four people who’ve put their hands up already, so there’s a lady here, there’s a lady in the front, and then there’s a gentleman there, and then we will come to the other two or three here, okay.

UF I’d like to say, you’re using words like convincing the teachers, surely, you should be saying, what incentives we’re going to give to teachers, what money is set aside for teachers, are you going to be holding jobs open in other schools for these teachers to maintain their positions, to keep their jobs open, you’re all using words, but you’re not mentioning money, you’re not mentioning incentives, you’re not saying you’re going to hold posts open in the new schools for our teachers and you’re talking about four years hence, we’re talking about now, children are already being pulled from these schools, teachers will start to walk, because they have families to provide for, they’re not going to wait around for four years, they’re going to have to start making decisions now, so what are you doing now, and where’s the money?

JD What we cannot do, is say to individual teachers, here are financial incentives to stay, here are the jobs we are going to hold open for you, until we have agreed formally what the number, shape, size and location of schools are. That will be done at Cabinet in October, unless there are formal objections, then it will be in January. Now I’m very happy and have already offered to come and talk personally to the staff about the kind of things we will be able to offer them, but not in firm detail, because we cannot do that until we know where the schools will be and their size, that’s to pre-empt the consultation process. It might well be that what we do is give what we call in the business, golden handcuffs to stay, it might well be that what we say to staff is, over the next three or four years, when jobs become available elsewhere in the town, we will make appointments across the two schools, so there’s a whole range of issues and a whole range of strategies we can use. We are not in a position to make those offers for teachers because that will be pre-empting this consultation process. We are professional people, we do know about these strategies, we have used them across the town in a range of different patterns, depending on the particular issue. What we don’t do, is say to staff, here are some firm arrangements until we know what schools will be open, what size they’ll be and where they are, that would not be a sensible thing to do, we can and will talk to the staff before the summer holidays about the kind of things that will be in place for them should these proposals go through, but what we can’t do is talk to the staff in detail before we’ve even agreed how many schools and how big they will be, we have to do this in sequence.

UF This is the third meeting that I’m attending and that’s in the hope that I might get some clarity and some understanding, I’m getting more confused. Your map shows very clearly that eventually there will be one school in the south, one school. When you close Heathcote, there is no room in Barnwell for the kids that will still be here, because that will be full. What’s going to happen to all the villages, your map doesn’t even consider all the villages that this school takes, what on earth are you going to do with all those kids. What [unclear] they don’t deserve it, they can all get a bus, you can’t do that, when you close this school, there will not be enough places in our area for our kids,

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our kids walk to school, this is what we’re supposed to be doing isn’t it, leaving our cars at home, this is our local school, a community school, also a very good school. You’re taking Marriotts, [unclear] if that gets [unclear] If we were maybe 40 miles down the road, would you leave us here, because you certainly need provision in this area for children that are coming up, [unclear] is being sold in September, houses are going on there, where are those kids going, what about all the houses that go on [unclear] where are all those children going, [unclear] any other developments locally that are being planned, where do all those kids go, the answer is, the north, you need more provision in the south, don’t shake your head, I live here, my children won’t have a place to go because people are telling me that Barnwell's full. Where will they go?

JD If I can just make a general point and then hand over to Pauline for the detail, basically what’s happening at the moment is, is that there’s movement from the north of the town to the south, because there’s no school where the children live in the north, those children are heading down to the schools, and what’s happening, it’s squeezing spaces here, but if you look at where the children live, in terms of the pattern we’re leaving behind, not only will there be sufficient places in the south for children who live in this part of the world, but there will be a 10% surplus of places to facilitate that, but perhaps if I can hand over to Pauline for some more detail on that.

PD I think there are two different sides of this, first of all, if we’re talking about long term planning, which as we said, we’re planning for the medium term here, if we put a school in the north to serve the people in the north, they then won’t be taking places in the middle of the town. The Barnwell School is currently full because they’re taking children in from the former Collenswood area.

UM [Unclear]

PD Right, so at the moment, the places in Barnwell School are being taken by the people that live not only in this very southern area, but the people that would otherwise have gone to Collenswood School, and they’re not able at this point in time, to get places in the schools, such at Marriotts and Nobel. In this plan, we will not only be providing more places in the north, but we will be expanding both Marriotts and Nobel, which will free up the places in Barnwell School for the people in the south of the town and the villages.

UF I still say that doesn’t stack up. You accepted the fact that numbers were dropping in this school, inevitably they are already, I’m sure, what I want to know is, can you guarantee us that you will protect us, like when you’ve got the kids that [unclear] and need a place or been expelled and need a place, they’re going to go to a school that’s got places, which is going to be us, what I want to know is, can you guarantee us that you won’t do that, because the last time I spoke to you, I asked you if you were prepared to give us a written guarantee that our children’s education would not suffer through this process, and you said you wouldn’t. Now, things like this are the things that worry me, and you know, you have a duty as an authority to protect our kids and to

Appendix 1B(i)

educate them. We accept the fact that all of this is all very marvellous and it’s going to benefit kids down the line, what you should not do, as an authority, is make our kids pay for it. This is a successful school, a happy school, you are doing that at our kids’ expense.

JD I mean, I accept the point you’re making is a very fair point in that the proposals that we’re putting forward here are certainly of most benefit to the children that are currently in the earlier years and in the infant and junior schools, that’s quite right, these proposals kick in, the first time children walk through these new buildings’ doors, it’s 2011, 12, 13, and so it’s perfectly true that the children who are currently in school or will be in, not just this school, but schools throughout Stevenage, over the next four, five, six, years, will be, if we’re not careful, subject to disruption and to benefit the children of the future, that’s a fair point to make, and it is also a fair point to say that there’s a history where schools do have surplus places, and this happens at the moment, if you’re not careful, they can take more than their fair share of challenging pupils, I think that’s a fair point. So what I would say to you is, what we’ll do is make sure we can put protocols in place between schools, and Stevenage is pretty good at this actually, in terms of sharing the load about working with challenging kids, we’ll make sure that we’ve got protocols in place that make sure that Heathcote, if it does have spare places, over the next four, five, years, doesn’t get full of children that other schools can’t cope with, it shouldn’t have more than it’s fair share of what we call challenging children. That’s a fair point.

UF You should say there should be none, because the kids will then be suffering.

JD Well, I mean, I’m not going to commit to that, what I’m saying is, I will make sure that Heathcote is run and gets all the due respect and support as a fully operational, viable school, and that will include not having to take more than its fair share of difficult and challenging pupils, I think that’s a fair point.

UM I’ve got a couple of points, one is that looking through all the BSF documentation on the website, I noted that at some point Stevenage has done a trial school, it must have done to be at this stage in the process, and I don’t know why you’re shaking your head because I clearly went through all the previous ones [unclear] is the closest we have done in [unclear]

LM No, I’m sorry, we haven’t done a trial school, we were not informed that we would receive Building Schools for the Future funding until the 20th of December, so we couldn’t possibly have done a trial school last year. Trial schools are done for the outline business case, in terms of their initial feasibility work which is required in February to March of next year.

UM It’s too late for your trial school, which I suggest means that you’ve just gone through, you raised it yourself because you raised [unclear] you’ve already taken one school out of the south of the town, and you’re now using that as an excuse for the school in the north. When we were looking at Collenswood two years ago, we were told that it wasn’t [unclear] but it turned

Appendix 1B(i)

itself around and was turning into what was going to be another successful school in the town, so why did you close it down? Well, I suspect I know, because you are much further down in this process in your detailed planning that any of this process is letting on. You say that you previously consulted all the stakeholders. No you haven’t, I’m a stakeholder, the children of this school are stakeholders, you are now consulting us, [unclear] that early consultation about where we wanted schools. What is happening to the parental choice in terms of choosing a school, schools of varying sizes. We distinctly chose this school for my son, my son wanted to come here because it has an engineering discipline, Barnwell’s no good to us, that’s maths and computers, or whatever it is, business studies, he’s not interested, he wanted to come to this school because it’s engineering. What is happening to that choice, am I now going to have to send my children way across the town to find a school with engineering specialisation?

JD If I pick up the Collenswood point and I can see the argument you’re trying to make and without sounding rude, you’re just wrong, I’m afraid, the two things don’t go hand in hand. I understand that you feel suspicious and, and I think I said before, people are naturally suspicious of local government, you know, that’s … if I can just finish the point, we intervened in Collenswood, you say it was a good school, this was a school with the lowest performing school in the county, this was a school we put a lot of support into, the thought of a local authority deliberately getting a school to fail I think takes suspicion a little bit too far, that’s frankly not a reasonable position to be in, what I’m saying to you is, we put a lot of time over three or four years into Collenswood, a lot of money, hundreds of thousands of pounds, we tried to turn the school around and we didn’t. Now I accept that because that school didn’t improve there is some fault in that in terms of local authority because the strategies we put in place to turn that school round are the same strategies we used elsewhere in the county which worked very well. We’ve had a review to look into why that didn’t work, but Collenswood was an intervention purely on grounds of standards, in the end we felt the standards were so low, and the teaching quality was so poor, we had to intervene and close it. At that point in time, we knew BSF was some way off in the distance, but we did not know that we were having BSF funding until last Christmas, and in fact we had to make an aggressive bid to bring Stevenage forward a number of years to get it into Wave Four. So the two are not linked, the two are separate processes and during the Collenswood closure, we made it quite clear that although we knew BSF was in the future, the two aren’t linked, and they’re not. I understand you’re trying to draw the two together but they are quite separate processes.

UM I just want to say one thing, you just said something now that was very odd, because I looked at the government spreadsheet on where Stevenage was in the Waves, the spreadsheet is dated early 2006, possibly late 2005, it said clearly that Stevenage was in B, which means that you knew that you were going to be in Wave Four a lot sooner than you’ve been saying.

LM No, let me just explain what the gentleman means if I may, the Building [unclear] programme is divided into parts and then in waves, a part is a

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bundle of three years, so part A is years one to three of the programme, part B is years four to six of the programme, and he’s absolutely right, we were put in part B of the programme, which means we could have got funded in anything of Waves Four, Five or Six, there’s quite a lot of difference in three years, it was not until the 20th of December 2006 that we knew we would be in Wave Four rather than Waves Five or Six.

UF Hi, I live in Datchworth, which is one of the villages you seem to be hoping doesn’t exist. My children went to a school that’s grown from 120 children to 170 children during the life of their school, I wanted my children to go to Hertford Schools, you decided, not you personally obviously, but the Education Authority decided they couldn’t go there, they lived in such a place that it was lottery whether they did or didn’t and they weren’t allowed in these schools, you said they had to go to Heathcote School. Now they’re at Heathcote School and this is supposed to be a consultation process, but I’ve read the literature, I’ve read the letters, I’ve sat and watched the presentation, I’m struggling to understand what my opinion counts. You’re giving me the option or you’re describing to me, Heathcote School closes or Heathcote School closes. My preference, or my opinion, is that Heathcote doesn’t close, but you don’t care about that because you are not giving me that in terms of authority. I’d like that to go on record firstly. Secondly, you’re talking about the shaping and how you can’t make commitments to teachers because you haven’t decided what you’re going to do, but whatever else happens, you have decided you’re going to close Heathcote, so that part of the decision is firm and I’m sorry, but I agree with the gentleman over there, the teachers will leave, they will stay as long as their loyalty and their finance and their families allow them because they’re all good teachers, but they will leave, they’ll leave our children with poor teaching. To be absolutely honest, I’m not interested in your ten year vision because I’m trying to get my children through education, I’m not doing birth control planning, they’re here, I don’t have ten years, I’ve got the next six years to get two kids educated and you’re damaging that and I’ve already expressed why you don’t care about my opinion. The final thing I’d like to say is, it was a lovely presentation with absolutely no evidence. If you’d consulted all the stakeholders, I’ve never met a parent, a teacher, a head teacher, a business person, who thinks that big schools are good for kids, never in all my life. I’d like to see the evidence behind this presentation, I’d like to see all those stakeholders who say it’s a good thing.

JD Okay, if I pick up some general points, we’re not saying we’ve consulted so far with absolutely everybody, what we’re saying to you is, we’re consulting, this is just the formal consultation, the process we’ve put in place in Hertfordshire has three basic stages to it, the first is, before coming up with proposals on which to publicly consult, which is the stage we’re at, we bring together a whole range of stakeholders heads, governing bodies, local politicians, a whole range of people, educationalists, to examine all the possible options, all the things we could do, in terms of creating this pattern of schools. That doesn’t involve everybody, what that is, if you like, is pre consultation to look at a number of ideas and then we break those ideas down by applying some key tests, then we go out to consult on that. What most authorities do is do that planning work themselves and then go out to consult,

Appendix 1B(i)

so what we’ve done is build in a process beforehand where we’re consulting with a wide range of stakeholders to develop the proposals in the first place. That’s quite true, not all of the stakeholders think that this overall pattern is sensible, I have to say, so far, because we’re tracking, as you imagine, as responses come through, there is a lot of support, a lot of support for what we’re proposing as a preferred option, across the town as a whole, there is overwhelming support for the pattern, shape, number and location of schools. That doesn’t necessarily mean that support is emanating here from Heathcote, and so that’s why I’m saying not all the stakeholders liked the idea. In terms of consulting, what we’re saying to you is, if you want to create a pattern for schools which does a couple of things, firstly reflects the current shape of where children now live and where they’re going to live, rather than where they used to live 30 or 40 years ago which is what the current pattern does. If you want schools of eight forms of entry, and I will come back to that point in a moment, and if you want the kind of, create the kind of thing that Lindsay was talking about, this is the pattern that we need to do, and we don’t two eight form elementary schools next to each other in the south of the town. Your point about eight form entry schools, I could take you to evidence actually, hard nosed research evidence to demonstrate small schools are the best, or large schools are the best, actually the evidence is very inconclusive. In the end, the evidence tells us, what counts against the quality of education of the children is the quality of leadership, the quality of teaching, the quality environment, the support from parents, all those things are far more important, actually, than the size of schools. So I’m not saying to you, by creating eight form entry schools, we’re automatically going to raise standards. What I am saying to you, by creating eight forms of entry, what you do is create a cohort at Key Stage Four and the Sixth Form, which are big enough to invest in those children at the age you need to invest in them in terms of possible vocational courses. Vocational courses cost two or three times as much as, if you like, a maths GCSE, and unless you’ve got large enough children coming through the school, it’s difficult to fund those places without undermining the rest of the children. Hertfordshire, we’ve done brilliantly in terms of standards, we’ve got it on really good authority, but over the last ten years we’ve fallen behind that development of vocational courses. What we’re saying is this pattern of school is big enough so we can invest in Key Stage Four, and in terms of some of the specialisms that somebody was talking about earlier, what we will do is each of the schools will have one or more specialism, which will be linked to a college, so the college will also be able to invest in those sites. The overall point that the lady said earlier is a very fair point, what we’re doing here is creating a pattern and shape of schools for the future and all I can say in terms of disruption, not just for Heathcote children, but for children across town, what we will do is, first of all, keep that disruption to an absolute minimum by planning what we’re doing very carefully, once we know what the shape and number of schools will be, and secondly, where there is unavoidable disruption, will manage it very carefully and work our way through that.

UF You talk about, if I want this and if I want that, what about those things you mentioned I don’t. What I want is for my children in the next six years to have a good education, and you keep saying words, but they don’t make any

Appendix 1B(i)

sense to me, I’m not an educationalist, I don’t understand all of the organisational … but I can see the vision, I can see in ten years’ time it’s going to be lovely but you’re all committing the next six years of our children to a disruptive education, and you might try and ….

JD What I am saying to you is we will invest heavily in Heathcote School over the next four or five years, both in its site, but also in its staff and its children to make sure that there is not just a viable, but a continuing good quality of education here at Heathcote School, and we’ll make sure those links are made so that this school benefits from the wider project.

UF Can you give me your mobile number so that I can keep in touch with you over the next six years so that you know when my child is ….

JD I will give you my contact details, yes, I will give you my card at the end. What we will certainly do is agree that we pull together a group of parents from Heathcote School and we would meet with them regularly over the next three or four years, like on a regular basis, so we can monitor what the parents think about what we’re doing, hold us to account and give us some feedback, and I’m very happy to do that, and I would be very happy personally to come along to those meetings.

UF One point is, I live in Knebworth, I’ve got a daughter at this school and I’ve got a son at private school, the county have already failed my son once, with the primary school admission system put Stevenage before where you live, he was unable to get into Knebworth School and he was sent to school in [unclear] and he’s away from all this friends. He’s actually due to come to secondary school the year that Heathcote is going to close according to you, where are you going to send children from Knebworth, which will be their allocated school?

PD As I’ve said before, we expect, with this plan, for there to be enough places for people in the south of the town and the villages to come to the school in the south of the town if that’s what parents choose.

UF So will that be Barnwell?

PD Barnwell will be the school in the south of the town.

UF At the moment, he’s in a primary school in the south of Stevenage because you would not let him go to the village school, because Stevenage said it’s got priority over Knebworth children, so he didn’t get into Knebworth school, he had to go to school in Stevenage, so you will not separate him from the friends he’s now got at a Stevenage school when he comes to secondary transfer?

PD The admission rules were applied when your son applied to go to Knebworth Primary School and the rules are quite clear that looked after children first, medical needs, siblings, then distance, and in the past, the population in Knebworth was larger and that historically, when it was smaller,

Appendix 1B(i)

people from Stevenage were able to gain places in Knebworth School, and for a period of time, therefore their siblings gained a place over and above some people who lived in the town. That situation isn’t happening now, because the population in Knebworth is declining.

UF Yeah, because all the Knebworth kids are coming to Stevenage.

PD No, there are places now in Knebworth Primary, so clearly, all the people who wanted a place got the places. In the future, when we’re talking about secondary school provision, those admission rules will still be applied equally, so that if you want a place in any school in Stevenage, you would apply through the normal admission rules …

UF If you’re in Knebworth and you apply you have Hitchin Girls, Hitchin Boys or Heathcote, you don’t get any other choice really from Knebworth. I have to say that if you live in Knebworth or one of the villages you get [unclear]

PD I am aware of the concern, the other lady said the same, the concern from people in the villages is it’s our contention that there will be enough places, but clearly my job is to manage that supply and demand for places, we will monitor it very carefully, we will also monitor what the admission rules in terms of whether it does disadvantage people from the villages and we will take action if we can and if that’s needed, we will monitor the situation very carefully, but we’re saying to you now that we don’t think that that’s going to be an issue.

UF My concern is now, he’s happy at school, I’m more than happy with the Stevenage school he’s at now, but if he’s going to be ripped away from all his friends because of Heathcote shutting, then do I move him now? My other point is, I’ve got a daughter here who’s been more than happy here, on Friday we’ve had an episode in Year Eight where we’ve got Stevenage and village schools, we’ve got them all ganging up against each other, you’re going to be separated, they’re going to bus all the village kids to different schools, Stevenage kids are all going to be kept together, we’ve had bullying, I had to pick my daughter up at quarter to three so that she wasn’t set upon before she got on the coach by another gang of girls, is this going to be the pattern that we’re going to have for four years?

PD Certainly we wouldn’t want that to happen and obviously the school will manage that situation. We will talk to the school to find out what happened and what strategies they will be putting in place to avoid that happening in the future, but thanks for telling us because it’s an important issue.

UF Hi, before I ask my question I just want to say something about Collenswood and I know you keep on about it, it’s only because I worked there, and it shut down because you wanted to sell the land and make lots of money and build a housing estate, that’s why it shut down and you put [unclear] teaching in there to make sure it shut down. Anyhow, my question to you now is, if this school is closing, which we all know it is, are you going to

Appendix 1B(i)

put money into a school that’s closing, if you don’t put money in, what’s going to happen to our children that are here, when all the other schools are getting nice sports equipment and stuff, are our children here going to still get that, are you still going to put money into a school that’s shutting?

JD We keep going backwards and forward on Collenswood, just for the record, for the tape, we closed Collenswood because it wasn’t good enough, the quality of education in Collenswood was poor, going down, I certainly wouldn’t want to send my own children there and in the end we intervened and the point you’re making is frankly an unreasonable one. I think you were wrong then and you are wrong now. In terms of investing in this site, in the end, that land might well be sold, but not for some time. We said that Barnwell could use that site as long as it needed it and it might well be useful as we work through the BSF programme, we don’t know, eventually it might well be sold on, but that’s not the reason we closed it, we closed it because it just wasn’t good enough and wasn’t improving. In terms of your other point, I think that’s a very fair point, if we are, as a local authority, saying we want this school to continue to thrive as a school right up to the point where it closes, then what we can’t do is allow the site to run down. What we wouldn’t do is say to you, well, we’ll build a brand new maths block over the next three or four years because that wouldn’t be good use of money, but we would make sure that the investment in the site kept it in the condition it needs to be and we would continue to do that. In terms of comparing with the other children, you need to bear in mind that the other children in Stevenage who are in the current schools in Stevenage, they also won’t benefit from any new buildings, because it’s going to take four or five years for those buildings, so if you take the Marriotts proposals, where we are proposing to build a new school, the children in the Marriotts School, although it won’t be potentially disruptive, won’t get access, if you like, to those new buildings, because they will have left the school before they get there.

UF I’m talking about equipment, IT screen stuff, it doesn’t make sense that you’re going to put money into a school that’s going to shut down.

JD Well, it does make sense because what we’re saying is, that the IT equipment, the facilities, the resources for the school, we’ll make sure that those resources continue to go in, because what we will be doing is investing in the children of Heathcote School. What we won’t do is build a brand new maths block or a brand new Science block, but we will make sure that the usual investment in a school of this size will continue.

UF Two of my children were in Collenswood, and you promised me, you promised me, no disruption, they went to Barnwell, one of my children in Barnwell never had detention, perfect school record, she was threatened, threatened by three teachers, she phoned me screaming with terror that she’d been threatened, I went up there, actually, she was right, she was in the right, they were completely wrong. My second child who is Year Eight was forced into what you knew was a failing school, was called [unclear] who know this child now, one of them said to me, she has never put a foot wrong, I know that child, and she was called an animal, now you cannot take a massive group of

Appendix 1B(i)

children and put them into another school without them being treated like second class citizens. I’ve got another child coming to the school in September, she is absolutely terrified that her education is going to go down the pan the same way that my other two children’s has. My child that is here now has gone up two grades in maths in nine months. You didn’t give them the education they deserved when they were in Collenswood, and neither did either of my children get the education in Barnwell that you promised, you promised that education, it didn’t materialise. Do you know, they were promised revision lessons for GCSEs, they turned up for revision lessons, they didn’t get them, how is that not going to disrupt their education, you said to me, there is no hope for their GCSEs this year, take the current Year Eleven from Collenswood that are in Barnwell have no hope for their GCSEs, my friend said, right Mr [unclear] I’m going to sue you because you just said that, you then backtracked, you backtracked, don’t you dare shake your head at me, I was there, I remember it, and tell you what, next time I will bring you my children and they can tell you how bad it’s been for them and how their education has been disrupted and how I’ve got three children, I’ve got four children, quite probably the three year old may get an education in secondary school that is not disruptive, but I very much doubt it if you are still in control.

JD I do remember you and remember you well, the point you make about no hope, I challenged at the time and said you were misquoting me, I went back and listened to the tape and you had indeed misquoted me. Luckily, we record these conversations as we’re recording them now, I went back and looked at the tape and when I’d said you’d misquoted me I was right and you were wrong, you had misquoted me.

UF All these people here don’t want the school to close, all you’re doing is going round and closing schools, you appear to be a law unto yourself. Are your children educated in Stevenage, I very much doubt it, because if they were, you wouldn’t be doing this now. You’d be leaving these children alone, they are in a school where they are now happy, they are confident, and where they are getting a very good education.

JW Thank you, I think you’ve made a very fair point …

UF I’m not six year old and I will not be dictated to, this is supposed to be consultation where we can say what we want to say, I haven’t finished.

JW Absolutely, but there are lot of people waiting and also, you haven’t got the mike and it’s not going on the tape which is my point, so I’ve very concerned that everybody should get a say.

UF Well I’m very concerned that my children’s education, three children, disrupted their whole education, which means three children come out of senior school with nothing to speak of, it will affect their education, the teachers will leave and the children will be disrupted, they will then be treated poorly when they are forced to go to a school they don’t want to go to. It has happened, I’ve watched it happen, you [unclear] this lady was fundamentally wrong, you are fundamentally wrong, your children don’t go there, you didn’t

Appendix 1B(i)

see the tears and the tantrums when they came home and teachers called them animals [?] My child, I can assure you, is far from that, and something else, three teachers threatening one small girl, yes, that’s very well mannered.

JD Okay, if I can answer, because the clock is going, first of all, it’s very fair that in a public meeting when I’m misquoted again, I think it’s fair to say that I went back, looked at the tape, and you were wrong in what you said and I think that’s fine. In terms of Collenswood, we’re not here to recluse Collenswood, but in terms of Collenswood, where I think I do disagree with you is twofold. Firstly, of course there are individual children in schools across the county who don’t settle into schools, who don’t have such a good experience as the rest of the school, but I would say to you, if you remember, you were part of a group of parents who tried to save Collenswood and took us one and gave us an interesting time, and we kept that group of parents together and I met with them after the consultation process, right up until when those children joined Barnwell, and I have to say, almost all of those parents, almost all, not yourself, and one other, but almost all of those parents said actually, we are delighted with the progress our children are making, in hindsight, you should have closed the school earlier. Now, not every parent said that, but a lot of parents have said that, I’ve been back to that Barnwell site, the Barnwell East site, and the behaviour is better, the attendance is up, the children are in control, that is a much, much better educational experience on the Collenswood site now than it ever was, and I know there are examples of children that haven’t fared as well, but the great majority of children have got a much better deal from that experience. The other thing I would say about Collenswood, is that the promises that we made there, for example, the promise I’ve given tonight, we’d make sure that all members of staff who wanted to stay in Stevenage or in Hertfordshire, that wanted to stay could, all those members of staff who wanted to stay, did stay, many of them in Barnwell, others in Stevenage, others in Hertfordshire, and their careers are flourishing.

UM I’ve got a couple of points, firstly my son went through that issue of super school with [unclear] which was a few years ago, and I’m sure some of the parents here also went through that. Now the parents here didn’t want a super school and I think you can see now that they still don’t want a super school. So, I don’t understand why they keep forcing this issue with the children of Stevenage, it’s just beyond belief. The other point I want to make is the consultation paper at that time, that you drew up for the super school was totally inaccurate and full of holes and inaccuracies, and I suspect this one is probably likewise, and I think the lady’s highlighted over there, regarding the numbers [unclear] in the south of Stevenage, so again, I think it’s going to be inaccurate [unclear] More importantly, I have a short term relationship with the school, my son is hopefully going to go on to do GCSEs in the Sixth Form and then eventually leave, I’d like to know, is it a matter of record, and I’d like to approach Mr Donovan, that you are going to invest heavily in not only the staff but the equipment and the education of the children at school until you close it? If you just say yes or no...

Appendix 1B(i)

JD If you could just sit down, I will. If you could just be quiet, that would be great. There are three points and I’ll take each one. First of all, the reference to super schools I think is unhelpful in that we are not proposing super schools. Eight form entry schools are not super schools. They are a standard size, up and down the country, eight and ten form entry schools are very, very common indeed, they are bigger than the schools that are currently in Stevenage, but to refer to them as big and super schools is not accurate. There are, Barnwell will be eight forms of entry, alongside all the other schools in Stevenage, if our proposals go through, and if you think of the reference you made to primary schools, we were proposing there a three form entry school, which is on the bigger side for primary schools, but again, not unusual, and what we’ve created there are three forms of entry on a single campus, two schools, federated together with one governing body, so in effect, we’ve still go three forms of entry on that site, and I have to say, it’s working really well indeed. Okay, well, I hope you agree that it’s working really well, there’s been a lot of hard work on that. The other thing is that you mention inaccuracies, every time we consult, and we do a lot of reviews, because it’s a large county, people always say our figures are wrong, but I have to say, once the reviews have taken place, historically we can demonstrate that actually, you were right in terms of our forecasting of where children live, and what the patterns are, if you go back through reviews that have taken place in areas like South Hatfield and Oxhey and all the rest a few years ago, the predictions we had in our forecasting tool were accurate, and we’ve had our forecasting tool looked at, and it’s plus or minus 1% across the county which is good. The third point, and again, I will check the tape to make sure what I say is accurate, what I’m saying to you, for the record, is that whilst Heathcote is running up until closer, we will make sure we invest in the school in the normal way, so where we would put usual amounts of money into support, IT, repairs and building maintenance, the school will get exactly the same budget it would have got. What we won’t do is cut that budget because it’s closing, I am quite happy to go on the record for that.

UM I think you’ll find the term you used was heavily and I’d like to see a transcript of the tape because I think it was heavily.

UM Okay, well, I think as an authority, we do invest heavily in our schools, it is my opinion, and what I am saying to you is, that we will invest in Heathcote School in the same way we would invest in Heathcote School now, we won’t start cutting budgets. What we won’t do is build a new sports hall or a new science block, we won’t do that.

UM Sorry, I’ve got just one final point. You talking about committing to parents and which meetings you will attend over the next three or four years, may I suggest to the Board of Governors that you set this up and [unclear] and rather than just attend the occasional meeting, that you should be a vice chair of that meeting, or certainly attend them on a regular basis.

UM I’m quite happy to go on the record to say that I think in fact I would encourage the idea of parents of a school like this going through that transitional period, if that group were to be set up, I’m not sure I should chair it

Appendix 1B(i)

or be vice chair, because I expect the group will want to hold me to account, but I will be very happy to attend regularly. I agree with you, I agree with you.

JW A member of the audience is just pointing out to me that time is ticking on, could you just please keep your comments fairly crisp and to the point, so that I can to everybody, otherwise people are going to go away feeling that they haven’t been able to get their point across and we are trying to do so. You need to have your say, but you could you then pass on.

UF As parents of two boys in Heathcote at present, we chose Heathcote for its ethos, for its dedicated staff, for it’s visionary and successful head, and at the moment, it’s a bit of a kick in the teeth really, that Heathcote isn’t being considered for relocation to the north and it has vastly superior value added than both Marriotts and [unclear]

JD I would agree with your analysis of Heathcote, I think it is a good and improving school, which is why I think it’s unfortunate to compare it with Collenswood and the intervention. The intervention here is about, it’s about the future of the town, and we don’t need two eight form entry schools next to each other in this part of the town over the next 20 to 30 years, that’s the reason we’re here, that’s the bottom line. In terms of considering moving Heathcote, we did look at that, because as you say, it’s got a good ethos, and a school really, we’re talking about buildings, but really in the end, it’s about staff and kids, it’s great to have spectacular buildings but it’s isn’t about that. We can’t really do that because if you were to locate this school, for example, on the northern site, what you would find is that the children who are living in the south, the current Heathcote, would be having to travel to the far end of the town, where are the moment, the children who are living within walking distance of the new site, are the children who are going to Thomas Alleyne, and therefore, it makes sense to move Thomas Alleyne because that, if you’re a Thomas Alleyne parent you’ll say, well hang on a minute, our children live here, why are you moving a school from the south or the north when you can move us just a mile. The other reason, and there’s a technical reason for this, is that if we were to relocate this school that far away we would have to close Heathcote anyway, but under the new rule, since the Education Inspections Act, if you move a school a distance so that it’s not anymore in its location, where the children currently live, you have to actually open a new school and you have to open that up to competition, so rather than say, for example, we would want to move Heathcote to the north of the town, we would have to close Heathcote, open a new school in the north of the town, and open that up to a competition, so anybody in the country could come along and say, we would want to run that school, so it could be the private sector, a faith group, a Trust, could come along and say we want to, and what we’re trying to do in Stevenage, for the next 20 to 30 years, is to create a pattern of schools, which work collaboratively together, especially Key Stage Four and the Sixth Form and we couldn’t guarantee that with a brand new school over which we had no control, so we did look at that, but for those two reasons, it just wouldn’t work.

Appendix 1B(i)

UM The point you made [unclear] a number of different reasons, about the issue of competition, but I’m sure you aware that what you said is partly true [unclear] for example, it’s quite possible for an authority to apply to [unclear] to have an exception from competition rules, so for example [unclear] February 2007, [unclear] if successful, the exception [unclear] proposal for a new school [unclear] says that the Guidance states [unclear] might have an adverse effect on the delivery of [unclear] So no, you didn’t actually [unclear]

JD You’re right to a point, it has to be under exceptional circumstances, but if you actually look at the pattern we’re trying to create here, there are not exceptional circumstances here, because the school in the north, if you think about what we saying to the Secretary of State, we have a school only a mile away which is currently serving the children who live in that area, no, 80% of the children in the current Year Seven and Eight at Thomas Alleyne live in the Great Ashby area, well yes, if you think about the closure, by the time those children move through, they’ll be in Years Nine, Ten, Eleven, and so what we will be saying to the Secretary of State, we want to close Thomas Alleyne's school, even though a new school is sitting right next to where the children currently go and then move a school from the other end of town to the opposite end of the town, so that the children who currently go to Heathcote travel past four or five other schools to get there. There is absolutely no way a Secretary of State is going to consider that as sensible and

UM The proposition is that you can actually avoid competition rules, you didn’t look at any way of doing that, [unclear] institution that wants to contribute. [unclear]

LM We did look at it, but we got a very clear steer from the Office of the Schools Commissioner that we’d be very unlikely to get an exception in these circumstances, so we did test it out, ultimately of course, you’re taking a chance aren’t you, because you may or may not get the Secretary of State’s exception, so it rather depends whether you want a certain future in a particular place, or the chance of trying to get an exception that you may or may not get, which I put to you, is something of a risk, especially when …

UF You’re taking the risk [unclear]

UM It just seems that you’re prepared to let a successful school go.

JD I’d go back to the points I think the gentleman here raised, really I think quite eloquently and assertively, that it is a good school, and it is a responsibility on the local authority to try and hang onto and persuade and cajole as many staff as possible to stay within the Stevenage Project, so we can capture the really good practice in Heathcote, and what we’ve done so far is have a letter signed by every head teacher in Stevenage, which has gone to the staff to say, look, we want to work with the staff of Heathcote over the next four to five years to make sure that your future careers are not just safe, but really quite interesting and exciting here in Stevenage, so before we’ve even completed this stage of the consultation, the rest of the head teachers in schools in Stevenage have agreed to work with us to try and hang on to all

Appendix 1B(i)

that good practice, because it is good practice. So I absolutely accept the point, the only reason why we’re looking at this school to close is because of its location, not because of its practice, I understand that that’s frustrating, irritating and it’s going to make people angry, and I do understand that what we’re doing is creating a pattern for children of the future, not the present, but we will do all we can to capture that best practice and work it through.

UM Several points I’m afraid, if you close Heathcote, you could not quite simply guarantee every teacher at Heathcote, if they wanted a job, they would be guaranteed another job in another school in Stevenage, that is certainly being made on the very date that the, the proposals may or may not go through council, that is written in stone to teachers in this school. Now secondly, you’ve created a mess for yourselves, nobody wants Heathcote to close, we want [unclear] but if you look at the first place [unclear] merger, we wouldn’t have liked it, but there wouldn’t have been that fear, and [unclear] the site being used, if [unclear] merger, there wouldn’t be half the alarm. Now we come to the final point I want to raise, you said that [unclear] firstly money is dependable on how many pupils are coming into the school [unclear] Let’s be realistic, what’s the intake going to be next year, is it going to be 150, [unclear] what will be the intake the year after that, then what will you do with the funding, [unclear] there isn’t the number of children in the school to do it. Everybody knows that this school, is it a great school? No. Is it a good school? Yes. I’ve got my fourth child joining here next year, he’s got every single right to have the same level of education, the same level of teaching that all my other three children do, and he has the same right to enjoy the prosperity, which is very welcome [unclear] nobody here, if they’ve really thought about it, is not going to be pleased about the investment in schools, it’s great to see, it will bring a better future for all the children, but every single child in Heathcote, every child in Stevenage has the same right to an education through that period, there is absolutely no reason why you have to have a monoculture number of schools, where all the schools are the same, this is an engineering school. I run a very small engineering business, [unclear] this is one thing that we would use in engineering, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Now, just finally, if Heathcote closes, which everybody knows, there’s a real chance of that, who’s fault is it, is it the children’s? Is it the head teacher? Is it the staff? It’s not just a moral thing, you have a legal responsibility to meet the needs of the children and nothing other than meeting the needs of every single child at Heathcote is acceptable.

PD Absolutely.

JD Seven points there, if someone asks me seven questions, you’re going to get seven answers, I’m sorry, otherwise I’m going to be accused of not answering questions. The first one, well, there’s sometimes points that need correcting, in terms of saying to staff, we will guarantee you a post in Stevenage, technically, this is, if you like, a legal position, the governing bodies of the schools have to make those guarantees and the governing bodies make those appointments. What we can say to staff is that we have already begun to work with the schools, the other schools, to make sure that staff who want to stay in Stevenage can do and what I’m saying to you is that

Appendix 1B(i)

up until now, we’ve had a 100% track record and we’ve already made a good start by all the heads signing up personally, including the Catholic school, to making this work across the town. The second point, when you say, no one wants this proposal, it’s not quite true, quite a lot of people across the town as a whole are writing in, supporting quite enthusiastically, these overall proposals, I accept, I accept not many of those, in fact, very, very few indeed, are connected to Heathcote School, but the overall proposals, no, if I just, I need to answer your questions and then you can come back. The third point, the third point, you made, was merger.

UM You just misquoted, I said that everybody welcomes, you just said that not everybody welcomes, everybody in this room welcomes the money that is going into Stevenage school.

JD I’m not quoting that bit, I’m quoting one of the earlier points, and one of your earlier points was, nobody wants Heathcote to close. What I’m saying to you is I understand, there is support for these proposals, fairly overwhelming support for the proposals, but I accept that very little, not none, but very little support from Heathcote. You mention merger, we did look at that, but the problem with that is we go back to the original point, you can’t amalgamate schools, what you have to do is close both, there’s no, if you like, technical way of amalgamating schools, you have to close both schools and then open a brand new school, bring the two together and that we’d have to open up to competition because there aren’t any exceptional circumstances. The fourth point you made was transitional arrangements, you know, I absolutely accept that if we’re not careful, the disruption will undermine what the kids are able to achieve, and we will do everything we possibly can to manage that. You talked about the fact that if the numbers do fall slightly in the school, that would negate my guarantee that we will keep the investment going, under normal circumstances you would be right, the biggest financial indicator if you like, for school, I think somebody used the phrase, bums on seats, normally children come through the door, they’ve got... but under reorganisations like this we have a funding formula which allows us to use transitional funding to make sure that through a transitional period, schools can be supported, so even though it might be expensive, because children might be in relatively small classes, we have transitional funding arrangements to help us do that. And finally, you mentioned the fact that most people would welcome the idea of £145 million coming into the town, I have to say to you, that’s not guaranteed, we’ll get the £145 million if we can convince the people who are going to give us the money, i.e. the government, that what we’re proposing is a shape, pattern, number of schools, which are fit for the next 30, 40 years, not, we certainly wouldn’t get funding if we went to them and said, all we are going to do is rebuild and invest in our current schools, I suspect we would not get the funding for that, what we have to do is make that larger argument in order to get the £145 million in.

UF I’d just like to know exactly what you’ve got proposed, there’s a lot of parents in this room that are in exactly the same position as I am, my daughter’s joining Year Seven this year, and obviously, this school will be due

Appendix 1B(i)

to finish in the year of her Year Ten, so where are you going to put her, where will she take her GCSEs in Year Eleven?

JD Basically what we’re, first thing to say, I think there’s a meeting for parents of next year’s Year Seven, I think on Monday, I’m not sure how wise it is, but I’m going to come to that meeting and try to talk to those parents, because I have to say, we’re concerned with any disruption at all but the parents of next year’s Year Seven have chosen Heathcote before these proposals came out, so I think, there’s a particular point, and so I intend to come along, I know it’s the school’s meeting, what I’m going to ask for is 10 or 15 minutes to set out some of the things we might want to do and then stay for the evening so that individual parents can come and catch me and what we will basically do, is again, once we’ve agreed, what the pattern, number and shape, once all that’s gone through, we will do some very detailed work on there, and I will give you some examples of the kind of things we can do. Basically, what I’m saying to you is, we will not move the children during a Key Stage. So if it looks like, and by the time your child gets to Year Nine, long before Year Nine, before they get to the end of Year Seven in fact, in the Spring of next year, we will have put in a business plan which sets out the dates, times, locations in absolute detail, so we will be able to say to you as a parent, before your child finishes Year Seven, here’s the detailed arrangements, and we will make sure those are clear, and we will set out those, but at the very least, what we will do is certainly not move children during their Key Stage. If necessary, we will have to delay the whole thing. I think it’s unreasonable to expect kids to move, particularly in the middle of Key Stage Four and so we will work that through, so that’s the guarantee we will give you, for the record, for the tape, we won’t disrupt children part way through a Key Stage, especially in the year they’re going to do their GCSEs, I think that will be disruption just too far, we wouldn’t be able to justify that.

UF I’ve got two kids [unclear] my brain is just absolutely spinning, I’ve come to so many meetings, I’m feeling worse, now I’m coming next week because my son starts in September. [Unclear] about Monday night and it did say that a representative from you guys would be there. I emailed [unclear] today to say to him that I didn’t wish to see them. We’re supposed to be keeping our kids upbeat and happy and wanting to come to school, I don’t want my son in this hall on Monday listening to you tell me [unclear]

JD If the parents feel it’s unhelpful for me to be there, I’ll reconsider that and I’ll talk to the head and Chair of Governors. I mean, I suggested I came because I thought it might be helpful. The other way of doing it, rather than getting up and giving a talk, is to be in the building, so if parents want to see me they can, I don’t know how common that view is, but I will talk to the head and Chair of Governors about that.

UF Before you spoke, again, if you just say to the hall, that we can go out and do something else in school if we want to, I’ve tried to keep this away from my kids.

Appendix 1B(i)

JD As I said, I’ll chat to the head and Chair of Governors about that and see if we need to reconsider.

UF One question I have got at the moment is my son is starting in September, my daughter is due to start senior school 2011, at the moment we’ve got no way of knowing if this school’s going to be here or not then, where is she going to go under the Stevenage rule? Is he going to have been told by the time, by the time of 2011 of not make my choice of what school I want them to go to because I live in Knebworth, so I will probably be told [unclear] but how am I going to know where my son is going, because I can’t get her into wherever he’s gone on the sibling rule if you don’t tell me in time where he’s going to go.

PD By the time, as we said, that when we publish statutory notices, it will be very clear where the children that will be in this school, where they would have the opportunity to go at the end of the school’s life. You will therefore know in advance where your son will be.

UF How far in advance?

PD Well, we will give you details when we publish the statutory notice, and if it’s more than one school, we would ask you to express your preference of the schools that might be on offer. You will know where your son is going so you will know when your other child comes up, you will know exactly where they will be and the admission rules will apply and if your second child is a sibling, the sibling rule will apply equally to your second child.

JD One assurance that we’ve given at previous meetings and we’re quite happy to give it again, is that we will not go to statutory, and so if we go to Education Panel at Cabinet and they decide to go for this option, we will not publish statutory notices to implement that option unless we’re quite clear about those admissions arrangements. So we won’t go out to implement this proposal unless we’ve got that information, I think it would be unfair to do so, in fact, if it’s not illegal, it should be.

UF I just want to know if you can give me any guarantees, I work for the NHS [unclear] so what guarantees, how confident are you that you will get this money [unclear] taking up places, so they would be [unclear] I have worked for the NHS [unclear] and have any of you sat down with any child and asked them [unclear]

LM If I answer the first bit, I think you asked if the money was guaranteed, it’s a funding allocation from central government for the financial year 2008/9, those funding plans are set, I think it very unlikely that anything significant like a general election or anything is going to happen between now and next March, so from that point of view, yes, the money is guaranteed for the Stevenage Project. In terms of PFI, the money will be a mixture of PFI and ordinary grant. The normal pattern, completely new build is PFI, the major remodelling and refurbishing is traditional finance, but that’s been the pattern in BSF so far. PFI is a private finance initiative where the government issues

Appendix 1B(i)

PFI credits that go to the private sector to build things and then supports the authority in paying the cost of that capital investment through the grants that the authority receives, it’s essentially a method of funding. I think in terms of knowing in advance, we didn’t get told we were on Wave Four funding in 2008 until 20th of December 2004. That must have been purely speculative, because in fact I can make a copy of the letter available if need be to demonstrate that.

PD You made one more point about the school bus, I think what I was referring to earlier was that people in the north of the town have been coming down into the centre of the town, into other schools across the town, because there isn’t local provision there. As we make places available there, they will no longer do that, so the pattern of attendance will shift, once the admission rules kick in, once we’ve changed the pattern of provision, so there’ll be places in the north for people in the north that otherwise would have had to come further south, and then the people in the middle of the town and the south of the town would have more opportunity to take advantage of the extra places there which will free up the places in the south of the town for the people who live here and in the villages.

JD Just to add very briefly to that, we have a countywide review of home to school transport, a detailed review, we’ve delayed that report to members until the autumn term, partly, but not only, to take into account the outcomes of this review, so we can look at that. Going back to your funding, just to make sure that we’re clear on this, whilst the overall level of funding is secure, it’s a different funding mechanism than what you’re used to, there will be difficult financial decisions to make, because when we cost all these options out, and then look at how, we will have to do some juggling to see what we can afford, so inevitably, we would like to spend money than we can get, but the money we are promised is secure, it’s a different funding model to the NHS.

UF My other point, have any of you three spoken to children?

LM No, we haven’t yet, but we are putting in place plans for consultation process during the autumn term about the Buildings for the Future Project.

UM What about children here, about closing their school.

JD What we will be doing is consulting with the children about the design of the new schools and the working through, if you’re saying that we should have consulted with the children about these consultation arrangements, the answer to the question is, no, we haven’t, and we haven’t done that.

UF You haven’t felt the need to ask any of the children if they wanted to close [unclear]

JD We did look at this, we do a lot of area reviews, and we think that if we asked a group of children, do you think we should close your school, the answer to that will certainly be no, even where we consulted with the children at Collenswood, where we felt the circumstances there were so significant,

Appendix 1B(i)

because what we were doing there is closing the school quickly and fairly brutally and we wanted to make sure we spoke to the children, even there, the children said, no, keep the school open, in the same meeting as saying, they’re fed up with poor teaching and all those kind of comments. The other question is there’s a balance between upsetting the children and involving them in the process, it’s a judgement call and we decided not to do that, and if you think we should have, then you know, we’ll take that on board for future, but we did think about that and our judgement was, we decided not to do that, what we will do is involve the children very carefully in the design of the new schools. What we’re saying is that of course we’re doing this for children, for standards, that’s the point, what we’re saying is, talking to the children about closing their school, we’re not sure how helpful that is in term of the process. There will be points where we just disagree, you think we should have, what I’m saying to you is, we thought about it, and decided not to and we’ll have to agree to disagree.

UF Have you ever asked the children if they want a superschool [?]

JD We’re not proposing to build superschools, we are proposing to build schools which are a standard size up and down the UK. I accept that Hertfordshire has a history of small schools, they were designed and built 40 to 50 years ago, the world has moved on, and what we’re saying is, we cannot support the curriculum, the teaching pedagogy, and the investment of equipment for the next 30 or 40 years with small schools. So that’s the line we’re taking. We have decided on the model we are proposing to you without consulting in detail with the children, yes.

UF I’ll try to be short, [unclear] I can’t really understand we can’t have a superschool of whatever you want to call it on the far side of town, as well as keep this school, because we do have children here [unclear]

JD If we were to build the eight form entry school in the north of the town, and maintain this school, we would have too many places in the system. What we’re saying to you is the pattern of schools that we’re creating here, not only are they in the right place in terms of where children live and will live in the future, but it leaves behind an overall surplus of places of 10%. Now we do know that that surplus of 10% is unlikely to rest in one school, it tends not to be distributed, but across the town as a whole, there will be, one in ten places will be free to allow parents to, I accept the lady’s point here, sometimes parents don’t have the choice that they would like, but 10% does allow you to express a preference.

UF I was never given a choice of what school I wanted my children to attend, my kids had to come here, we [unclear] because it was the closest to us, I actually wanted them to go to Barnwell because I’d gone there and I knew the school, but now I’m glad they came here, but that’s because they had to come here, now in the future children will have to go to Barnwell.

JD I absolutely accept that depending on where you live in Hertfordshire you have more or less choice, that’s a fair point, because you have to have

Appendix 1B(i)

rules to determine which children go and which children don’t, and depending on where you live, you have more or less option, I accept the point, and not just here, but elsewhere in the county, there are children who live in villages that will express a preference for a number of schools, but will get written into another because of where they live, but I think if you’ve got something like 16,000 people making a choice to start in September at 76 schools, then you have to have some kind of mechanism for working that out, overall, roundabout 95% of parents across the county get their preferred choices, and there are about 5% that don’t. I do also accept the point, if you close a school, then there are fewer schools for which you can express a preference, that’s fair, so we would be reducing parental choice by one school, that’s fair.

UF You’re really saying, you’ve make your mind up, but what you do you actually plan to do with this site once it’s closed.

PD Right, as Justin said earlier on, we don’t need two eight form entry schools here, but neither this site nor Barnwell’s side is big enough for an eight FE school in the site, we will need to use both sites to support the eight FE school in the south of the town, so this site will remain in use for educational purposes. Exactly where the buildings for the Barnwell school, if the proposals go forward, will be located, will be a matter for the school and the architectural team to decide where the building’s will best be located, where the playing fields and sports facilities will be located, but if the proposals go forward, it is quite clear that we will need to use both the Barnwell and the Heathcote site for the one school. I can’t say to you with any degree of confidence at this point in time that the buildings will remain, because that’s the next stage of BSF, where we work with the schools, looking at what they, what they need to do in the future and what sort of buildings they need to support them and the decisions would be made then about where the school buildings will be based.

UF So your proposal is to move this school to Barnwell?

PD We know that we will need to use this site and the Barnwell site for the one school in the south, exactly whether we use these buildings or the Barnwell buildings, is a decision to be made in the future. This site will be used by Barnwell, yes.

UM This isn’t an amalgamation, this isn’t a merger of the two schools.

PD No, let’s be clear … I’d like to clarify this, in the future, there will be one school in the south of the town, it will be based across both this site and the Barnwell site …

UM She means the proposal.

PD I’ll just finish that, so this school in the south, under the proposal, if they’re put forward, will be based on this site and the current main Barnwell site and in the future, it is not anticipated that Barnwell School will continue to use the Collenswood site.

Appendix 1B(i)

UM Hello, teacher at the school here so I’ve got the best interests, I have to say that. Can I first say that I’ve been here since 1990 and in that time, we’ve fought to actually make this a better school, and I think that largely, the staff has achieved that. We have now a school which has got incredibly good results at Key Stage Three, record results just came through which our head teacher wants to talk about privately afterwards, we have never ever failed an [unclear] inspection in all the time I’ve been here, never ever, and that compares very well with many other schools in the town, we like many people here, we’re really excited about Building Schools for the Future, we thought it meant something for us as well and we were going to be a part of that visionary future, but apparently, our skills and all these improvements aren’t that important. But the thing is, I want to ask about Stevenage in next 50 years, because I’ve lived here for 50 years so I know something about the past as well. If you move Thomas Alleyne's from where it currently is up to Great Ashby, presumably that’s going to pull people to the north as well, and I guess that that’s going to pull people from Marriotts quite significantly, away from Marriotts site, can you talk through the chain of events, the movements and the pupils who are going to be involved, so parents know exactly who is going to be involved in the next ten years, thank you.

PD I can talk about the logic of the new admission patterns in the future, what I can’t do at this point in time is to say exactly which buildings we will start with and how that will move around the town, because that’s part of the process, so when we know what all the building work requirements will be, we will have to negotiate that with the contractors to see how much work they can take on and what sequence is best for them, but in terms of, you talked about, if the Thomas Alleyne School moves to the north then it will pull people out of Marriotts and such like. As Justin has said to you before, about 80% of the children in Year Seven and Eight and a large percentage of the pupils in other year groups in Thomas Alleyne already live within the Great Ashby area, so those pupils will continue to go to Thomas Alleyne’s School, they will just not have to travel over to Thomas Alleyne. Some of the people in the north can’t get into those local schools so they come further south, to Nobel, and some of them have expressed frustration because they can’t get in there, they go to Marriotts and they go to other places in the town. If there’s a school in the north, there are enough children born now to fill an eight form entry school as we speak in the future, so that school will serve the local community around the Great Ashby area. That will mean that people who currently have to leave the Great Ashby area to go to the school at Thomas Alleyne, now, for example, won’t need to do that, and that school will serve the local people there. It will mean that the people that have to travel south to Nobel and Marriotts won’t do that, so there will be more places available in the centre of town for the people in the centre of the town that currently come further south because Collenswood isn’t there and they can’t get into Nobel, so the whole pattern of attendance will shift over time. It will take a while to sort its way through, obviously, but that’s the logic, that the whole thing will shift, because there will be more schools, more local to people where they live.

Appendix 1B(i)

UM So from what you’ve said, is that logic then, that in order to make Marriotts viable, you need to draw people from Bandley Hill and Monksley more heavily, therefore reducing down the number of people here, so you will have to persuade an awful lot of these parents to send their kids to Marriotts.

PD What it will mean is that more parents who have expressed preferences in the past to go to schools like Marriotts and Nobel will be able to get in there.

UM [Unclear]

PD That’s okay, but people have expressed frustration both from the north of the town and in the centre that they can’t get their children into local schools and they’re having to travel much further for them, and they are making Barclay bigger as well, so there will be more places for where the children currently live.

UM I don’t understand the central argument, where are the people going to come from to fill up those central schools, I think Nobel’s assured because of the developments in the east, but I can’t see where Marriotts are going to get their pupils from, unless they draw on these southern areas.

PD They may draw a little on the northern part of the southern area, because as I said before, we are proposing to rebuild Marriotts School on the southern part of its side, and open up the main entrance on that southern part of the site, so quite clearly, t admission rules and the distance arrangements will mean that people from a wider area will get into Marriotts.

UM So you concur that the future pupils of Marriotts are having to come from our traditional catchment area, is that right?

PD I’ve said we’re redistributing the pattern of places, and if more people from what you consider to be your traditional catchment area go to schools fairly close to them, then yes, the pattern will redistribute itself.

UM [Unclear] So the catchment area of Marriotts is moving south to come into this area [unclear]?

LM What we’re saying is, if you look at the pattern of schools in the future, and you apply the admission rules, there will be a transitional period because the sibling rule will still kick in, but it’s perfectly true that the people who live nearer Barnwell or nearer the schools in the south will have a better chance of getting in than those parents who live further away, and the, if parents are living close to Marriotts, the only reason they can get into schools in this area, is if there are spaces free, so what we’re saying to you is, the admissions rules, will, if you like, even that out, and it might well be that some parents would like to send their children in the south, but no longer can, because the schools in the south will fill first with children who live in t south, that will take some time, because the lady at the front here was saying how frustrated she was that that didn’t happen to her child because the sibling rule overruled it,

Appendix 1B(i)

and so there will be a period of time, a transitional period, but the admissions rules will mean that those parents living in the south of the town will have a much better chance of getting into the schools in the south than the parents who are living further away.

JW Thank you, if you have a further question, you can direct it at the panel after we’ve closed the meeting. I realise that some of you have not been able to speak, it’s been difficult getting round everybody because it’s quite a large meeting, can I remind you that your points can be made on forms that you have to send it, you can go on the website and make sure that your points are made if you don’t feel you’ve had a chance, or even just to reinforce the points that you’ve already made, do send them in, because they will all be looked at and listened to and there will be a transcript of this tape, I can’t tell you quite when and thank you very much.

UM How do we obtain a copy of the transcript?

PD We will put both this recording and the transcript of this meeting on the county council’s website as soon as it comes back. Okay, I’ve just been told, I’m not sure technically whether the recording can go on, but we will certainly put the transcript on as soon as it comes back from the company that’s doing it. Can do that, happy to do that, yes.

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11/07/07 Heathcote School public meeting 4 

  Speaker key JW Jane WiltonLM Lindsay MartinPD Pauline DavisPB Paul BowerJD Justin DonovanEC Elizabeth ClarkeM1 Unidentified male speakerM2 Unidentified male speakerM3 Unidentified male speakerM4 Unidentified male speakerM5 Unidentified male speakerM6 Unidentified male speakerM7 Unidentified male speakerF1 Unidentified female speakerF2 Unidentified female speakerF3 Unidentified female speakerF4 Unidentified female speakerF5 Unidentified female speakerF6 Unidentified female speaker  JW Welcome to this public consultation evening. My name’s Jane Wilton and I’m employed by Hertfordshire County Council, along with a company called Accent who are an independent market research company, to help them make sure that this evening is run in a fair and proper manner and that the consultation is conducted in a way that everyone has a chance to say, hopefully everyone has a chance to say what they would like to say and the panel has the ability to respond to that. As you can see and hear, I’m wearing a microphone. The reason for that is so that your voice can be heard. We’re recording all of these public consultation evenings and a transcript will be available on the website sometime within the next couple of weeks. I think it takes a little while for them to actually do the transcript, but as soon as it’s done, it will be up on the website. What we’re going to do is, we’re going to start with a presentation which Lindsay Martin here will begin. That will run for approximately 20 to 25 minutes, something like that. After that we’ll go to the open part of the meeting when you will have the option to ask questions of the panel. Just one thing, mobile phones. If your mobile phones are on or even on silent, if you can possibly turn them off that would be helpful because I gather that it actually interferes with the recording and we get buzzes and crackles and things, so it’s quite hard to hear what’s being said. Without more ado, I think I’ll hand over to Lindsay. Thank you. LM Thank you very much, Jane. Welcome to this fourth consultation evening at Heathcote School on behalf of the County Council. It’s good to

Appendix 1B(i)

see you here. We’re going to, as Jane has said, run through the following agenda for the evening. I’ll come over here so I get out of everybody’s way for seeing the screen. I’m going to do some introductions to my colleagues who are here, talk a little bit about Building Schools for the Future, which is the context of the review that we’re currently carrying out. My colleague Pauline will talk about why we need an area review and what our proposals are and then the main part of the evening, as Jane has said, will be an opportunity for you to ask questions and make comments and so on. I have with me Justin Donovan on my right, on your left, deputy director of Children, Schools and Families, our chief education officer, Pauline Davis who has done, and her team have done, the detailed work on the review in Stevenage. I’m the one in the middle, on the screen anyway. I want to talk a little bit about what Building Schools for the Future is and for those of you who’ve been to these evenings before, its going to be much the same I’m afraid as I said last time, but I hope, for those of you who haven’t been before, it will provide some context for the review that we’re currently carrying out.

To start off with a little history. I don’t suppose any of you, I certainly don’t, remember education 130 or so years ago, but this is a picture of a Victorian classroom and what it looked like. I think it’s a girl’s only classroom. Single sex education by the looks of it. More recently and certainly within my lifetime, you can’t actually see this very well, the sun is determined it’s going to break through onto the screen, but we haven’t had much sun so let’s not knock that. This is a slide rule and this is a slide rule and I certainly used these when I was at school, not very well actually. This is a very early calculator, a singular calculator, and this is a very early computation machine that accountants used a few decades ago. In my lifetime, from when I was at school to my age now, which is admittedly quite a few decades, how far have we moved from slide rules to what you can now use. I haven’t got my Blackberry in my bag but Justin’s got his on him. The difference is between the computing power that you can hold in your palm now and something like that slide rule, in one lifetime. I mention this to demonstrate how quickly the context within which we provide learning, provide for learning and provide teaching changes. These are the buildings, again a slightly murky picture I’m afraid because of the light. These are the post war buildings, flat roofed, window walled buildings that you can see all over Hertfordshire, such as the one that we’re in now. This isn’t actually a school in Stevenage, it’s a school somewhere else in the county, but they’re all of a similar type, those built between the late 1940s and the early 1970s. In Stevenage in fact the original secondary school buildings were all built between the early 1950s, starting at Barclay, to the late 1960s, in the valley, with of course, blocks and additions and extra bits added on over the years. In terms of the original buildings, these were all built between the early 50s and the late 60s, so they’re all that sort of age. All of these buildings are now 40 to 50 years old. Some would say increasingly not fit for purpose, not fit for delivering a modern and current curriculum, let alone a future one, with the sorts of changes that are difficult to predict. Who using a slide rule sitting in a 1960s classroom would have predicted the power in a palm top that we have now?

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This is a central government sponsored design of what a secondary school building can look like. We don’t have any that look like this in Hertfordshire. We haven’t built a secondary school in Hertfordshire since 1975. We’ve built primary schools, but we haven’t built any secondary schools. Inside, outside, just to give you an idea of the sort of, hopefully stimulating, exciting, interesting buildings that a school can be. But of course, it’s not all about that. Despite the amounts of money involved, and I’m going to say something about that, it’s not just about the buildings. I’ll say more about that in a moment. The programme itself is a 2.2 billion pound per annum programme to invest in secondary and special schools throughout England. This is a large sum, the first chunk of which for Hertfordshire comes to Stevenage. This 145 million for Stevenage, which includes 12 million pounds dedicated for information and communications technology, gives you some idea of how important ICT is regarded. That’s quite a large proportion of the total dedicated for that purpose.

This is then a very exciting investment opportunity for Stevenage. It’s a once in several lifetime’s opportunity to build, to get this sort of investment that was last made after the war. We’re not going to get many chances at this so it’s pretty important that we get it right. That we don’t misuse the money or that we don’t use the money efficiently and effectively enough, because this is going to benefit generations and generations of children to come throughout Stevenage initially and then throughout the whole of Hertfordshire. You don’t get 145 million pounds or more off government funding without quite a lot of red tape attached to it. This is certainly the case with Building Schools for the Future. We have to get central government approval to three sets of documentation. The first submitted in April, that we’ve done. The second for October of this year and the third in March of next year. All of which have to be approved before we can begin what’s called the procurement process. That is, the process of going to the market and obtaining a private sector partner to carry out the actual building works, which then has to go through the European tendering process, which, as you can see from this slide, is itself a long drawn out process. We expect to start that next spring and for it to take about a year and a half. We don’t therefore expect to start building work, we don’t expect to put the spade in the ground until late 2009, maybe even the beginning of 2010, depending on how successfully and how quickly this procurement process goes. So it is quite long and drawn out. I think it’s important that you realise this isn’t a next Tuesday a week type development. This is a development that is going to take several years to come to fruition.

As I said earlier, it’s not just about buildings and it’s not just about money. Buildings after all are a means to an end. They’re not an end in themselves. We only have school buildings because we have children who need to learn and teachers who need to teach. It’s that way around, isn’t it? So we felt we needed to start from a shared vision for the future of learning and teaching in the whole of the county and in Stevenage. Indeed, that is where government expects us to start with this project. So we had meetings consulting secondary schools throughout Hertfordshire, concentrating particularly in Stevenage, but not only in Stevenage. We’ve been consulting county wide and we came up with half a dozen principles, if you like, elements of a vision

Appendix 1B(i)

which I don’t think anyone would argue with. I think they’re all fairly straightforward. A focus on excellent teaching and effective learning, commitment to raising attainment and aspirations and participation for young people as well as schools which lead and serve the community. A commitment to promoting healthy lifestyles and participation in sport. Schools that can offer a diverse range of specialisms, including vocational ones. I mentioned the importance of ICT earlier. To provide personalised study programmes for young people and community access to learning and of course light, attractive and flexible spaces. We need buildings which are in the jargon, future proofed and buildings that can be adaptable and flexible because of how difficult it is to predict in 20, 30 or 40 years time, what styles of learning and teaching would then be in vogue and what technology will be available. So they need to be flexible enough to accommodate those future changes and future developments.

So what do we need in order to deliver the half a dozen things that are in that vision? Again, we consulted stakeholders, representative schools but also other interested organisations. Most, but not all, stakeholders agreed that we needed a smaller number of mainstream schools, offering larger sixth forms and more specialisms and a greater range of subject specialism, big enough to be flexible and efficient but small enough to sustain those relationships between students and staff. Most stakeholders agreed that we needed closer links between mainstream and special schools. Pauline will say a little bit more about our proposals in relation to special schools later on. They agreed that we needed to develop even closer links with North Herts College. I’ve said even closer links deliberately because the links are already good and well developed but of course we can develop them further and we have the capital means to do that. We need improved facilities for the education support centre, that is, the centre for children who’ve been excluded from mainstream provision and for whom we are required to make full time provision out of school. Currently, there is mobile accommodation on the edge of a primary school site, quite inappropriate to its needs, so we need to do something about that.

That’s something about Building Schools for the Future, its resources and our vision for it. Pauline will now talk about the area review.

PD Thank you. Good evening everybody. Why do we need an area review? As Lindsay has said, this investment is the means to achieve a vision. It’s not an end in itself. It’s important that we spend that money very wisely. We need to make sure while we’re doing so that we have the right number of places for all secondary aged children in the right locations. So what have we done so far? Lindsay referred to those discussions with stakeholders. We started that back in January this year. They talked about what young people would need in terms of skills and aptitudes in the future. They talked about the type of organisations that we would need and they came up with, with us, a list of possibilities in terms of the size and shape of schools within the town. That formed this long list of possible options that we talk about. We evaluated that long list of options against four criteria which were devised by our director of Children’s Schools and Families. I’ll take you

Appendix 1B(i)

through those in just a moment. That evaluation was then considered again by the director and he decided which of those options he wanted us to come and talk to you about and to get your views about. That’s what we’re doing here. This is the last of the public meetings that we’re holding in Stevenage as part of a consultation process that has been going on since May.

I’ll just give you a second or two to read those. You’ll see that they talk about achievement, they talk about places, buildings and cost and transitional arrangements. Whatever we do, we need to make sure that those plans are robust. Why do we need to change the pattern of provision within Stevenage you might ask. Well, the town is changing and if we look into the future, say ten years into the future, which is what the Department for Children’s Schools and Families have asked us to do when planning for spending this BSF funding, we think we need 48 forms of entry. A form of entry, for those of you who aren’t sure about that, is 30 children into each year group. That 48 forms of entry includes 10% surplus capacity. That’s to pick up any changes that we haven’t foreseen and also to allow you as parents to be able to express a preference for a school other then, say your local school, one which you would prefer your child to go and have a reasonable chance of getting into it. We know within this town at the moment that the places in the secondary schools, the mainstream schools, are not evenly distributed. The schools are of different sizes and they’re not evenly geographically distributed across the town for where the people currently live. Certainly, the housing up on the east of the town and in the north east of the town of Great Ashby have changed the pattern of demand. We know that parents in the north east of the town are quite frustrated not being able to get their children into, what they’ve perceived, their local schools or their preferred schools. We’ve got an imbalance of provision there. While we’re talking about the geography of the town, it’s worth noting that if and when the large development on the west of the motorway happens, there is already an agreement provision for a new school, secondary school, and some primary schools there, to serve that very distinct community.

So let’s have a look at the town. You know it better than I, I’m sure. This is the big development on the west of Stevenage that I’ve just been talking about. These are other areas of housing due to go into the north of the town potentially. Obviously there may be other little bits of infill throughout the town, but they’re the larger ones. You’ll notice I talked about these people up in the north here having no local school and we’ve identified a site to the north of that area that we could build a school on. I talked about schools being not evenly distributed. For example, we have two schools here, side by side, their sites adjoin in one part of the town and you know here, in this school, that your sites virtually touch at the bottom of the playing fields. You’ve got two schools in this part of the town virtually side by side too.

What are the proposals? For most of you here tonight, I’m sure you’re interested in the proposals as they affect this school. As Lindsay said, the vision is for fewer larger schools. This is our proposal, which is our preferred proposal, is a pattern of eight form entry schools. I talked about that new site in the north and the proposal is to move Thomas Alleyne to that new site.

Appendix 1B(i)

That was one of the two that were close together in the north of the town. More importantly, I assume for many of you here tonight, this proposal also means the closer of this school, Heathcote School as one of the two schools very close together in the south of the town.

There is a second proposal that you would have seen in the consultation document. That only needs to be there because there are a couple of pieces of land that we don’t yet own because obviously we haven’t finalised the proposals here. Because we don’t own them, there is a slight risk that something could go wrong. We’re not expecting that to happen, but just in case we have to have a fall back position. For example, Marriotts School, we need a little bit more land to expand that school and to create a new entrance to the south. If anything goes wrong with that piece of land, which again we don’t expect to, then Marriotts School would have to close in addition to Heathcote School. If anything went wrong with that new site in the north of the town, which we don’t expect to, then Thomas Alleyne School would close because of that. There’s an either / or there for both the Heathcote School closing in the south and either Marriotts or Thomas Alleyne, depending on the site issues that arise.

Now I know you probably want to get on and talk about this school, but while we’re here and because our proposals do include for secondary aged children in special schools, we have some proposals for those special schools. For Lonsdale School, which is the school for children with physical and neurological impairments, two options there. The school can stay on its current site and benefit from BSF investment to improve their facilities, or it could if it wanted to, relocate to one of those two mainstream school sites. They’ll be the bigger mainstream school sites and so can accommodate a special school alongside them. The Greenside School, many of you will know in this area, is the school for children with severe learning difficulties. The school buildings themselves are very good and they’re very conducive to what that school needs to do for their children but they just aren’t big enough. They’re probably better for the primary aged children than they are the secondary aged children. Our proposal is that we build some new accommodation for the secondary aged children alongside Barnwell School, because those schools have a relationship at the moment for both their students and staff. That will allow the primary aged children to be concentrated in their existing buildings and to spread out there.

For the Valley School, the Valley School is the school for young people with moderate learning difficulties and some of those people have other more complex needs. We really do want to hear what people have to say about a variety of options for that school. There’s no preferred option there you will notice. We could, for example, just as we said Lonsdale School, the school could stay where it is. We could invest in that accommodation and improve it for them. It could relocate to one of those two mainstream school sites and cooperate and collaborate as and when the needs of the children allow and permit. The school could still stay as a school in the sense that it has a school identity and the children are on the roll of the school and the staff and their professional expertise is maintained as a unit, but the children are educated

Appendix 1B(i)

on mainstream school sites, supported by that professional team across the town. Or, the school could close and we could form special needs units on each of the mainstream school sites. So there’s a wide range of possibilities for that school which we want to hear what people have to say.

For those of you who are parents and for those of you who are staff and governors, certainly transitional arrangements are going to be important to you. In terms of building plans and the works, we want everybody to be involved in developing the school projects. Clearly we know that building work can be disruptive, there’s no doubt about that. We all need to work together to make sure we minimise that disruption. We’re very well versed in doing so. Obviously, where we’re building new buildings, we’ll make sure that those buildings are complete before we move students into them. For those schools that would close under these proposals, we realise that that’s one of the most difficult decisions that the County Council can take. For you, we need to handle that as carefully and as sensitively as we can. What we want to do is to work with the school to make sure that you can maintain your confidence in the quality and the teaching and learning that carries on in a closing school during any transition period.

The staff, clearly we want to involve them too in developing transition plans. Staff are one of the most valuable commodities we can have in this town. We want staff to stay and work in this town so we want to work with staff and governors and get them involved in those transition plans. We want to say too that this isn’t just about a school that might be closing, because this about a whole town approach to the future of secondary education. This is not just the closure of a school and the reduction of places, this is the closure of a school and the expansion of places. We want to work with people and head teachers in the other schools who are very keen to support the staff in a closing school for their future careers. If we get into a position of redeployment, the County Council has an excellent track record of helping staff move from this sort of situation into a developing and future career opportunity.

For students, clearly we want them to be involved and work with them in any transition plans too. They are the people are that know how their buildings work and what it means for them. For those parents who are here that may be wondering, if my child has to move I’ll have to buy a new uniform, the County Council makes a financial contribution. What we’d normally do is ask the receiving school to organise the collection of information from you so that they can provide you with appropriate items.

Before we get to the important part, which is hearing what you have to say and answering your questions, this is just how the decisions will be taken. The most important thing is that the people who take the decisions can hear what you say. You can let them know by writing to us, talking to us here at public meetings, we’re recording them, there’ll be transcripts, response forms at the end of the booklets, letters, emails, online, just make sure you record your views in one way or another. Our job is to collate all of your responses and to identify the key issues that you are raising so that we can present that

Appendix 1B(i)

to the County Councillors who will take those decisions. To reassure you, just because we’re collating it, doesn’t mean to say that we don’t then make available every single one of your returns to all the County Councillors so that they can read your comments first hand.

As I said, we’ve got this public consultation period. It runs until August 7 so it’s important you get your forms, letters, and emails back by that date. We then send the report to the Education Panel which meets on October 3rd. That’s where they will debate the issues that arise from your views on this consultation. They will then send their comments and recommendations on to the cabinet of the County Council which meets on October 15th. That’s where the County Council takes its decisions. You’ll notice from that slide that both of those meetings are open to the public. You can go along and you can hear what is going on. As a school community, you are likely to be able to send a representative to talk to that Panel for a short period of time to make your case. You can’t go along, like you are here tonight, asking questions, raising your hand, making statements. You’re there to hear what goes on. If the cabinet of the County Council decides to proceed with any of the proposals that are for significant change, we would have to issue what are known as statutory notices. That’s the legal bit. We have to publish a notice in the newspaper that says the County Council intends to do this on that day. Then, that statutory notice sits there for a period of six weeks. Any one of you can object to those statutory notices and if you do, we then have to refer your objection and any commentary back to the Cabinet of the County Council. We’ve said there in the slide, end of 2007, that’s because the government have changed the way in which most final decisions are taken. I just need to say to you, that’s likely now to be later in January because it’s going back to the Cabinet of the County Council.

At this point, I think I’ll hand over to you because what we want to do is hear what you have to say. Thank you.

JW I’ve just got a couple of things to say before I take questions. The meeting will run until 8:45, the open part of the meeting. Then there will be time for you to talk to the panel individually at the end of the session if you have any particular concerns about your own children that you would like to talk to them about, that’s not appropriate to mention in the public meeting. Can I just say that we all know how strong the feelings are here. This is the fourth meeting here and we’re very well aware, and certainly I’m very well aware, of the strength of feelings, but I could I just ask that you please try not to shout out. This is not for me and it’s not for the panel but it’s actually for the tape. When we listen to the tape with people shouting out over it, we can’t hear and the people who need to hear it are the County Councillors. As we’ve said, all of those things go back to them. If you can, please restrain yourself. I will get around to everybody if I possibly can in the time that we have. I will go to people asking questions who, as far I can see, haven’t been to previous meetings and haven’t asked questions as this is the final meeting. It means that this will be the last chance for you to take part in this particular bit of the public consultation. Can I also ask that you speak very clearly into the microphone and perhaps project a little more because again, we’re finding

Appendix 1B(i)

that people, when they get the microphone, they think that everybody can hear them so they speak quite quietly. Actually we need a little bit of volume as well. So after all that, we can start. Thank you very much, let’s take a first question over there. Katie is going to take the microphone around. Thank you.

PB Good evening. My name’s Paul Bower [?]. I’m the chair of governors here. This is the fourth of these consultation meetings that you’ve held here and I haven’t actually said anything so far and I think that it’s appropriate if I just give you my feelings about how this process has been carried out. I think, judging by what I’ve heard in the first three meetings, it mirrors concerns that a lot of people had. I don’t know how people will feel this evening. This is described as a Stevenage secondary review public consultation and I certainly don’t feel and I don’t think that many people who attended the first three meetings felt we were really being consulted in any meaningful way. In fact, I believe personally, that proper consultation has been conspicuously absent from the whole process. I’d like to turn to, no need for other people to do so, to a couple of slides that were put up this evening and have been put up at each of these meetings regarding the earlier process. One is slide 11 which Pauline, you used, which started off with what has happened so far. The review started January, stakeholders discussions, I’d like to come back to that in a minute, but then it says long list of possible options. My question is quite a specific one here. At the first of those meetings, you were asked by a parent, I think it was Mrs Brookes, if that long list of possible options was something she could see and I believe you promised to email it to her. She’s spoken to me earlier this week and that has not been forthcoming. Can I just say that I would like to see that long list of possible options please. I’d be grateful if that could be emailed to me at the school this week.

PD Of course.

PB Thank you. Now a slide that really does concern me in terms of misrepresenting, I think, some of the process that we’ve been through, is slide nine which was used by Lindsay. I think it’s headed what is needed to deliver the vision and I think is what is an attempt to sum up where the thinking was just prior to the issue of the consultation document. It starts what is needed to deliver the vision and there’s a statement underneath that says stakeholders agree. I’d just like to challenge that statement as to exactly what that means. Which stakeholders agree, let’s just run through the stakeholders. At last weeks meeting you were asked by the audience whether you consulted any of the children, which you categorically said you hadn’t. I’ve got to say, I don’t disagree with that. I think it would be wholly impractical, but those stakeholders don’t agree because they weren’t asked. The overwhelmingly next largest group of stakeholders are the parents. I don’t believe, at that time, that you had consulted any parents what so ever. The next largest group of stakeholders would be teachers in Stevenage. How many of them had been consulted back in March as to what was happening, my guess is as near none as makes no difference. A similar position, I think, with most governors. What in fact, I think, was going on in the process at that stage, is you had a small selected group of people on whom you were bouncing ideas

Appendix 1B(i)

and bouncing them in a bit of a vacuum. I don’t think they had any perception as to where this would necessarily go and certainly no perception that what would come out of this was a document with no real options what so ever and the closure of a very successful school. So I think to say at that stage that stakeholders agree is a complete misrepresentation because I should think that 99.9% of the stakeholders had no idea what was going on, never mind agree.

We move forward then to the consultation process that’s gone on in the last few weeks and again, I don’t really believe anyone would feel that there’s any consulting going on here at all. You provided us with one option, a second option which is simply a fall back if you don’t quite get what you want in terms of land. It’s not a fall back if you were going to take notice of any comments that are being made. I think most of us feel that anything we say about how we feel about this school, a very successful school, are going to be ignored.

So the only comfort I think any of us realistically can get out of coming to these meetings, is to make sure that in public we are clear as to the commitment you’re giving us as to the support we might get in the future. I’ve scribbled down what I believe are the commitments that have come from you out of these meetings. I’ll give you my version of them and I would ask you to clarify if I’ve got this wrong. Not in any particular order. I think at the last meeting you were asked a very clear question about how you would handle, in the future, permanent exclusions and children that I’m going to loosely call problem children, who get moved around from school to school and which every school has to take its share of. There was obviously real concern expressed that if we were a school with low numbers, we could end up suffering there. I believe, Justin, that you gave a categorical commitment that in the future Heathcote would not get any more then the normal share of such cases.

You were asked questions about the financial budget and I believe that the commitment you’ve given us is that we have a commitment that the finances that will be dedicated Heathcote in the future will certainly not be less then they would have been had this situation not arisen and should indeed be more. A lot of problems that people and are anxious about are that we are obviously want to see that our staff are incentivised to stay here through what’s going to be a very difficult period. I believe, without being specific, you have given us commitments that you will come up with strategies that will offer financial incentives and professional incentives for staff to remain in their careers here. I would absolutely want to clarify there that what we’re looking for is strategies that would make staff stay here, not just within the overall Stevenage area, because it’s here that they’re needed for the children.

I believe also that you’ve given us a commitment that there’ll be no disruption in terms of moving people around from school to school during any of the key stages. If any of those statements are incorrect, I’d ask you to clarify that afterwards.

Appendix 1B(i)

This school has very good standards at the moment. They’re improving standards. If those standards fall and that happens because those commitments haven’t been met, I don’t think anybody in this room would feel that there’s any doubt where the responsibility would lie. It would be with you and your colleagues and I’d like to think that everybody would hold you morally and perhaps legally responsible for that. Thank you.

JW Thank you.

JD Thank you Paul. There’s quite a lot there. In two halves, if I start with consultation process first. I understand that if you are connected to Heathcote and chairs or governors, heads of staff and parents will be, then you will be less committed to the options we’re putting forward then if you’re not. I understand that point. In terms of the process we’re going through, I just wanted to respond to some of that. First of all, the consultation process that we’re running, have run and continue to run is well in excess of the consultation process we have to run by law. There’s a statutory responsibility on us to consult. The fact that we’ve met four times here and it must have been a dozen or so times, evenings like this, over the last month, is well in excess of that requirement. We don’t actually have to have these meetings at all. I do think that the consultation process we’ve run is extended and certainly, as I say, in excess of the requirements upon us.

In terms of the long list of options though, you’re quite right, you’ve asked for that and we’ll get you that. We’ll email that to you tomorrow. In terms of the consultation process, I think we need to be aware here that what we’ve done is put in an additional phase of the consultation process before this one. We are currently in the public consultation, that’s what we’re doing. In the past what we’ve done as an authority, is to come up with the options on which we’re going to consult on our own in county hall and then come out and consult on them. What we’ve done with the review so far, and this is the sixth or seventh review that we’ve been running over the last year or so, is to involve, not everybody, I accept the point not hundreds of people, not meetings like this, but involve a selection of stakeholders in the process of developing the proposals in the first place. So that the first time we publish these proposals, they are based on discussions we’ve had with head teachers, with governors, local councillors, professionals and officers so it’s not a case of people sitting in a locked room and secretly dreaming up proposals. The process of coming up with the proposals in the first place is done in an open transparent way. That’s why we have the long list and the four tests which come through. I think it’s unfair to say that that stakeholder process isn’t a process which is worthwhile. What I’m saying to you is, I think it’s an extra element which has been put into the process and it’s one that we think works.

The fact that there are only two options there, I think, is a result of the fact that those are the two options which came through that process which meet the four tests and which we agreed to at cabinet. What we’ve said is that we will test any option for any review, primary or secondary, BSF or not, against four key tests in terms of standards of achievement, in terms of finance, in terms of

Appendix 1B(i)

getting the right places in the right parts of the town, in terms of design, environment, those kinds of things. The proposals you have in the document, both for the mainstream schools and the special schools meet those four tests. Where officers genuinely believe there is a preferred option, we think it’s important to say so. So we’re absolutely upfront about that. You’ll notice with the special schools, we haven’t got a preferred option. We’re open to that and we think any one of those options can deliver equally in terms of the four tests. On the mainstream proposals, we as officers believe that the idea of eight forms of entry schools located in a pattern which reflects the current and future residential shape of the town, rather then the historic residential shape of the town, is our preferred option so we’ve been upfront and said that. If there were four or five options which met the tests, we would consult on them, which is why the Valley School has four options, because all of those four options do meet those four tests, but for the mainstream schools there are only two.

In terms of the commitments I’ve given, I’m very happy to confirm all of them for the tape. First of all, somebody, I think it was two meetings ago, raised the, I think, fair concern that if a school starts reducing in size compared to other schools in the town, there is a danger it will end up with more than it’s fair share of challenging children. I’m trying to be careful how I say this. I think that is a genuine danger actually and it can happen and does happen in areas of the county where there are surplus places. What I will do is give a commitment that as the Heathcote School works through to closure should these proposals go through, we’ll make sure what we call a fair access protocol is implemented across the town so that this school doesn’t get more then its fair share of challenging children. I think that’s fair.

The other commitment which I gave and will continue to give, is that all the time Heathcote School is a school, and we’re saying at the very earliest it would close in 2011, we would continue to invest in it in the way that we would invest in a going school. For example, the devolved capital money, the money for infrastructure, the money for staffing would still go into the school as it does at the moment. We wouldn’t start cutting budgets and slashing funding. Indeed, as the school, if the school does reduce in size, we do have arrangements within our formulas to make sure that there’s additional funding available for schools to see them through transitional phases. What we will do is, long before we get to the point of closure, is make sure we’ve reviewed those arrangements and make sure that they are secure enough for the future of Heathcote. So that’s true.

The staffing issue. I’ve arranged to meet with the staff, those who want to meet me, in a staff meeting next week to talk through the kind of strategies that we are likely to come forward on. What we can’t do at the moment is give, if you like, a written assurance of what those strategies are. I think it’s very important that we, and I know this is frustrating Paul because you’ve told me how frustrated you are, I’ve disagreed with you on this point before, but at the moment, as officers, we have the authority to consult on the number, the size, the location and the nature of the schools. We don’t have the authority to consult on the detail around admissions arrangements, staffing, finances

Appendix 1B(i)

and those kinds of things. What I will be doing next week though, is setting out to the staff in some detail, the kind of strategies we’ve used elsewhere and the kind of thinking we have so that when they go away for the summer term, they are aware of what we have in place. We are very keen indeed to maintain the staff we have here.

The other commitment which I have given and I met with, I think, 30 or 40 parents came to see me last night in groups of two’s, three’s and four’s and at one time half a dozen, who came to talk to me about the arrangements next year. These are next year’s year seven parents. The commitment I gave there and I’ll give again tonight, is we will not move children during their key stages. That would be unreasonable. One of our key tests is disruption and we think that is too disruptive to move them at any of the key stages. That’s again a commitment I’m happy to confirm.

JW The lady there, then I’ll come to you and then you.

EC My name’s Elizabeth Clarke. I’m a parent at this school. I’ve got five questions. You may not be able to respond to all of them. My first question is, are you aware that Stevenage Borough Council and local planning authority actually have conservation area consultation out on the Shephall Green area now? My second question is, how much does the county stand to benefit off the land value if the site is sold and would that money be ploughed into education for Building Schools for the Future? Thirdly, what will happen to the Barnwell children while all the work’s being done on their site? Fourthly, are you aware there may be some restrictive covenants on the Alleyne’s playing field as that was donated by Cambridge University? Fifthly, what are you going to do about all the transport and environmental disruption while this is going on?

JW Thank you. There’s quite a lot there as well.

JD I think we’ll probably have to divide those up between us to answer, but I shall start off. In terms of land values and investment in Building Schools for the Future, yes, any capital received in the sale of sites during the Building Schools for the Future process will be reinvested according to the government formula. By that I mean that the government assumes that they will get some of the receipt to support the 145 million we’re going to receive from them. The other half of the receipt is expected to be used as part of the BSF funding programme. So yes, any land values, any realisation of land values would go into the BSF either through central government or through us.

On the restrictive covenants on Thomas Alleyne’s, yes, we have started work on land title and the things that are associated with it. As we expect those to continue as playing fields, that doesn’t become an issue for us as we’re not intending to build on them. It would only be a problem if we needed to breach a covenant, which we don’t, so that shouldn’t be an issue. I think on the Barnwell works and transportation, Pauline, I think I’ll pass to you on those two.

Appendix 1B(i)

PD Can I just go back to what Lindsay said before, just to clarify for you, there are no plans to sell this site. Let’s be clear about that. The reason there are no plans to sell this site is because neither this site nor the Barnwell site just across the way is big enough for an eight form entry school. We will need to use both schools for the one eight form entry school in the south of the town. So there are no plans to sell this site. In terms of what will happen to the Barnwell children while their work’s going on, that’s a little early to say simply because, as Lindsay has explained to you, the first part of the BSF process is working through what the vision is, both for the whole county, for Stevenage as a whole and then for the individual schools concerned. Then we start translating that vision into building proposals and then specific plans and then transition plans. We’re only just in the process of beginning that sort of school visioning exercise so it’s a bit too early to say what the works will be and therefore where the children might need to be, depending on what those works are.

In terms of transport, what we’d be doing is, clearly there’s a pattern of transport buses, either specific busses for school age children or public bus routes which young people use. We will be working through, with our passenger transport unit, when we get a bit closer to this, because as we’ve explained it’s at least 2011 so we’ve got some years in hand to look at the new pattern of schools, the new distribution of pupils and then to work out what those transport routes would best be to meet that changing pattern of demand.

JD Just to add to the transport, we’ve got quite a detailed public school transport review taking place because our arrangements have evolved over time and they’re quite complicated. We think we could put more children on the busses at the same cost. What we’ve done is delay that report until the decisions over where these schools are going to be so that we can go back to that review and have a look at what the new arrangements in Stevenage will look like. We’ve delayed that until late autumn, early spring, in order to feed that into the work.

JW The gentleman in this t-shirt here. Oh sorry, there’s one thing that they didn’t actually…

JD We have seen that document, yes.

EC How do you propose to respond?

JD I don’t know that we will respond at all. I’m not sure we’ll make a formal County Council response. We’re in almost weekly discussion with the town planners in the Borough Council about our proposals and the implications of them and also with Herts Highways which is the highways authority. We’re in very close collaboration with Stevenage Borough Council officers and with North Herts District Council because the new site at the top of the maps is actually in North Herts rather then Stevenage so we’re in very close touch with them. I’m not sure we’ll make a formal County Council response.

Appendix 1B(i)

JW Thank you. The gentleman there.

M1 You say Heathcote could be closing in four years time. Are you going to keep admitting children up until that time? If you are, how are you going to get children to come here?

JD No, probably not.

M1 So this school is going to be run down [overtalking]?

JD What we will do is…

M1 So there’ll be less pupils here?

JD If you let me finish the answer. The answer to that is that we will look at the pattern of the children coming through in future years, discuss with the head and the chair of governors about when it will be appropriate to stop admitting children to the Heathcote School. So the direct answer to your question is, by the time the children who, if you like, are going into year seven next year, are in year 11, then yes the school will be quite a small school because they may well not have younger children behind. But what we’ll have to do is model that and make sure that we stop admitting children to this school at the time when the other buildings have been expanded to make sure that there is space for those children.

M1 Well I can’t see how you can keep the school running normally with less and less pupils in it.

JD In what sense? What we will have…

M1 Are you saying you want things to carry on normally but you’re gradually running the school down. How are you going to keep the teachers here?

JD Before the school closes…

M1 [overtalking] incentives to keep the teachers, for the teachers to stay here is there?

JD If these proposals go through, by the time the school actually comes up to close, it is likely, but we haven’t done that work yet, to be a relatively small school. What we will be doing, and that’s the meeting I have with the staff in next week, I think its next Wednesday or Thursday, to talk through those options. There are a number of incentives we can put in place to encourage staff to stay at Heathcote to see it through, lots of incentives to do that. We want to make sure the staff at Heathcote not just stay, as the chair of governors has made it clear, to stay with Heathcote School, but more then that, we’d like them to stay within the Stevenage project for the longer term. Now if you think about it, there are slightly more children by 2011, 2012, 2013

Appendix 1B(i)

then there are now. Not many more, but slightly more. There are certainly not fewer children, so we still need the number of teachers we’ve got currently, plus some more. We’re going to work hard to convince staff that this is going to be an exciting place to be because for the town with basically either new buildings, or buildings which we’ve put many millions into, each school being part of a town wide trust, so that the schools in Stevenage that know the children in Stevenage best, can start making some key decisions about the education in Stevenage. We think that’s an exciting place to be. We will be working hard to retain as many staff as we can. Of course there’s turnover. Over the next four or five years staff will come and go, we know that, but we will be putting statues in place, yes.

JW Thank you. The gentleman here’s been waiting.

M2 A very specific question. I’m a little bit confused about what you’ve said about transitional arrangements and key stages. I was confused before tonight, I’m even more confused now and so can I ask you a very specific question. I’ve got a child coming here in year seven, starts in September. From what you’ve said, nobody’s going to move until 2011, so she’ll be here to year 11, so she won’t move from this school until it’s time for her sixth form. Is that correct?

JD Yes. Yes, but. Yes, your child will stay within Heathcote School right the way through. What we’re say is, if, and it’s a big if, if the children have to move off this site by the time you’re child gets to year 11… What I’m saying is, if we have to move children from this site in 2011, that will mean moving children who are in next year’s year seven half way through their GCSE courses and we don’t think that’s sensible. So either we have to delay the building programme so the children stay here right through until they sit their GCSEs or we have to find another solution for the whole of the key stage programme so that they start afresh through their GCSE and the whole school would move. What we’re saying to you is we don’t think it’s reasonable to expect children to move. Coursework will go adrift…

M2 The specific question is, my child, coming here in September, will be at this school right until her GCSEs? End of.

JD When you say end of, no it’s not as simple as that because it depends on whether you’re talking about the buildings or the school. The answer to your question is yes, your child will work right the way through, finish her GCSEs as a Heathcote student. What we’re saying to you is if it looks like, and we’ll know this by the spring, if it looks like this site will be disruptive for those children part way through their GCSE programme then we’ll come back and talk to you about where we will put the children, but they would stay as a Heathcote School, Heathcote staff and Heathcote children. So they’d stay as part of the Heathcote School but might not be in these buildings.

JW Thank you. The lady in red here and then we’re going to come to you and then you and you.

Appendix 1B(i)

F1 Can I just say one thing, why can’t you just build a new school and leave Heathcote where it is?

JD It goes back to one of the points Pauline was saying earlier on in the presentation. What we’re looking to do here is create a pattern of schools and a location of schools for the future.

F1 We’re not interested in the future. What about our children? We don’t want them to be guinea pigs.

JD The problem is, as the Local Authority, we have to look at the future and what we’re looking at is to put schools of the right size in the right location where children actually lives. Currently the schools were built to reflect the Stevenage of 40, 50 years ago. What we need to do is make sure the schools at least reflect the Stevenage of today and more importantly, reflect the likely shape of Stevenage in the next 20, 30, 40 years. When you look at where the children live and the shape and pattern of the town, we need more places and a new school in the north and fewer places in the south.

F1 I’m sorry, you’re very wrong, because what about the villages? I am from a village, Datchworth. Nobody hears of it but there’s Datchworth and Knebworth. Knebworth is expanding, where’re they going to go? Over to the north?

PD As Justin said, what we’re trying to do is to adjust the pattern of schooling in the town to reflect the different size and shape of the town and where the new housing is and where the demand is coming from. That doesn’t mean to say that we’re ignoring the villages because we’re very conscious of the fact that villagers come in to Stevenage for their education. We’re also aware of the size of Knebworth and what’s happening there. What we’re planning to do is propose a pattern of schools so that there will be enough places for everybody to go and that the villages and the people in the villages can still access their education in the southern part of the town.

JW Thank you. This lady here.

F2 I was quite relieved to hear that you are in discussions with Stevenage Borough Council and North Herts District Council, but I wonder really how much consideration has been given to the emerging East of England plan, which, and I quote, “is likely to require substantial growth in and around Stevenage including land within North Hertfordshire”. I think there’s probably going to be substantial development around south Stevenage especially, given that things have already happened in the north. So if there’s only one school in south Stevenage, I really think there’s not going to be enough places.

JW Thank you.

PD I can understand why you make that point. First of all let me reassure you, as Lindsay said, that we have had quite substantial discussions with both

Appendix 1B(i)

Stevenage and North Herts District Council and we’ve also taken quite a lot of account of the government’s proposals for the East of England plan as you call it. Our projections include all of that new housing and also advice from those town planning authorities about where they believe that new housing will go. They’re the people responsible for housing as you know. We’re not being told of major new development in the south of the town, but let’s just follow that possibility at some stage beyond 2017 say or 2021. If there is a very, very large development south of the town, a large development, depending on its size, will support its own schooling. So just as we talked about a large development on the west of Stevenage, if there was a large development in the south of Stevenage, depending on its size, it may support a new school. We have a rule of thumb that a thousand houses equals a form of entry. It depends on the scale of that housing, but equally, I need to reassure you that one of the things we’re doing with the sites for those schools that we’re proposing here, is to make sure that those sites are larger then we currently need. Should anything change in the future, we have the potential to expand schools if need be. We’re not proposing that because that’s not what we think will need to happen and we’ve already said we would prefer a pattern of eight entry schools. We do have enough land to do something about that should something change.

JW Gentleman here, then we go to the lady at the back then to the lady over there and then back over here and then I’ll assess where we are at that point.

M3 I’d like to take up the same point about numbers and so on. I’ve sat through the same presentation four times now, like many people here. I feel quite sorry for you, the number of times you had to make it. You must be bored rigid by the whole thing. You’re asking us to trust your professionalism as education administrators and that you’re making some very important judgements on our behalf. I’ve been a teacher at this school for 32 years. I’ve seen it change quite a number of times, but I never expected to experience this. I never expected my colleagues to have to have to go through this. Likewise, parents are being asked to put trust in you that the future of their children’s education over the next four or five years won’t be disrupted and you can’t guarantee that, as you’ve already said. Yet, your view is that the price is worth paying for the future.

Can we look at the professional judgements that you’ve made. Firstly, if you take the evidence of the maps that you’ve produced, Heathcote and Barnwell schools have very powerful local footprints, that is, we both draw our students very much from the local area. In particular, Roebuck, Longmeadow, Bandley Hill and Shephall. By the census figures of 2001, the current numbers of 11 year olds in those four wards is 367. It falls over the next four or five years to 315, but that’s still bigger than the 280 from this local area that you say is what’s necessary. Then, we take a significant number of students from Monk’s Wood and Bedwell, Bedwell Plash in particular, about half of the students there. So that takes the figure even in 2012 to 365 students. None of this takes into account the villagers. Knebworth actually rises from a current figure of 54 to a figure of 73 current age six students. If we get the

Appendix 1B(i)

kind of numbers to this school that we do at the moment, you’re pushing the number up somewhere in the region to 400 students. These are figures based on the census. Actually, they show smaller numbers then the figures in your own documentation. Your own documentation puts those numbers higher. You are saying that all you need for this area is something like one school with and intake of 280 a year, but the actual number of students in this area, and I am talking about this area, not the broader Stevenage where you say that the redistribution of students will mean that parents will send their children to other schools like Marriotts. I’m talking about this area alone, there will be somewhere over 400 students, not 280. That’s just from the four closest wards plus slightly further a field, but ones we already have students from.

My first question is, where are the other students going to go and why haven’t you come up with a second plan that parents can choose between, one that allows these children to be educated in their local area. My second question borders on that same thing, about choice. Justin on three occasions has said that he can present evidence to show that bigger schools and smaller schools can produce better education. It’s not the size of the school that matters, it’s the management and the quality of the teaching and learning that goes on in the institution that makes the difference. The only advantage from your perspective is that bigger schools are more economic in terms of the curriculum that they can offer. In which case, if you cannot, and you’ve already said you cannot, present evidence to show that a bigger school is educationally better, not more economic, but actually better then a smaller school; why have you failed to offer an opportunity to these parents and all the parents of Stevenage, to choose between the kind of school that you think is better and the kind of school that they think is better?

JW Thank you.

LM Thank you for that. I’m just going to start on a general point that I want to address and then ask my colleagues to deal with the more specific points. The point I want to address is the point about relying on our professional judgement, which is a perfectly fair point, in a sense that that is what the expectation is. What I wanted to say is that it doesn’t just rest on our professional judgement in that, if you remember the slide in which I talked about the amount of red tape that there is in approving Building Schools for the Future funding. I said that a set of documents had to be agreed by central government before we could get the money. Our forecasts of pupil numbers and our proposals for the numbers of places to deal with those have been specifically examined by central government departments, including their statisticians, in order to satisfy themselves that our proposals relating to the year 2017 are, in their view, correct. For whatever it comfort it is, and it may not be any more comfort then relying on us, you’re not just relying on our professional judgement, you’re relying on an examination of our proposals by central government as well. As I say, that might not give you any more comfort, clearly the lady is laughing, so presumably that does not. However, that is what the process is and I thought I should mention that at the outset.

Appendix 1B(i)

Now I’ll ask Pauline to deal with the detail of the numbers and the schools, the expansion in the centre of the town where they will go.

PD Clearly you’ve quoted some figures that I’d very much like to talk to you about afterwards and have a look at those figures with you. I can’t respond to it in great detail in the same way as you’ve quoted to me. You have your figures there. I’m quite happy to talk that through with you afterwards and check your … Sorry, the figures you’ve quoted to me are not the ones in my document I can assure you. We’ll talk about that afterwards.

As Lindsay said, we do have demographers, we have looked at those things and also, the children coming to this school and the children going to Barnwell School come from all over Stevenage. Some of them come from the area, as I’ve said before, around the old Collenswood School. Some of the children from this area travel to schools further north through choice. What we’re doing is we’re creating a pattern of schools, we’re expanding provision in the centre of town as well so the whole pattern of attendance will redistribute itself over time.

JD On the size of schools. The reason that we are keen to develop eight form elementary schools are twofold. One is efficiency and I don’t think we should shy away from the fact that schools have multi million pound budgets. It’s public money and we need to spend it in the most efficient way possible. Certainly, that will be one of the tests. When we draw down the 145 million, the government are not going to give us 145 million pounds to spend on schools we can’t demonstrate are economically efficient. I think that’s fair enough. By making them economically efficient, what’s happening is that more money can be spent in the classroom on teaching and learning. You can have more staffing and better staffing ratios so I don’t think financial efficiency is a bad thing. I think that’s something worth pursuing.

They key reason for eight forms of entry is because what we’re looking to do here is create schools which are large enough to generate a cohort that begin at a key stage four so that it can afford to run a wider range of vocational options then it currently does. Vocational courses are expensive to run. They’re about twice, sometimes more then twice as much as, if you like, a traditional academic subject. The schools in Stevenage are really very good at offering vocational courses already, but if you want to broaden that range so that young people halfway through year nine can opt in vocational courses, we want to broaden that range out significantly so they have a much wider choice of courses to study. To do that, you need to have 240, 250 or so children in the key stage four programme to make it financially viable. Otherwise, what you’re doing is, you’re providing those programmes, to be frank, at the expense of the children who are not doing vocational courses. Similarly, with sixth forms, we want to make sure that the schools are big enough to generate sixth forms which are again, big enough to be financially viable. There was some pressure, not pressure, but there were some suggestions from the earlier stakeholder process, when we were generating proposals, to just have 11 to 16 schools and a six form college in the middle. We don’t want to do that. We want our schools to have 11 to 18, not least

Appendix 1B(i)

because you then attract teachers of the highest quality in terms of academic subjects. If you can teach A level physics and you’re in a school where you’re teaching A level physics, you can also teach high level physics to children doing GCSE. It’s very important we think to recruit staff, certainly when I had a job as a teacher, I was drawn to schools which were 11 to 18. At the moment, the six forms in some of our schools are very small and we want to make sure that they’re big enough. So, two reasons really and you’ve put both reasons forward. All I’m saying is that I’m confirming you’re right. On the one hand we want schools which are financially efficient and on the other hand we want schools that can offer a broad and rich and wide curriculum, particularly at key stage four.

JW Thank you.

M3 As a historian, I’m quite happy to acknowledge that there are lies, damn lies and statistics, but let’s take another statistic. There are currently 479 students, as of 2006, who live in Stevenage but actually take their education elsewhere. 179 of them go to Buntingford. 179 Stevenage students go to Buntingford. Well actually, its 180 because we’ve lost one more to Buntingford because parents are starting to react to the proposals. The proposals that you say are still in consultation but actually are starting to have an effect on this school already.

All I can say about the numbers is look at your own maps. Look at your own statements. You say you want students to walk to school. If you draw a circle of one kilometre distance around Barnwell and around Heathcote and around Marriotts and then compare where the intake comes from, there are vast numbers of students from around Collenswood who go to Barnwell, but not here. We take them from this local area. So any student from this local area in future, if they don’t go to Barnwell, they’d have to go further a field. They’d have to travel further. The students who go to this school now, from Knebworth and the people who will follow them in the future, will have to travel further, not to Heathcote, but to Marriotts, to Nobel or to Great Ashby maybe if that’s where the places are.

JD To be frank, I’ve got the map in front of me and you have as well. If you look at it, there are children from Great Ashby from near Thomas Alleyne, from near Nobel, who are travelling down to this school at the moment. What we’re saying…

M3 I’m not talking about Great Ashby, I’m talking about this local area.

JD What we’re saying is, at the moment, there’s so much movement up and down the town because of the admissions pattern, let me just finish [overtalking]. I’ve sat very patiently and I need to make the point that if you look at the maps for all the schools at the moment, children are travelling all over the place in Stevenage to get to schools because there’s no school in the north. So children who are living in the north are opting for schools in the middle, squashing out kids who live there and so on and so on. There’s a downward pressure. What we’re doing here is saying we will put the schools

Appendix 1B(i)

in the places where those children live and put in a 10% surplus of places as well. Then those admissions patterns will even out over time. It will take time because the sibling links will continue. It’s not going to happen overnight but over a period of time. The admission arrangements will even their way out. What we’re saying to you is that we’ve got the figures, we can add up and basically there are more then enough places for children who want to go to school in Stevenage, to go to school in Stevenage and there’s a 10% surplus.

JW Thank you. Could we take some other people. The lady at the back there has been waiting very patiently. I’ll come to you, I’ve got about two others before I get to you and then the lady down there. We’ll get around to you.

F3 Everything I wanted to say really has been said, but one thing that hasn’t been pointed out is that our children, if you close Heathcote, our local children that come to Heathcote will have to go further. I live in a road that I felt sure my child would get into Barnwell as she goes, but I was totally gob smacked when she didn’t get Barnwell, she got Heathcote. So we came and revisited the school and my child was quite happy to come here. I made lots of enquiries before she came and rather then go to appeal, I decided that through these enquiries, it was safe enough for my child to come. But if you’re going to close Heathcote, she wouldn’t be able to go to Barnwell so she would have to go further a field to Marriotts or Nobel and that is further away. I like her to walk home. I take her to school to make sure that she gets there, it’s sort of an idiosyncrasy of mine, but I let her walk home. I’m at home and I know that if she’s not in by a certain time, I need to make some enquiries. Setting her aside, the children coming from Knebworth, Datchworth and around, they could actually be on a coach making their day a nine hour day, plus homework. Now even adults, very few of us, don’t work those many hours. I think that that for them is a serious consideration.

JW Thank you.

PD I appreciate what you’re saying about the length of the school day, especially for those children travelling on coaches and coming in from the villages. Unfortunately, Knebworth is a very large village but unfortunately not large enough to sustain its own secondary school. So yes, children who live in villages do have to come into towns to access their education. Some of the reasons that we’ve tried to explain as to why, for example, we’re not just talking about your daughter, but why people haven’t been able to get into local schools in the past. It’s because of that domino effect that Justin has been talking about and also, lets be fair, that when Collenswood closed and Barnwell took all of the Collenswood children, that has affected the ability of people to get into Barnwell School because of the sibling connections. With the Collenswood area, the people who potentially live in the Collenswood area and to the north of Collenswood, may also look further north to the expanded schools that we’re proposing in the future. So as Justin said, it may take a little while to work its way through, but in future there’ll be more places for that community to access and therefore more places for local people in the south of the town.

Appendix 1B(i)

F4 I come from Knebworth and I’ve got children who wouldn’t… they’re the type of children who are very academic, they wouldn’t come under these vocational type things. I believe that you’re going to restrict my choice as a mum to this massive school in the south of Stevenage because I believe you’re restricting my choices right down. I want to know, will Knebworth or other villages have their other options back again to be able to go to other areas? About five years ago we had our options reduced drastically. We weren’t allowed then to apply to Monks Walk or Hatfield Girls etc. Will that now opened back up to us so we can apply to those schools or are you really saying to me that my only option is to put my child into one of these massive schools that you’re proposing. I don’t want my child to go to such a large school as you’re proposing because my children aren’t those sorts of children. They would benefit from a smaller school. My second question, my children do a lot of music and I’d like to know what’s happening to the music school as a reflection of what you’re going to do to Valley School.

JW Thank you.

JD If I do the size of school point and then Pauline picks up admissions and then music. It comes down to what people refer to as massive schools or super schools. Eight forms of entry are not massive schools. Eight forms of entry schools are standard schools up and down the country. There are much bigger schools then that, including here. In fact, one of our highest performing schools here in Hertfordshire, one of our tops schools, is a ten form entry school. What I’m saying to you is, what you’re saying is that we’re creating massive schools, what I’m saying to you is we’re not. We’re creating schools which are a normal size up and down the country. I disagree with your use of, it’s a massive school. Where I do agree with you, because you’re fundamentally correct, by closing a school in a town, by definition, we are reducing the number of schools to which you can express a preference. I accept that point. If this proposal goes through and Heathcote closes, then yes, one of the downsides is that parents have fewer schools from which to select. That’s a fair point. Whatever we do in terms of reorganising the schools in Stevenage, there will be a downside. But to go back to the point the gentleman over there was making, as officers and as a County Council, our view is that the long term benefits to the town and the children of the town are there, with a pattern of schools we’re creating. I absolutely accept the point that the children who will be in the secondary schools over the next three to four years are not necessarily the children who will benefit from the long term model we are creating. I accept that point because it will take three, four, five, six years to create what we’re looking to create and clearly, whenever we start, the children who are in the system, if we start in four years time, those children wouldn’t benefit and it would be the next generation after that. Because of that, that is why we are trying to create arrangements where the children who are in the Stevenage schools over the next four or five years, have as little disruption as possible. That’s the point I’m trying to make.

F4 [overtalking] options of other schools [overtalking].

Appendix 1B(i)

LM I understand your point entirely. That is in a sense governed by what we call priority areas and which priority area you are in. We review those and can consult on changes every year. Every year we do make some tinkerings or we review on an annual basis. There’s no reason why we should not review the priority area or priority areas that Knebworth is in. So you would have an opportunity to contribute to a consultation process about that. Just on the music school.

F4 So can I contact you in a few years time?

LM Yes, you have an email address which is a generic one on the consultation document. That will reach us.

PD You asked a question about the music school as well. You saw on the slide that I put up for the Valley School that there are several options for that school. For those of you that don’t know, on the site where the Valley School is located, there are other users, including the music school for this area. We have no proposals to reorganise the music school. We have no proposals to do away with the music school as such, but it will depend on which option the County Councillors decide on as to whether the music schools location is effected. For example, a lady here asked, are there any plans to sell this site. The same question could be asked, if you closed the Valley School for example, are you going to sell that side. That’s too early to say at this stage because what would happen is, once a decision was taken and I must remind you that’s only one of four potential options, but once a decision is taken, we then have to look at the consequences of that decision and say right, who else have we got on that site for example. Do we need to put any other services on that site. Does it make sense for us to rationalise the use of that site, does it make sense to give up that site. If we do and if that affects the holding that the music school will have, we would have to relocate that music school somewhere else. We’re not planning to make a change to the existence of the music school. I want to reassure you about that point, but it’s too early to say what would happen to the Valley site and therefore whether the music school would be affected or not.

JW Thank you. Can I just highlight the fact that we’ve got a gentleman here who’s been waiting a long time. We also have a gentleman here who’s been waiting and here and there. Those are the four people I’m going to take for the moment.

M4 I’m a governor at the school. In your slide you gave the impression that a lot of the school is old fashioned and that a lot of the buildings need modernising. Since I’ve been here a lot of money has been spent on the school and improving these classrooms, the buildings, the language block and the engineering block. If you close the school you’re wasting quite a lot of money. I was wondering whether it would be possible to keep Heathcote as a choice in the south of Stevenage for parents in the south of Stevenage so they’ve got a choice of Heathcote or Barnwell. There’s also plans to have more housing Bragbury End.

Appendix 1B(i)

LM I’m not sure if that’s a question or a comment.

M4 I just think there should be a choice for parents living in the south side of Stevenage between Barnwell which could be the larger school and Heathcote which could be the smaller school. Some parents obviously prefer a smaller school.

PD I appreciate what you’re saying. I think that Justin has already addressed those issues of what the County Council would prefer to see. But I hear that you’re saying that you’d prefer to have some choice. I hear that.

M4 I just think there should be more choice for parents in the south.

JW So let’s go to that gentleman and then the gentleman down there and then we’ll come back to you.

M5 Thank you for that and thank you for this evening. Could I say first of all, from the off, that I’m a parent of two children who were at this school ten years ago. I was a former governor for about ten years at this very school. I want to query page five of the review. Just above centre, page five of the review, it says the County Council’s proposals are for one larger school to serve the south of the town. Can I just say in passing and with a bit of honesty, that I am a County Councillor and the County Council have never discussed this. Just for further information, twice this evening Mr Donovan, you’ve mentioned Stevenage in consultation with Stevenage Borough Council and that you’ve been in conversation with Stevenage Borough Council. May I assure you that I in life am a twin tracker. I’m also a Stevenage Borough Councillor and may I assure you that nobody has approached Stevenage Borough Council yet to discuss any of these proposals.

May I also assure you and the people present, that nobody has officially approached Stevenage Borough Council, there’s nothing on the agenda. I happen to be the deputy mayor of the borough. My job is to chair the four councils so I know it’s not come up before the council. We had a council meeting last night, there was nothing on the agenda about secondary school reviews. Last night, the Borough Council, I understand, also said that you want to purchase around Marriotts School. I don’t know where your discussions are heading but I think, in honesty, what you should be saying is that you’re in discussion with officers of the Borough Council. You are certainly not in discussion with Stevenage Borough Council. I am one of them and nobody has spoken to me.

Another issue, I personally believe that this is a sneak consultation. I like this school and I can assure that everybody here, including the officers, that if it’s a straightforward consultation, I would vote in favour of keeping the school. Now it sneaked in under the umbrella of Building Schools for the Future. It’s very similar to something like the sword of Damocles. It swings both ways. If it went in on a straight review of secondary schools, it would swing in favour of Heathcote. But because we’ve got this balance where we have to discuss the future to take it with Building Schools for the Future, the sword will swing the

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other way. Then of course, because you have the two opposites, the sword will hang in the middle and it will not move. That’s the problem that the school is in now because in fact it’s going to start dying on its feet. Prospective parents will start to move their children elsewhere. We’ve seen it happen elsewhere in Stevenage. We saw it at the local school which I live very near to in Lonsdale Road. The local kids there and the parents, quite rightly so and justifiably, moved their children away until that school literally died on its feet. I would not like to see that happen here at Heathcote.

I think I have one more question to you as a County Councillor, nothing to do with this, but it links in nicely. Because of the old Collenswood School site, I think nobody has mentioned yet that there are still pupils on the old Collenswood School site. If Barnwell School wasn’t big enough to take them, how on earth are they going to be big enough to take the pupils of this school, that school and the remnants of what’s left of Collenswood. I suppose when the new school is built on this site, that the Collenswood site would be sold. Thank you.

LM Thanks for that. I’ll take the first two points. I think there were three, I’ll take the first two and Pauline will take the last one. The director of Children, Schools and Families has delegated authority to consult publicly on options on behalf of the County Council, so in that sense, the County Council options, he has that under delegated authority. On the Stevenage Borough Council issue as I mentioned, we’ve had regular meetings with officers, you’re quite right, but also, Justin and I personally have had a meeting with the leader and deputy leader of the council.

F5 Which councillors have you spoken to?

LM I’m not going to go through the full list of officers we’ve spoken to, there’s at least half a dozen or more of them. The point I’m seeking to make is that we have had meetings specifically with the leader and deputy leader of the council jointly. We have discussed the possibility of attending Stevenage Borough Council meetings at the request of the leader of the council. For example when we consulted on the changes to south Stevenage primary schools, I attended two scrutiny committee meetings during that period. That is, Stevenage Borough Council scrutiny committee meetings and we have made that sort of offer available to the leader and deputy leader. We are waiting to hear from them what they would like us to do. We have of course sent our consultation documents formally to the Borough Council as well as the meetings. We’ve also discussed the possibility of a seminar for members but that is as much about Building Schools for the Future as about the area review. Those are the measures that we’ve taken. On the Collenswood site, Pauline would you like to talk about that.

PD You’re right, the Barnwell buildings aren’t big enough for the school that we’re proposing. They’re not big enough for the school as it is at the moment which is why they’re using the Collenswood site. We’ve said we will need both sites to sustain a school of that size and the Buildings Schools for the Future programme will provide the investment to build upon and expand

Appendix 1B(i)

the buildings so that Barnwell School will have enough buildings in the south of the town for the size of school it will be. That leads on to your question or your assumption about the Collenswood site. In the long term we’re not expecting Barnwell School to continue to use the Collenswood site and therefore that site will need to be reviewed. Our use of that site will need to be reviewed and there is a possibility in the future that that site will be sold. I need to reassure you that if a site is sold, and there is due process to be gone through to get to that point because we have to offer it for other services first and only if nobody else needs to use it can a site be sold. We can only redevelop the built area of any school site because the school playing fields are protected by law.

JD Just to add to that, just to remind you that as Lindsay said earlier, any site which is sold and capital receipts are gained during the process, go back into the Stevenage programme, so the schools of Stevenage will benefit from those capital receipts.

JW Thank you. We’re going to go to the gentleman in the front here then we’re going to come to the lady in the white shirt and then over to the lady there. I’m conscious of the fact that time is rolling on so I’m going to try and take as many new people as possible who haven’t spoken before.

M6 Hello. I’m expanding the point that the lady made at the back. With Barnwell at capacity, where do you see our children going if you’re proposal to close Heathcote goes through? What would be your preferred option for our children? The second question is, with the news that this site is now to be used for Barnwell School in the future, with building due to commence in 2009, and as if the children haven’t had enough disruption if you’re proposal is agreed, will you give your guarantees that they will not also be subjected to disruptions here due to it becoming a building site to accommodate that fantastic looking building that you had in your presentation.

PD I’ll answer the last part first because I need to clarify. We will need to use both sites and we don’t know how both sites will be used for the one school yet because as I explained before, that work is only just beginning to translate the schools vision into a built environment. We can reassure you that any building work associated with Barnwell will not affect this school while children remain on this site. We can give you that commitment. I just needed to clarify… can you just remind me and clarify the first point that you made please.

M6 With Barnwell at capacity, we live on this doorstep between the two schools, where would your preferred option for our children be to go if they had to move away from the school if you shut the school or if they had to move at the end of stage three. In three years time, where would you foresee our children going?

PD I think what Justin said to you before is that we wouldn’t want to move your child in between a key stage so we’d work with you to work out what’s the appropriate point. So for example if you’re child could stay until the end of

Appendix 1B(i)

key stage four, then they would stay. If we felt that a move at key stage three was appropriate, then we would discuss that with you. As Justin explained before, we’re not quite at that stage now so, for example, when the County Council and if the County Council publish a statutory notice about the closure of this school, we will be precise at that point in time as to what those transition plans will be and they will be included in the notice.

JD Just to clarify that. What we’re saying to you is, we won’t publish statutory notices until we’ve got that clear and we won’t move your child partway through their GCSEs.

M6 I understand that but if you need to move them, have you done the research to see if a school will be able to accommodate them?

PD We wouldn’t move your child to a school that hasn’t already benefited from the building works and hasn’t expanded as a consequence of those building works and so would have the capacity for any children that move into it.

JW Thank you. The lady in white over here.

F6 My child starts secondary school next year so this year I’ve got to have my form back in by October and I come in the catchment area for Heathcote and Barnwell. I’m certainly not going to put Heathcote down so am I going to get Barnwell? If not, because the school is already over subscribed, am I going to have to have my son here and when he sits down for his GCSEs in 2011 his schooling is going to be disrupted. Why should I put my son into a school that’s going to close? You can’t give any guarantees.

PD I appreciate what you’re saying. I think what we’ve said to you before is we will not move your child and we will not disrupt their education in the middle of a key stage.

[overtalking]

M7 Our children get one chance here, one shot at education and you’re about to muck it up for the next four or five years of it.

JW Thank you. I think you made your point. Could you give the microphone back. We’ll take the lady over there.

F6 I’ve got two points I’d like to make. Firstly, I’d like to echo what the lady said at the back about the nine hour day. I’ve got two daughters at primary school at the moment but the first one will be starting secondary school in 2011 and I hoped that she would get into her local school. Given that we live in Knebworth and Knebworth usually feeds into Heathcote, it doesn’t sound like we’re going to have much choice of getting into a local school given the numbers that we’ve been talking about. That means that as parents, are we then going to have to be ferrying our children half way across Stevenage, adding to the congestion within Stevenage. The County Councils green

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transport policy talks very clearly about children being encouraged to walk or cycle to school to minimise congestion at rush hour times. I just wondered how that fitted into your plans for the schools. That’s my first question. My second question is completely unrelated to that but something I would like to know. There’s been no discussion about the John Henry Newman School so I’m assuming that’s going to retain its Roman Catholic status? The Church of England primary schools, there’s no secondary school in this area that they can go to that’s a Church of England school. I wondered if any faith schools had been considered with all these plans.

PD If I start off then Lindsay will follow that on. I think we’ve been trying to say to you and I realise there have been challenges here tonight. We believe your children in Knebworth will be able to get into a school in the south of the town if the proposals go forward. As Lindsay has said, first of all, we consult on the priority areas every year and he’s already had that discussion about the possibility of looking at that. Secondly, we’re not just going to do this and just walk away from it and say oh well that’s it then. We will keep a close eye on it and if we find that people are being disadvantaged then we will start looking at those very admission rules to see if we can do anything about that.

F6 We don’t want our children to be the ones that are disadvantaged. We don’t want it to get to the point where they’re disadvantaged and then you look at it. As you said, this is your chance to get it right so we need to get it right now, don’t we?

PD We believe that we’re getting it right. I’m saying to you though, that if in the future the situation changes and it looks as though it’s changing then we will seek to adapt with that.

LM I’ve had discussions with the St Albans diocese which is the diocese in question, precisely about the provision about Anglican secondary provision in the town, in a sense, to compliment the Roman Catholic provision that there is now. As we’re not through these reorganisation proposals creating a new school, we may be relocating one, but we’re not creating a new school, there isn’t an opportunity for there to be a new faith school. However, I have had discussions with the diocese about the new school that would come with the housing on the west of the A1(M) development, which would of course, subject to admissions rules, be available to people not just in the new development. They are very interested in being the sponsors for that new school and indeed if they were to pursue that, then the County Council would not seek to sponsor the school in competition with them. This is in the discussions that we’ve had, relatively informally because it’s at an early stage. So they are very interested in the possibility of there being a new Anglican secondary school. Most likely, the one which comes with the development on that side of the A1(M). I realise that that is some distance out of the centre of the town, but the nature of recruitment to faith schools tends to be a wider and larger catchment area anyway. That’s as far as the discussions have got so far. You’d be able to watch those developments.

Appendix 1B(i)

JW Thank you. I’m conscious of the fact that we’re almost out of time. There’s a lady at the back for one last question. What I’m doing is I’m taking people who haven’t been at the meetings before and haven’t spoken.

F7 I’d just like to say, how can you close a school that isn’t failing? How can you close a school with buildings going up on the south side of Stevenage. I know all of this has been said tonight, over and over in many different ways. How can you close something that is strong and will build for the future and if you must close Heathcote, why cannot we join with Barnwell, two schools, one governing body?

JD I’ll pick that up and I’ll try and be quick. We’ll stay here so if people want to talk to us individually, at the end of these meetings lots of people have wanted to talk to us that didn’t want to talk in the main meeting. I’m very happy to place on record that Heathcote is not only a good school, but a school which is improving. What we’re looking to do here is not an intervention on standards. What we’re doing here is looking ten, 15, 20, 30 years into the future. There’s been a lot of comment tonight about people who can’t get into their nearest school. That’s largely because the schools are in the wrong place and so parents who don’t live here are squashing down and skewing the admission arrangements. You can see that from our mapping work. What we want to do, I know it sounds repetitive, but the answer to your question is, we want schools where children live now, not where they used to live, and where they’re likely to live in greater numbers in the future. So this is about creating a pattern of schools. One of the reasons we’re very keen indeed to hang on to as many of the teachers as we possibly can, is because we want to hang on to the good practice which is in Heathcote and embed that in the larger schools.

JW Thank you. I’d like to thank you very much. I’m aware that the time has just rolled on actually. I’d like to thank you very much for what was a very useful meeting because I think people did get to hear and to say things in a way that I hope will be helpful and will have been helpful to you. The panel are here for individuals, particularly the gentleman back there, if you want to come and talk through your points again, please do. I know that there are people here who will probably [overtalking] sorry, I’m closing the meeting, do come and talk to them. [overtalking] Thank you very much for your say. Do come and talk and come and get your answer and if anybody else wants to talk to the panel, please do. Thank you very much, I think it’s been a productive meeting, if a difficult one for you. Thank you.

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27/06/07 Round Diamond School 1 

  Speaker key JW Jane Wilton LM Lindsay MartinKH Keith HuttMF Member of the FloorJD Justin DonovanP Pat  JW Well, I think we’ll start. Good evening, and welcome everybody, to this public consultation meeting. As you may know, it’s one of a series of evenings that is being run by Hertfordshire County Council. My name is Jane Wilton, and I work with a company called Accent. Accent is an independent market research company and we’ve been asked by Hertfordshire to help run the consultation. My role is as an independent person, to make sure that the consultation is run in a fair and proper manner, and that your voice is heard, so I’m here to help facilitate everybody who wants to ask questions. The evening will start with a presentation, which will be introduced and partly presented by Lindsay Martin. That will run for about half an hour, and then after that we’ll have the open part of the meeting when we’ll have questions from the floor, and the panel will answer questions. If we’re still going by quarter to nine we’ll close the open part of the meeting then, and anybody who wants to have an individual word with the panel, at that point can. As you can see, or probably hear, as well, I’m wearing a microphone and we will all be using microphones this evening, because we’re recording the whole public consultation. A transcript of this meeting, and all the other meetings, will be actually on the council website within a week or so, or a couple of weeks, depending how long it takes for it to be transcribed. So can I just ask people to, if possible, turn off your mobile phones, and off rather than on silent, because it interferes with the recording? I think that’s just about all I have to say. I see the panel were caught out, even, with the mobile phones. [Background speaking regarding coffee and mobile phones] Okay, so I’ll hand over to Lindsay to kick-off the proceedings.

LM Okay, Jane, thank you, and don’t forget the biscuits as well, if you haven’t already had some. Thank you, Jane, and welcome on behalf of the county council, to this consultation evening. This is our agenda, as Jane said, roughly. I’m going to do some introductions, I’m going to talk about building schools for the future, a colleague of mine is going to talk about the area review, and our proposals, and then the main business is your own time. So who’s here? I’ve got Justin Donovan, Deputy Director, Chief Education Officer, on my right, and your right. I haven’t got Pauline Davis, this is not Pauline Davis in drag, this is Keith Hutt, who is a member of the team that has

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done the detailed work on the review in Stevenage, and I’m the one in the middle. I’m going to talk about building schools for the future, which is the context within which the review of provision in Stevenage is taking place. I think all of you know where the review has come from, and what the context is, and I don’t suppose any of you, and even I don’t remember Victorian classrooms of about 130, or 140 years ago, but that’s what they looked like, all wearing pinafores, and that looks like a single sex school, doesn’t it? They all look like girls, but it wasn’t intentional, it was just the one I happened to find, but some of you may remember some of the things that we used not quite so long ago, like slide rules. I certainly used a slide rule when I was at school, but then I’m old. An early calculator, a Sinclair, four-figure tables, a very early computational, sort of adding machine, that colleagues in County Hall tell me they first used when they were accountancy trainees many years ago in County Hall. I don’t know what it does, actually, but within our lifetime we’ve moved on. Within my lifetime, anyway, and not yours, perhaps, but within my lifetime we’ve moved on from things like this to the incredible computing power, which is now available in Keith’s Blackberry, for example, which he’s probably got in his pocket, and mine is in my bag. You know, the difference between that, and say, that, is quite amazing, isn’t it, in my lifetime? These are the sorts of buildings that that education happened in, and actually it still does in most places, doesn’t it? You will recognise these flat roofed, window-walled buildings all over Hertfordshire. This isn’t a school in Stevenage, actually, it’s in another part of the county, but pretty much all the secondary schools in Stevenage look something like this, don’t they? I mean we’re in a brand spanking new primary school here, and this is different, and looks actually rather nice, I think. This is a design that’s won quite a lot of interest, I have to say, but the majority of schools still look like this. Within Stevenage they were all built from the early 1950s, starting with Barclay, to the end of the 1960s – 1968, at the Valley School. They’ve all had additions, and add-ons afterwards, but the original buildings date from the early 50s to the late 60s, and all in these single glazed, window-walled, flat roofed, energy hungry buildings that are now getting rather old. They are 40 or 50 years old and not really fit for the purpose. Schools can look like this, however. This is a DfES, the Department for Education and Skills, and that’s been a voice, hasn’t it, the Department for Children, Schools and Families, as it’s called, as of Mr Brown’s new cabinet announcement. The Department for Children, Schools and Families exemplar, and they commissioned a whole set of exemplar designs for the buildings, the grounds, and the sustainability for extended schools. A whole set of architects developing interesting designs for buildings, and this is what they can look like. You won’t find any that look like that in Hertfordshire, or anything like that, actually, because we haven’t built a new secondary school in Hertfordshire since 1975, and they didn’t look like that then. I mean not many of them look like that now, but they can be exciting, interesting, stimulating structures.

LM So what is that programme all about? Well, it’s the major government investment in secondary, and in secondary-aged special school provision, worth ₤2.2 billion a year, annually, which I though was a large sum of money. Well, it is a large sum of money, of course, but then I discovered what Terminal 5 at Heathrow cost, at ₤4.3 billion, just on one building. I don’t know

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how you can spend that much on one building, but apparently you can, and that put that into some sort of scale, but it is nevertheless a lot of money, a lot more money than education has had pumped into it for buildings, for a very, very, very long time. The first wave of that money to hit Hertfordshire comes to Stevenage, ₤145 million, about 12 million of which is for information and communications technology, and gives some idea of the importance that government places on ICT for the future, because it’s quite a significant sum. So this is a really exciting opportunity for Stevenage, to invest that much money in secondary, and secondary-aged special, so it’s really important that we get it right. It’s pretty important that we spend that money to the best possible effect, because we’re going to be building buildings for decades to come, for generations of children to come, and we’ll be doing them a huge disservice if we don’t spend the money in the best possible way. I just said that, just pressed the wrong button, that’s all. You wouldn’t expect, would you, or perhaps you would, but you’d be wrong if you did expect to get hundreds, or millions, or thousands of millions of pounds out of central government, with [sic] [without?] a lot of strings, or in this case red tape attached. That’s just the way it works when you’re spending your money, my money, public money. There has to be a lot of control on that, there has to be a lot of supervision of that, and this is certainly the case with building schools for the future. We have to submit three sets of documentation for approval, the first in April, which has happened. The second in about September, to October, and then finally a detailed business case in February, March of next year, and it isn’t until that final one in February, March next year has been approved, that we are allowed to start the business of procurement. That is finding a private sector company to actually undertake the construction work, and that procurement process itself, subject as it is to European directives, and some European red tape, if you like, takes quite a long time too. We don’t expect to put the first spade in the ground, or whatever you do on a building site to start things off these days, until late 2009, possibly even the beginning of 2010, depending on how long that procurement process takes.

LM So that’s a lot of process, isn’t it, it’s a lot about buildings, a lot about money, but actually the buildings are only the means to an end. They are only the means of providing the right spaces for children to learn in, and for teachers to teach in, because we don’t build nice new buildings, and think, what shall we do with these buildings? Oh, I know, we could put a school in there. It doesn’t work that way round, does it, we build schools because we have children who need places to learn, and teachers therefore need to teach them, and we need the right sort of spaces, the right sort of buildings for that to happen in. So we started this process, and I say we, we started this process with a vision for what education and learning should look like in Stevenage. The we is the county council, working in conjunction with other stakeholders in the town, principally heads, and other representatives of schools, and that shared vision came up with these things, none of which, I think, you’ll find surprising, at least I hope not: A focus on excellent teaching, and effective learning, a commitment to raising attainment, aspirations, participation, and schools which lead and serve the community with a range of public services, a commitment to the promotion of healthy lifestyles, and participation in sport, and a diverse range of specialisms, including vocational

Appendix 1B(i)

ones. I mentioned the importance of ICT earlier, and ICT to provide, for example, more personalised study programmes, to provide community access to learning programmes, and last but not least, light, attractive, and flexible spaces in buildings fit for the future. Buildings that are flexible enough to adapt to the demands of teaching and learning in 20, 30, or 40 years time, which are pretty difficult to predict, because I’m not sure who, using a slide rule when I was at school, would have predicted the Blackberry, or the palm-top [?], or whatever, that we have now, for example.

LM So what do we need in order to deliver that vision that I put up on the previous slide? Again we consulted a range of stakeholders. Most stakeholders agreed, and not absolutely everybody, but the vast majority of stakeholders agreed that what we needed was a smaller number of mainstream schools, with larger sixth forms, more specialisms, big enough to be efficient and flexible, but small enough to support those all important relationships between students and staff. They agreed that we needed closer links between mainstream and special schools; they agreed that we should develop even closer links with North Herts. College, and I say even closer links, because the links are close now. They are very good now, but they can always develop further, and finally they agreed that we desperately needed improved facilities for the education support centre. That is the centre for children who are educated out of school, because they are currently in mobile classroom accommodation on the edge of a primary school, entirely unsuitable for that purpose, and we’ve agreed we should do something about that. So having said all that, almost by way of background, Keith will now give us more information about the review itself. [Background noise and overtalking].

KH It’s quite exciting, really, we’ve got 82, is it, secondary schools, in Hertfordshire, and the last one was built in 1975. We’re going to transform what we’ve got in Stevenage, and it’s really, really exciting. Why do we need to consider provision across Stevenage? Well, first of all we’ve got to make sure that this money, with this once in a lifetime opportunity, that we spend it really wisely, and actually what we provide for young people in Stevenage is as good as we possibly can get it. Buildings do make a big difference, and it’s not just about buildings, but this school is just a really exciting place, and you can see what you can do when you’ve got new money and the opportunities that that brings. So we’ve got to invest the money wisely, but we’ve got to make sure that we get the right number of places for the right number of people, but also in the right locations in the town. I’m not going to spend a great deal of time looking at this one, but this has been going on for some time. Lindsay mentioned that early last autumn we began consulting with a very wide range of people, about what their idea of what education should be like in this town, and we had all these stakeholder discussions, right across Hertfordshire. From that we drew up a long list of all the possible ideas that people actually had, and then we tested those, and the director then looked at all those options, against the full [?] tests and the result of that is the document that you’ve actually been presented with tonight.

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KS So these are the tests and the first one I already mentioned, do we have the right number of places in the places we need them to be? Secondly, and right at the forefront of everything, will the changes we make actually enhance the standards, the achievement of the young people in our schools, because at the end of the day that’s what we want to do? We want the best possible outcomes for our young people, that we can get, and then there are issues about making sure that whatever we deliver meets cost requirements. And the last one I’ll talk a little bit more about later, that we have appropriate process in place to make sure that as we go through the changes they are as smooth for everybody as possible. So how has demand changed? Well, Lindsay has already mentioned the pattern of schools. All the indicators we have, and we’ve got very sophisticated ways of predicting numbers for the future, and our prediction into 2017, as you can see, is that we’re going to need 48 forms of entry. That’s 48 lots of 30 pupils, going into schools across Stevenage each year, and that 48 forms of entry includes some surplus. That’s to allow, hopefully, that most people will want to go to the school closest to where they live, or for their children to go there, but for all sorts of reasons people may not want to do that, and there is a little bit of flexibility built in for that reason. At the moment distribution is not appropriate to where people actually live. The schools in Stevenage were built a long time ago and the population is shifting, as for example, where we are tonight, and obviously the development here is at a fairly early stage and will continue for some time. So I mentioned there the development, and in addition, but separate from these proposals, the proposed developments to the west of the A1 will bring with that development a new school for that area. So when that happens there will be a new school, and that will be funded in a different way to the funding we’re talking about tonight. So just to make the point, the new school that we’re talking about up in the Great Ashby [?] area is up there. It’s quite difficult to pinpoint on a map, but we can show you if you really are interested, after the questions later on.

KH Then the distribution, and perhaps I will just mention them very briefly. The proposal is that Thomas Alain [?] School, which is there at the moment, would move to there, and that will free up that site so that we can expand Berkley School. We were talking about eight forms of entry, so that’s why we need six schools with a sixth form, six schools of eight form entry, and that will give us enough land to enable us to do that. Thomas Alain School, the Catholic school, is to be expanded to eight form entry. Marriot is there, and our proposal for that, hopefully is to build a new school, but on the same site, and hopefully to provide a new and different access onto that site. Nobel School, to the east there, to be expanded. Sorry, I’ll go back, I pressed the wrong button. That’s Nobel School. At the moment Barnwell [?] School uses, what we call the east campus, which is the old Collingwood [?] site, and we won’t need that site once all this has happened. That site is not big enough for us to expand any school; it’s not big enough for an eight form entry school. Down here the proposal is that Heathcoat School, which is there, is closed, and that that would free up the space there, to enable us to expand Barnwell School on to both of the sites that they occupy at the moment. There isn’t enough room on either of those sites at the moment for an eight form entry school. Then the other schools that are mentioned on there are

Appendix 1B(i)

Lonsdale School. They are the special school for PNI, physical neurologically impaired children. The possibility there is that we might be able to move that onto another school, possibly the Berkley site, or perhaps the Marriot site, and that would give all sorts of opportunities if we’re able to do that, to enable the students of both schools to share some of the facilities, and there’s a lot of advantages to doing that that we can talk about, perhaps later. Greenside School, down here, another special school, is in a very inadequate building. It’s ideal for primary children, but actually at the moment it has secondary-aged children, as well as primary children, so the intention there would be that we build a new secondary department on the new Barnwell School. And for the same reasons I just mentioned, lots and lots of opportunities for them to share facilities, but to keep their separate identities, and all the benefits that that brings. Then you’ll have seen that for the Valley School we’re actually not making any specific proposal. There is a range of options in the booklet that you’ve got, and we’re very keen to get feedback about what people think about those proposals.

KH So that’s really what I’ve just been talking about, and it says it’s our preferred option, and that’s what we intend to do. That’s the intention of the director to deliver that, subject to this consultation, and this consultation does actually matter. We’re getting a lot of feedback from all these meetings and it will be taken into account before any final decision is made, but that’s our intention at the moment. There is a second proposal, and this is really a fallback proposal, in case things don’t go quite right with the first one, and the reason for that is that two of the sites, the Great Ashby site, the school in the north, we don’t actually own the land at the moment. We expect to be able to purchase the land, the people that own it are saying they’ll sell it to us, but we don’t actually own it, and if something goes wrong with that and we’re not able to purchase that, that would actually change what we’re able to do. We’ve got a similar problem, potentially, at Marriot School. Again, we don’t think it will cause us any problems, but there are issues about the ownership of land on to that site and until we’ve secured that we feel we’ve got an obligation to at least put an alternative in. So this is really very much a fallback position, in case either Marriot School, or the Great Ashby site turn out not to be available to us. We would still expect to close Heathcoat School, but we would expand the other schools to take up the capacity that we’d lose. I’ve already mentioned the special schools, and we’ve got two choices, as you will see, for Lonsdale. One I mentioned already, we could relocate it to one of the other sites, so that some of the facilities could be shared, or the alternative is we can keep it where it is now and we would actually enhance the facilities there. Similarly with Greenside, and well, there’s only one option there, really. I suppose we haven’t really got a choice there. I was going to say there are two, but there isn’t. Then the Valley School is slightly more complicated. We can keep it where it is, we can relocate it to one of the other sites, or we can keep the school, maintaining professional responsibility for students, who will be located in mainstream schools, if that makes sense. So the students would be in mainstream schools, but the staff would actually go out and look after them, and be professionally responsible for them. And the last one is that we could close the Valley School altogether, and enhance the provision

Appendix 1B(i)

on the mainstream sites to take up the educational needs of the children that will be affected.

KH Transitional arrangements are very important. This is a very long-term process, and Lindsay was talking about the procurement process, so we wouldn’t expect the first school to be available until 2011, probably, at the earliest, so we’ve got a long time to plan for all this and to make arrangements, and actually, because we’re working across the town it makes it much easier for us. It actually gives us the opportunity to take up slack in one building while we redevelop another one, so we can actually make provision across the town, over a period of time. So we can actually minimise the disruption, we can actually ensure that new buildings are finished before we need to move students into those buildings. We’re pretty expert at this. We haven’t built any new schools, but we do a lot of building work in schools and we’re very used to making transitional arrangements. Of course one of the key things, at the bottom there, to go back to it, is that we need to ensure that quality of teaching and learning is maintained, and indeed continues to improve through this process. It’s very important of course that the arrangements for staff are in place, and we are already working on arrangements to make sure that there will be a job for every member of staff currently employed, who wants one in the new arrangements. There are lots and lots of reasons for staff to want to stay in Stevenage. This is actually one of the most exciting developments anywhere in the country, so there are massive opportunities for staff to be involved in this, and actually to enhance their careers at the same time, so we do expect and anticipate that staff will want to stay. Some will go, for all the obvious reasons that people do go. People will retire, and get promotion, and do all those things, over the years, but we’re expecting most of the staff to actually stay. It says the authority will facilitate redeployment, if necessary, and indeed the head teachers, and indeed the principal of the college, have already said to all the staff that they will collectively share responsibility for making sure that everybody does have a job, so that’s pretty reassuring. We’ll make arrangements for students as well, and one of the things we’re pledging is that any students that are affected by this, we won’t move during a key stage, so for example, students in years 10 and 11, who are in their GCSE years, would not be moved halfway through that. We will make certain that arrangements are in place to make sure they’re disrupted as little as possible.

KH So there’s a process going on, you’re part of that process, and it’s really important that you feed back whatever you think, positive as well as negative. So whatever ideas you’ve got about what we’re proposing, we would really be grateful to hear from you. This process will go on until August, then those tests will then be applied, and the proposal will be put to the education panel in October. A decision will be made in October, and then the process will move forward. So having said all that, it’s your chance to actually ask us some questions. Thank you.

JW Thank you, Keith. Right, so now this is the open part of the meeting, where the panel are here to answer your questions. Can I just ask you to put your hand up if you want to ask a question, and Katy, over there, has got a

Appendix 1B(i)

microphone and she’ll come and give it to you. If you could all just abide by that, because then it means we hear one person at a time, rather than everybody asking questions all at once, and it won’t get recorded very well. So, Katy, if you’d like to get ready and we’ll see who wants to ask questions? Yes, the lady in the front here.

MF When I was at secondary school in Stevenage there were 12 secondary schools, and mine had five form entry, and I believe the others were a similar size. In the document it specifically says you want schools to be small enough to retain and build upon close working relationships between students and staff. Nowhere can I see it explained why, from an educational point of view, it is now decided that what we want is great big schools with eight form entry, or possibly even ten?

JD I’ll pick that up, on the grounds that I haven’t spoken yet, so good evening, Justin Donovan, Chief Education Officer. I think the first thing to say is that the schools we’re looking to develop here are fit for the next 30, 40, or 50 years. The schools that we’ve got at the moment were designed 30, 40 or 50 years ago, so there’s nearly a century between the start and end of those two processes, and the world has moved on, the curriculum has moved on. So that’s the first point to make, and the second point to make is that eight form entry schools are not big schools. They are bigger than five form entry schools, but they are typical throughout the country. They’re unusual in Hertfordshire, but very, very common everywhere else. Eight form entry schools, and ten form entry schools are normal sized secondary schools. We would prefer eight form entry schools, not because we dislike the idea of ten form entry schools, and I’ll come back to the reason why we want that size. The reason that that’s our preferred option, option one, is for two reasons. One, it leaves greater parental choice in the town, and a greater spread of places, and secondly, it allows for further expansion later on. So in 20 years time, if all our schools are ten forms of entry the sites will be quite tight, but at eight forms of entry they could expand further in the future. There are lots of reasons I want eight form entry schools, and the main reason is because they generate a cohort at the age of 14, 15, 16, which makes them viable financially to run a much wider range of vocational courses. When we were at school there were some vocational courses, but the funding arrangements were very different and the kinds of courses that are available now simply weren’t around. The problem is they are very expensive, and typically they can cost more than twice as much as a standard programme. Unless you’ve got a relatively large number of students of that age you can’t actually afford to run those courses without penalising the younger children. And similarly with a sixth form, if you’ve got sixth form numbers below about 150, actually when you work out the finances, and I’m sorry, but in the end there are some financial issues here, you’re running sixth forms at the expense of the younger children. Once you get up to about 200 or so, then actually the sixth forms begin to be much more efficient, and can run. We particularly want our schools to have sixth forms, because they bring with them the expertise. If you’ve got somebody who can teach, for example, A Level Mathematics, you’ve got somebody in front of your top maths sets, who can stretch them and take them forward, and it’s also a greater attraction for recruiting staff. I

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remember, back when I had a proper job as a secondary teacher, thinking back, the groups I miss teaching were the kind of, really difficult, awkward groups, and the very able attentive groups. That kind of teaching you miss, and that’s what attracts you to schools. Where I would agree with you is that if you’ve got an eight form, or even a ten form entry school and you try and run it as if it’s a five form entry school, then you get into difficulty. These are not super schools, these are standard sized schools, but the head of year becomes much more important as a focal point for the children, the form tutors become much more important, departments become more important, and the pastoral system, so that you’ve got older children supporting younger children, helping them to read, and buddy systems. So really you have to run a larger school in a different way to a smaller school, but here in Hertfordshire we get that response that these seem very big. They’re big for Hertfordshire, but they’re an average size for the rest of the country. We have looked at a lot of research over the impact of the size of a school on standards, and it looks like there’s a stronger link at primary, actually, than secondary. I could show you lots of compelling evidence to say that very small secondary schools are the best, and I can show you some more compelling evidence to say that larger schools are the best. In the end, I think the research tells us about the quality of teaching, the relationships with kids, the ways it’s managed, and the quality of resources, so hopefully that reassures you a little bit. It looks like just a little! [Laugh] Yes, okay.

JW Yes, the lady at the back there, thank you.

MF It’s a similar sort of question. There’s another survey, I think, in the paper today, saying that the educational standards in private schools tend to be much higher, and two of the things you notice in private schools is, one, the size, and secondly that a lot of private schools are single sex schools. I just wondered if there is any provision to have any single sex schools?

JD There are other reasons why at private schools the standards are high. First of all they are very selective of who they allow in, secondly they are very expensive, and therefore they have very small classes, so I mean, there are lots of other reasons why private schools are very successful. Having said that, I think we can learn a lot from the private sector. I think we in the public sector sometimes dismiss the private schools as just a completely different breed. I’ve got to be careful here, because my wife teaches at a private school, and we’ve never argued in 27 years other than that, on her decision to take that job. She has classes of seven. I think the largest class she’s ever had is 12 and her results are spectacular, and those kids were interviewed and highly selected. She only does that one day a week and the rest of the week she works in a proper school, as a [unclear]. And some of our private schools are big, so I don’t think it’s because of that, but in terms of single sex that’s also up for debate, and in fact we have a debate planned for our politicians in the autumn term, about the impact of single sex teaching. You don’t have to have single sex schools, of course, to have single sex teaching, and there are lots of experiments about separating the kids until they get to key [?] stage four, and then bringing them together. But actually that research is also very inconclusive, because single sex schools are often, and not

Appendix 1B(i)

always, but often in quite well to do areas, are often selective, and take cohorts, so the comparisons are not quite right, but the straight answer to the question is we don’t have any plans to have single sex schools in this provision. [Overtalking].

MF And why is that?

JD We just felt that in terms of raising standards in Stevenage, in terms of creating the pattern of schools that we wanted, we didn’t think single sex schools would bring anything to the arrangements, and it didn’t emerge from the initial stakeholder conversations. It’s not something that came through as a very strong idea, and I’m not sure it came through very much at all.

LM I read something different, actually, which is that what we often hear at meetings, and I have over the years, the assumption that bigger schools means bigger class sizes, and of course it doesn’t at all. It just means more classes, rather than classes are larger, but we do quite commonly hear that, so I just thought I’d lay that one to rest.

JW Any other questions? The lady at the front here.

MF Some of these schools will only be surrounded by desolate [?] areas, if you’re going to extend [inaudible]?

JD The sites where the schools are located, and the sites that were chosen are big enough to expand to the size we want, and in fact most of the schools of eight forms of entry are big enough to expand further than that, if we have to. So if you take Marriot, for example, what we will do is build the new school at the other end of the overall site. When it’s finished the children will move from their existing building, to the new buildings, and we’ll then flatten the old buildings and they’ll become the playing fields, so there’s enough site for that. If you think of Berkley School, Berkley School, under these proposals will take onboard Thomas Alain, and its own site, so it will double the site. Barnwell will have the Heathcoat and Barnwell sites, so they will double in size, so one of the many advantages of the schools in Hertfordshire is most of them are surrounded by very large sites, and much more so than most schools up and down the country, so there’s plenty of room on the sites. If we want to have ten form entry sites, then that they do become tight. There’s still plenty of room, but we would rather rate eight forms of entry, but there’s plenty of room on the sites that we have available to us.

LM Just something else about that, actually, that we’ve been thinking, as part of this whole process, of pedestrian access, and vehicle access onto these schools, because these schools were built before people had cars, and parked in the streets, and all the rest of it. On most of the sites, we think we can enhance access a great deal, so that actually we’ll be separating vehicles and pedestrians very clearly, so we’re hoping to access the new Barnwell School, if we can, from the dual carriageway, and the same thing for Berkley School. Obviously, with the school in the north we’ll be able to think about

Appendix 1B(i)

access, and we can actually do a lot about the way in which children get onto these schools, so that’s actually going to be quite a big bonus for us, I think.

MF Hello, and there’s lots of questions. I suppose the first question is [background noise] [inaudible] and why that particular patch, and why other areas were not identified at an earlier point within this building work here that’s going on, because it looks as if it’s going to be a completely green field site?

LM Yeah, it is going to be a green field site. We’ve chosen a site that is, A, available, i.e. there’s somebody prepared to sell it, and B, it has the right access to satisfy town planning requirements for access to it.

MF And where would that access be?

LM I don’t know, off the top of my head. I’m afraid I don’t have that detail, but I do know that my technical work stream colleagues have been working with the town planners, both in Stevenage, and in North Herts. because the site is in North Herts. District Council area, and not in Stevenage, about access, and we had to have a site that we were confident would satisfy their requirements for access. But in terms of not getting one earlier, well, part of the problem was we didn’t know until December that we were going to get Building Schools for the Future money, in this particular round of funding, and so we couldn’t commit ourselves to any process of acquiring a site until we knew we’d have the money to enable us to build on it, essentially. I mean, if we’d found a site years ago when there were more sites available, before more were built on, we would have had to sit on that site, like I’m perilously sitting on this table. I’ll stand up. We’d have had to sit on that site, unused, you know, in the hope that we’d get the money, and that wouldn’t have been a very effective thing to do, I think. So we were a bit hamstrung, until we actually had an assurance from government that we would get the money, and as I said, we only got that assurance on 20th December, just before Christmas, and we immediately went out and did a site search. Or our land agents did a site search, started talking to site owners, started talking to the planners, and tried to find a site that would be likely to meet town-planning requirements. I say likely to meet, because of course you don’t find out definitively until you actually put in a planning application, and we’re not quite at that point yet, but the preliminary discussions with the planners lead us to believe that that site could have adequate access, but the details of that access I can’t give you, off the top of my head, I’m afraid.

JW Thank you, and the gentleman in the front.

KH Can I just add briefly to that? On our website there’s a list of frequently asked questions, one of which is just about to go on, so it’s not there, actually, if you look tonight, but it’s where is the new site in the north? So we are actually planning to put more information about that, and we’ll put the answer to your question on the website, so give us a few days, if you wouldn’t mind?

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MF I suppose this is the same question, really, but the four ladies behind me actually all live in Weston [?] [overtalking and background noise], and your site for the school is in Weston. In fact, I live at the bottom of the field in which you intend to build it, so [overtalking] I have a real interest in both the site for the school, and also in its access, so it is important to me to know where [overtalking] the access [?] will come from? Is this working?

LM Yes, I can hear you.

MF I wanted to ask you about the [inaudible] site for this. I notice that in your brochure you’ve identified two areas on the north side of Stevenage where you are expecting housing to be built. I know these two areas have been in people’s minds for a very, very long time [background noise and overtalking]. And people were trying to just not [background noise], but there’s still actually been no consultation about this area, [background noise] and I’m wondering, therefore, how your calculations for the number of children are working out, when you actually don’t know whether there’s going to be housing there, or not? And we’re also very much concerned that having moved into the Parish of Weston [background noise], having once moved there you will then say to yourselves [overtalking], well, there is a school very handily sited, and let’s put some more houses all round the back?

LM Yes.

MF [Overtalking].

LM Well, I mean these are all quite tricky things, aren’t they, because we’re dealing with more than one local authority, as you’ve alluded to, the county council responsible for the schools, and the district councils that are obviously the housing and the planning authorities. The green sites that you mentioned, that we identified for housing, were done so on the advice of our town planning colleagues, in the district councils. We take their advice on where they think housing is likely to be. Our forecast for pupil numbers, however, only takes account of houses that have at least entered the town-planning system. They might not actually be built, but they’ve entered the town-planning system, so in other words there is an application lodged that enables us to know how many units there are likely to be. I mean even at that stage, that early you don’t always know exactly what sort of unit, whether it will be two-bed houses, or three-bed houses, two-bed flats, or whatever.

MF So you clearly are not at that stage?

LM No, quite, quite, exactly.

MF And the district council don’t know, at this stage [?]?

LM No, no. Well, it does and it doesn’t. [Overtalking]. They are on the map. Our pupil forecast only forecasts five years ahead, so we’re forecasting at the moment, up to 2012, or thereabouts, and that only takes account of houses, or units that are at some point in the planning system, and as you

Appendix 1B(i)

rightly say, those two green sites haven’t got to that stage yet. What we have to do to forecast further ahead, and we’ve been required to forecast for 2017, because the government wishes us to build for capacity based on a forecast ten years ahead, even though routinely we only forecast five years ahead, because you’ve only got five years of live births leading up to school. We’ve only got five years worth of data in the system, as it were, so you can only forecast five years ahead, and so what you have to do for 2017 is to do population forecasting, rather than pupil forecasting, which is a slightly different thing. Pupil forecasting is based on known live births, known housing developments that are going to generate children that you can estimate the number of, and known patterns of migration between areas. You can use all of that and produce pretty sophisticated forecasts, actually, but only for five years ahead, and that’s not good enough for this purpose, where we have to forecast for 2017. So there we’ve used population forecasting, and the services of a demographer to know that, which takes account of the regional spatial strategy, the district council housing targets, and information from the districts about where that housing is likely to be, and for example, 3,600 houses west of the A1 M, at least. That’s the current application, and I suspect it will grow. Those two green areas that we show on the map, and other areas, simply as areas where the planners think that any extra housing is likely to go, but it’s no more accurate than that, I’m afraid, that’s all the information we can get. That’s why Keith said that in the 40 eight forms of entry that we are predicting for 2017 we’ve left a 10% margin in that total, for two reasons. One is to facilitate some parental preference for places, but also to make some allowance for housing that’s not yet in the planning system, coming close to schools, and that may be more, or larger than we expect, and therefore having an influence on intakes. So we have that margin, and we also, of course have sites, some of which are further expandable, or at least the schools are further expandable. So on some sites, and I think, in fact, the Great Ashby one, and the northern site is one that could expand to ten forms of entry, rather than eight. So again, if much more housing comes along than we expect, or that we’ve been led to believe by the districts, we could expand the school further. Sorry, it’s a bit long-winded, but [overtalking] in terms of your last point about, how shall I put it, the school not exactly being a Trojan horse, but a school being seen as a desirable feature to encourage developers to want to build more houses around it, because it’s there? Yeah, I mean I’m not a planner; I’m not a housing person, obviously. I’m an educationalist, but dare I say, I mean, I can’t speak for the district council, obviously. Personally, a purely personal view, I would have thought that’s a possibility, but I can’t say that in any way officially, and it wouldn’t be our responsibility anyway, as you know, it’s a district council responsibility. Neither do I know about the pattern of land tenure in that area, and how available extra land will be likely to be. I mean I don’t have that sort of information, I’m afraid. That’s the best I can do. [Overtalking].

JW Thank you. Right, yes, with your hand up, down here. Thank you.

P Thank you. [Inaudible] in the Parish of Weston, and so as you know, the county council tend to go on postcodes and parishes, for admission. So would this mean that within a priority area fewer people would get into

Appendix 1B(i)

[inaudible], and would then take more from [inaudible], or Weston, and take some more from [inaudible]?

LM Thank you, Pat. I think I need notice of that question; it’s a bit technical. Admissions are rather a technical thing, but yes, you’re quite right about parishes, and postcodes, and all of that. I think there’s a slightly larger question, and a slightly larger answer, I suspect, which is that because we will be expanding all the schools in Stevenage, the whole pattern of recruitment to schools will change somewhat, because we’re redistributing places around the town. This is not a very exact answer, because I can’t give that, but I can give a more general answer, which is basically that there will be that changing pattern. I think when we get a little bit nearer to 2011, or maybe the 2012 intake, we’ll have to try and do some modelling on what that might look like. But actually, until at least we’ve got proposals that are agreed, so we know whether we’re building a pattern of eight form entry schools, or some nine, or ten form entry schools, or whether we’re co-locating specials, with all those sorts of things, until we’ve got the options agreed later this year, I suspect that we won’t do detailed modelling until we know what it is we’re modelling for. Then we can try to see what effect the redistribution of places is likely to have on the pattern of admissions. I know that’s not a very good answer, in a way, but… [10 second break in recording] because it’s a rather general one. But I think at this point I can only give a general answer, and we won’t be able to do the detailed work, I suspect, until maybe towards the end of this year, or the beginning of next. But I mean, in plenty of time for parents coming up to secondary transfer for, say, a September 2011 intake.

P [Overtalking].

LM No, right. Yes, it is, actually, yes, I have to say, as these good folk know.

MF But most of this area is in [overtalking].

LM Indeed, indeed.

MF [Overtalking] I mean you ought to cover [?] Weston [overtalking].

JW Well, we’ll come to you. We can always come back to your question, because I’m sure there are lots more.

MF I have two questions, if I may? The first one is [background noise] I think you said that you did a long list of [background noise], yet the consultation document lists it as one proposal, and couldn’t we have had a more creative consultation process if we’d had a few options to look at, and to choose what we [background noise]?

LM Yeah, well, actually there’s more than one, isn’t there? Surely there are about six?

MF Well, [overtalking].

Appendix 1B(i)

LM You mean mainstream schools, because all secondary…? Yeah, mainstream, okay, so there are only two, really.

MF Well, one, there’s one, and then [overtalking].

LM Yeah, okay, yes. Yes, I suppose you’re right, there is one preferred option, which is the eight form entry pattern, and there’s the, sort of fallback, backup option of slightly larger schools, if something goes wrong with the land acquisition. I mean the process that we went through, as I think Keith explained, was that the longer list actually wasn’t a great deal of a longer list, I don’t think. I’m looking at Richard, because Richard, Head of Barnwell, was one of the stakeholders who was involved in the process with us, and it wasn’t a much longer list, actually. It varies from area to area.

MF But there was only one [?]?

LM No, no. Well, one, and a backup, and we also had to test those options against the four tests that Keith put up on the slide earlier, which [overtalking] you’ve got there on the printed sheet, and basically the ones that are here are the ones that satisfied the four tests. I mean, did you have thoughts about any particular option that you would like to have seen there, because we’re always open to extra ideas?

MF Well, not particularly, but [background noise].

LM No, I suppose not.

MF In Stevenage we’ve only got access to the kinds of suggestions [inaudible]. I think the consultation paper would have been a lot better if you’d at least presented one or two [overtalking and background noise]. That would have been [overtalking] actually seeing the job [?] in the paper, and setting the criteria in the paper, [overtalking] some proposals about [overtalking]. I know you’ve said some stuff, and given us some information about that [overtalking].

LM I’m trying to remember. Did we not put the grid analysis on the Web?

JD Can I just make a general point? I think, to be absolutely frank with you, the idea of this process is that we only come out on public consultation with proposals that we think deliver on the ground. And bearing in mind that in terms of stakeholders, we’ve got councillors, local councillors, district councillors, head teachers, governors, and officers, people who really do know what they’re talking about. Actually, of the proposals that came out of the stakeholder process, this proposal, our preferred option, everybody felt was so compelling because of what it delivers across the town, and we haven’t quite captured all of that, which perhaps I will. It had a lot of support, and what we’re looking to do here is create a pattern of schools, which does a number of things. First of all that reflects the now residential shape of Stevenage, rather than the residential Stevenage of 30, or 40 years ago,

Appendix 1B(i)

which was very different. Secondly, to have schools, which can offer specialist courses that are currently not available to the kids, and between them the schools in Stevenage have pulled something quite remarkable off. It’s one of only ten towns in the whole of the country that, from 2008 all the available specialist diplomas will be available to the children in Stevenage. Now, to do that you need schools that are going to collaborate, are large enough to deliver those programmes, and can collaborate between them. What we want to do here is have an overarching trust across all the schools in Stevenage, which has some control over that collaboration, because at the moment the schools are collaborating because the heads get on very well and have developed some really quite interesting models, so the kids can opt into a much wider range of courses than they can elsewhere in the county. What we want to do here, with this pattern of schools is capture that in a formal structure, so that we can start to invest in it. We did look at other options, but once you decide you need at least eight forms of entry, to generate the kind of numbers we want, and once you look at where the children live, and where the housing developments are, and then when you look at where the existing sites are, actually our preferred option comes out as a pretty compelling case. What we don’t want to do is conjure up a lot of other options, which don’t really meet the test as well as this one, simply to give people something to talk about, to be frank. Whereas in the Valley School, for example, there are four different options, all of which can deliver what we’d like to deliver for the schools, so we’ve put all four options up, and what we don’t want to do is consult on options that we don’t really think, as, if you like, professionals, are worth doing. I have to say, in some parts of the county we really do consult just on one option, because there’s just an obvious way through. All the background information, in terms of it, we can certainly make available to you, if you want it. You know, the matrix with the various options, we can share that with you, if you like?

MF [Background noise and overtalking].

LM [Overtalking]. I was just going to say the other options that were on the long list, as far as we can recall, because we’d have to go back and go through the document. One was that we have a voluntary aided school, a church school. That was a proposal, and that would only arise if we were opening a new school, so if we were opening a brand new school that would be a possibility, but we’re not, so all the schools that will exist in the future already exist. So that was discounted for that reason, and the other proposal that attracted no support, really, from almost everybody, was that we had a sixth form college, and we did away with sixth forms. The heads, and the principal of the college were very strongly against that, and very much in favour of keeping sixth forms, expanding them, as Justin was saying, and actually developing the close collaboration that we’ve already got with the FE College. I don’t think there were any other significant proposals, actually.

JD No, and just something to say about the document; we try to keep it as short, and as brief, and to the point as we can, because we’re on a non-win here. If we put too much detail in people say it’s complicated, and boring and

Appendix 1B(i)

too long-winded, and if we don’t put enough in we get accused of not putting in enough, so we’ve gone for a balance.

JW And your second question?

MF I think at the end I’ll ask [background noise], but I find it very difficult because my daughter is at Nobel, and all I really get from this consultation is that Nobel will be bigger, some time in the next…

LM Five or six years.

MF Without any real indication of what the impact on my daughter, or my younger daughter [background noise] is going to be. So I realise that you can’t really say, in great detail what’s going to happen, because it’s too early, but I think there’s such a void [?] as to understanding what the transitional arrangements are going to be, and you know, if we’re happy with it, or not. I think, if someone said that there will be [inaudible] but even some things like a new [?] principal, with things like that it would help to understand [background noise]. I realise [background noise] you’ve thought about it quite carefully, [background noise] but I think you have to have the information [inaudible].

LM Yeah, I think that’s a good point. I mean there will be more information available through the schools, as the schools work on their strategies for changing from their current size to eight forms of entry. All the schools are working on that at the moment, kind of, more or less as we speak, I think, because we’ve asked for that by the end of this term. But you’re quite right, we haven’t really coordinated the information parents might get out of that process within individual schools, with our overall consultation process, and that, I guess, we could have done better, and I’m quite happy to accept that. So you will find in Nobel, for example, Alistair is working on a strategy for translating five and a bit, whatever, forms of entry, into eight, or seven, in the case of Nobel. Is it as much as seven? I thought it was…? Anyway, seven into eight, which is a relatively small change, but it will impact, not for that reason. The huge impact to Nobel won’t be because it’s enlarging, as much as because the Building Schools for the Future project is designed to remodel and refurbish buildings of that age, and in a sense, we would do that even if it stayed the same size, so there are two issues really. There’s the increase in size issue, which you may have a view about, desirable, undesirable, or whatever, but there is also the issue, which is not, in a sense, subject to formal consultation, because it doesn’t require any legal changes to undertake the remodelling and refurbishment of the school. That can, however, bring some disruption to children while that’s happening, of course, and we would expect schools to keep their own parents in touch with what is likely to happen, when it’s likely to happen, how if will affect them, and so on. But you’re quite right, we could, maybe have put more about that into this process, and the document, bearing in mind, of course, that none of that, either the growth, or the building works will happen until, say, 2011, or 2010, or thereabouts.

Appendix 1B(i)

JD Just to add to that, I think it’s worth coming back to what we’re consulting on, and the purpose of this consultation. Actually, what we’re consulting on at the moment, just at the moment, is the overall number, shape, size, and location of the schools. When we’ve got that agreement that’s when we’ll have a lot of the detail. You can imagine, the heads are currently doing a lot of work and they’ve got designers with them at the moment, but I think we’ve got to be a bit careful here, because actually what we’d like your views on is have we got the locations right, the size, and the location of the special schools? Then once we get into the building process there will be the usual communication with parents, and feedback from parents and the children, because Lindsay’s team have got a lot of plans to actually involve the children very heavily in the design of the schools. That’s when we’ll get into that detail, but at the moment what we’re asking for you to say is, look, across the map of Stevenage, have we broadly got the right shape, pattern, size, and delivery of schools across the town, and then we’ve got four or five years to get that detail absolutely sorted out. But I take the point, it’s kind of chicken and egg, really. Some schools, of course, will have less disruption than others, because we can build the school at the other end of the site, and move the children in, whereas at Nobel we won’t have that luxury.

JW Thank you. Did you have another question, or shall we go to the gentleman here?

MF I’ve listened to what you have to say about what we would consider about larger schools and I fear that parents and students wouldn’t want to go with ten forms of entry, and I think that the authority might have a difficult job in selling that to parents here. One thing that I’m concerned with [background noise] will be [inaudible] the likes of Marriot, and that Marriot will have to go [background noise] if the land wasn’t purchased to do it. I said at that particular meeting, why couldn’t they acknowledge [?] the site to be used, because that would be [inaudible] at that particular time? I’ve been trying to envisage what schools for the future, in the future will look like, and I can see, I can appreciate that the Heathcoat and the Barnwell site go together. I can appreciate Berkley, and Alain [?] go together, and if it fell through [inaudible]? What surprises me a little bit is what’s going to happen with the Nobel site, if you close Marriot, if you go for option two [?]? Nobel is a miniscule site, and how are you going to squeeze ten forms of entry on to that site?

LM Well, it wouldn’t be ten. He said nine or ten forms of entry, and Nobel would be nine. If you look at that option, it says that the schools will go up to nine or ten, some will be nine, and some will be ten.

MF But still…?

LM It’s still not very big, you mean, yes.

JD It is big enough. [Overtalking].

Appendix 1B(i)

LM Our design team have looked, our architects and planners have looked at the site, and the buildings, and they assure us that we can take it to nine forms of entry. It might require a detached playing field; it might require some additional playing fields offsite. That would be one of the consequences, which is not ideal, but I mean, we do have schools around the county, both primary and secondary, that do have offsite playing fields. Obviously it isn’t ideal, which is why we prefer, or one of the reasons why we prefer the eight form entry option.

JW Thank you. Now somebody had their hand up at the back there.

MF [Inaudible]?

LM Well, I mean, essentially we’re having meetings in secondary schools, other than the ones here, for all the schools. What we’re doing is having a meeting in any secondary school that is having a significant alteration, or a more significant alteration, i.e. closure, or move, and we’re having these general meetings to which everybody else is invited to come. We’re not specifically holding meetings in geographical feeder areas, if you like. We have circulated the booklet to primary schools and I’m pretty sure, although I’d need to consult my colleagues, that we’ve included the primary schools in the surrounding areas, as well as the primary schools actually in Stevenage. I’m pretty sure that we have.

MF [Inaudible]

LM Now, that’s interesting, because the feedback we’ve been getting, and we’ve taken this up recently, is that some primary schools have passed that information on to parents, and some haven’t. We have just, very recently reminded all heads in primary schools that we would like them to pass that information on to parents, so what I will do is to look specifically at that, when I get back to the office, and make sure that that happens, because it’s certainly supposed to have done.

JD It’s also worth bearing in mind that we’ve put these documents in lots of public spaces, wherever we can, in libraries, doctors’ surgeries, we’ve put it in the press, on websites, and there are 27,000 of these documents in circulation. There comes a point where, I think, we can try and get as much information out there as possible, but we do rely on distribution, but as Lindsay says, we can follow that up, and I’ll check that.

MF [Inaudible]

JD Yeah, because [overtalking]. No, you’re not the only people who have said that, actually, to be fair. Parents from other primary schools have said the same, both here in Stevenage, and in the surrounding areas.

MF [Inaudible]

LM Sorry, which one did you mean?

Appendix 1B(i)

MF The Great Ashby site.

LM But a lot of people live within walking distance of that site, don’t they?

MF [Inaudible and overtalking].

KH [Overtalking]. They are the current figures, actually, for Thomas Alain School.

MF [Inaudible]

KH Well, actually, the current figures are that 80 something percent of pupils in year seven and eight come from the Great Ashby area, and actually move down, are moving from the north to the south, [overtalking] so actually some of them will be nearer.

LM The way the map is, because at the moment there isn’t a school. [Background noise] There isn’t a school between these sites, and all of this [background noise], so that site with this housing is as easily accessible [overtalking] as the site here, and nearer, in fact.

JD You haven’t got a microphone.

LM Sorry, sorry. Keith said, in year seven and eight, because the pattern is changing, because as the Great Ashby area is developing more people from Great Ashby are going to Thomas Alain. With the older year groups, when there was less housing, of course there were fewer Great Ashby children there, because of the way the growth has happened. Sorry, did you want to come back on that?

MF Yes.

LM Sorry, I saw your hand.

MF [Background noise] looking at sites there, and why did you not look at sites with more [inaudible and overtalking]?

LM Sure, [overtalking] yeah, you mean this, [overtalking] that sort of area there?

MF Yes, that looks [inaudible] more, and that, and those look better.

LM Yeah, sure. [Overtalking].

MF [Overtalking] to the east of the town.

LM Mm, it will entirely be the availability of sites, i.e. a site that we’re actually able to acquire. Our land agents did a site search in the whole area, and obviously we would try to get the best site geographically that we could,

Appendix 1B(i)

but that is entirely governed by a site that we can actually buy. My guess is, and I’d have to go back to the work that our land agents did, that they couldn’t find a site here, which we could acquire, but I don’t have that detail in my head, I’m afraid.

KH Can I just say, actually, just to add to that, Lindsay, if it’s a competition between building houses on a site, and building a school, there’s a lot more value in flogging it for housing, than there is to sell it for educational purposes, so actually that does restrict us. We did, as Lindsay said earlier on, start off with every theoretically possible site, and the very first map that we had ourselves was actually covered in possible sites. Every one of them was then investigated, so that we actually narrowed down what was really available, what we could afford, potentially, and whether people were actually prepared to sell it, and actually the choices are very, very limited.

MF But it strikes me that [background noise] you are dealing with somebody to purchase that piece of land, but when will we know whether or not that sale has gone through, because until we know that we can’t really give you an opinion on [coughing] the options are?

LM Well, equally we’re not going to conclude the purchase of a site, unless we know that we can definitely build a school there, so I’m afraid we’ve got a bit of a chicken and egg here, because [overtalking]. Oh yes, yes, and we’ve particularly undertaken to give people the very latest information on that for the open evenings, in September, when people are preparing for secondary transfer in September of this year. I’m not saying we’ll have bought the site for September, but we may be sufficiently along the process of negotiation to be able to give people a very clear indication of whether or not it’s going to happen. By October 15th, is it? I can’t remember, but the secondary transfer forms have to be in, and so people need to think about their choices, in relation to what the options are going to be. Not because it’s going to happen immediately those children start, in September 2008, of course, but it will happen while they’re still at school, and that’s the important thing, isn’t it?

KH The other issue, actually, just if I could add to that, is of course, the scope for us to do anything about any of this is restricted until we know the outcome of this review. [Overtalking]. Whatever the outcome of this review will determine what we do next, so although we’re obviously discussing things with people we can’t firm anything up until after October.

JW Thank you. There’s a lady who’s been waiting a while, at the front, and I’ll come back to you, but if we just pass it down the row, because it gets a bit difficult?

MF Hello. With regards to the special schools, is the plan to put the special schools into one secondary school, as a complete unit? And will all the teaching staff be with that unit, and if so, is there going to be [background noise] integration within the whole of the school, or kept [overtalking]?

LM Okay, Justin will answer that.

Appendix 1B(i)

JD It varies between the three schools, but basically with all three schools there is an option to co-locate them. There are slightly different versions of each, but one of the options, which I think you’re referring to, is where we’re saying co-locate. What we’re trying to do there is, to be frank, to get our cake and eat it, really, so let’s take the Valley School, for example. If the option to co-locate it goes through, what we do is build a brand new school to replace the Valley, on a mainstream site, but there would be two separate schools, separate head teachers, and separate uniforms. So two separate schools, but because they’re on one campus they can share things like car parking, they might share a dining room, they might have one caretaker working across the two, and they may well share a library. But what we want to do for the special school is have an arrangement whereby, if there are children in the special school that need to spend all their time in, if you like, the secure environment of a special school, they can. But if there are children in the special school that actually can’t just cope, but will flourish in a mainstream setting for part of the week, they could do that too, especially as they grow up. When they go into the special school at the age of 11 they may well need to stay within the special school for a while, but as they progress, develop in self-esteem, and confidence, they could spend more and more time in the secondary school. The idea is that we would handle that, if you like, on a child-by-child basis, so we’d want the building to be sufficiently flexible, and the curriculum flexible, so that those choices could be made by the teachers, and the parents to work that through. So although it sounds expensive, because it is, it’s also efficient, in terms of some of the savings, because we won’t have to replace the whole thing, and those kids in the special school will have access to facilities they don’t have at the moment, so very big sports hall facilities, and things like that. So that’s the plan, but that’s one option in each of the three special schools, but then there are other options for each of those schools.

MF What idea do you have of number of places available [inaudible]?

JD Right, the increase in the number in special schools is different. We don’t do that on birth rates, and all the rest of it, in the same way as mainstream schools. What we do is monitor the development of special needs throughout the county, so for example, we know at the moment there has been a very significant rise in the number of children with Autism. Now, a lot of those children are just part way through the Autism continuum, and can do very well in mainstream schools, and do well. But we’ve got an increasing number of children at the far end of the continuum of Autism that will struggle if they are just put into a mainstream school. So what we do is monitor, if you like, the development and the needs of the children throughout the county, and then tweak the numbers that we have in our special schools, and the nature of the provision at our special schools to match that. We’ve got 26 special schools in Hertfordshire, which is very unusual. The number of special schools per child in Hertfordshire is one of the highest in the country, and we want to maintain that, we think our special schools do a great job. We are concerned, though, without going into too much detail, because we’re very happy to have 26 special schools, and as I say, they are all very good, and

Appendix 1B(i)

some of them are some of the best in the country, but at the same time, even though we’ve got all that special school provision, we have about 200 children who are placed outside of the county, because we can’t meet their special needs. We think that we need to take another look at our special schools, over the next four or five years, to make provision for those particularly complex children and bring them back into the county. They are our most vulnerable children, and to have them placed in Bath, and Bristol, and other places just doesn’t seem right to us. It’s also very expensive, and those 200 children cost us about ₤11 million a year, so just on cost it’s important and we’d rather invest that money in our special schools. So in terms of the Stevenage review, over the next four or five years, when we look at those special schools we’ll need to talk to the heads of governing bodies about the population they might expect in the future. So the Valley, for example, are already saying to us, look, over the last four or five years the children coming through our door are far more complex and needy than they were some time in the future [sic] [past?], so that’s the way we’re doing it.

JW Thank you very much.

KH I was just going to say something about co-location, if I may? Just a very small example, because Justin was talking about Autism, and one of the ways of treating kids with Autism, and supporting them, is something called rebound therapy, which means bouncing, basically, but it’s actually quite an important strategy to support them. In other words, putting in a trampoline for them that’s actually at floor level. There’s also a mainstream benefit for children having access to a trampoline, so if we were able to put a specialist facility in the new school at Greenside, which is located on the Barnwell site, the Barnwell students can get access to that as well. So we can offer specialist facilities, and that’s just one example that actually can benefit all the students and not just be very much limited to one group of kids, so there’s lots of advantages, and there are lots of other examples like that, actually.

JW Right, the lady at the back, did you want to speak?

MF If this new school [inaudible] at what point would we have to [inaudible and background noise]?

LM It would be addressed in time for the secondary transfer for the first year of entry into the new school, and by that, I mean probably 18 months ahead of that. The County Council does an annual consultation process on its admission rules, and it has to, it’s required by law to consult every year, and that consultation is done, roughly a little bit more than 18 months… We will be consulting next January, to March, on entry for 2009, so for entry in 2011 we’d be consulting at the beginning of 2009, I guess. Yes, I think I’ve got that right, yes, so it’s that sort of… Is that right, if there’s 2008? No, sorry, for entry in September 2011 we’ll consult between January and March 2010, not nine. In 2010, so it’s a bit over 18 months ahead.

MF [Inaudible]?

Appendix 1B(i)

LM Mm, interesting, okay. I mean I’m not [overtalking] sufficiently familiar with the work of the primary schools, to know how close the links are with Knights Templar, but if they are that close, I mean, I…

MF You know, they might visit [?] [inaudible and overtalking].

JD Can I just say that it’s not 2000. An eight form entry school is 1,200, plus the sixth form, so Knights Templar is one of our bigger schools, actually, so it won’t be that significantly different for the children.

LM Okay, but it’s not just size that you’re talking about, I suspect, [overtalking] it’s about the relationship between the schools. Okay, well, we’ll look at it earlier then, in that case. Yes, and I’ll find out quite what those sorts of links, what those sorts of curriculum links, social links, or whatever, are. Thank you for that, that’s helpful.

JW Did you want to…?

MF Another Weston question. [Overtalking]. On page two of the document it says that the schools we’re looking for are schools that lead and serve the community with a range of public facilities [background noise]. I personally think this is a very important aspect of secondary schools, or primary and secondary schools, that they are a part of the community [overtalking]. With a school coming up here quite close to this community, then these kinds of facilities ought to be thought about, and not just [background noise] as part of the school.

LM Certainly for a brand new school, they are, and we’re talking with a wide range of service providers, from health, sports, arts, about a whole range of services that could be within schools, and we’ve started that discussion now, even though we won’t be building for a few years, because there’s quite a long lead-in time to getting that in place, as you can imagine. The Primary Care Trust is very interested in the co-location of surgery, or super surgery facilities on school sites, for example, but it’s a completely different organisation from us, and so there’s quite a lot of planning that needs to go into making that happen, but we have started that. But that’s just one example of the sort of thing we can do.

MF [Overtalking]?

LM It is. It absolutely is an opportunity; it’s a golden opportunity, yes. I mean we used to do it. 50 years ago we used to regularly build primary schools with health centres in them, because 50 years ago health was part of local government. It isn’t any more, and so it’s a bit harder, and it takes a little bit longer, but this is a golden opportunity and we’re determined to do that, yes.

JD It’s probably just worth saying that it’s not just the local authority that takes that view, but actually the secondary heads, and the governing bodies are pressing on that point right from day one. You know, there have been a

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lot of discussions, and there’s lots of payback for schools. I remember one conversation we’ve had with the heads is that if you had an orthodontist, for example, on a school site, one day a week, you’d increase your attendance by a percentage, because of the number of teenagers that traipse off to get their braces tightened up, and take half a day to do it. So it will be out of a maths lesson, get them tightened up, and back in, and in fact, if they end up [?] misbehaving, give them an extra twist! We’ve also got secondary heads, who are seriously considering the idea of childcare facilities. You know, breakfast clubs, drop off young children, and there’s a lot of possibilities, and that’s being pushed, if you like, as much by the heads, and probably even stronger from the heads, or certainly as strong from the heads, as it is from the LEA.

MF And sort of, some clubs, and societies?

JD Absolutely, yeah, adult learning, and what we will do is make sure that when the buildings are designed that all those additional activities are built into the fabric and design of the buildings.

JW Thank you, and there’s a lady here at the front.

MF [Inaudible] and I can see the advantage, of course, for children [inaudible] facilities, but as a mother I’m very concerned about the effect on the children that don’t [inaudible], and what will happen? As my husband said, our daughter goes to Nobel, so we’ve already been told that there’s a possibility they might have leave the site for a year [?]. Now, if all the school buildings, if all the schools are having building work done, where on earth are they going to go? Will they be passed around [background noise], and how can they retain the building, or the place where [background noise]?

LM I think the first point is certainly not doing it all at once. It will be a phased building programme, for several reasons, and one reason is that one. I mean one reason is the capacity of the company to do that much building work all at once, which is unlikely, but secondly, we need to develop phased building arrangements that allow for transitions for pupils that minimise the disruption. If we take, maybe a simple example, so if Thomas Alain here is going to be rebuilt there, when that happens and Thomas Alain’s pupils move, the Thomas Alain buildings are then empty. So to remodel the Berkley school we’ve got other buildings contiguous with the Berkley ones, which can be used, so that implies doing the Berkley remodel and refurbishment after the new Thomas Alain school is built, and open. So in a sequential way, and so we will, wherever we can, do that, to minimise disruption. Now, on the Nobel site, and Nobel obviously is major remodelling and refurbishment on its existing site, and we do have a lot of experience of doing that work while pupils are in situ, and we’ve done it at quite a lot of primary schools. However, Nobel school is pretty full, and obviously the fuller a school is the harder working in situ is, because you’ve got less slack to move children with the school when you’ve got areas of work. So I suspect that we will have to look at possible movement during part of the building works, but again that is detailed programming, which it’s difficult to do until we have a construction

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company that’s actually signed up to do the work, and we can talk to them about how that happens, but there is a possibility of that, yes. Do you want to add anything?

JD Yes, can I just add one thing? I think, as adults we can underestimate the resilience of kids, in terms of it can be disruptive, but actually, as long as it’s planned and you tell the kids well in advance… If you plan it carefully, you zone off sites, and actually kids are far happier at these transitional arrangements than sometimes we give them credit for, as long as it’s done very, very carefully. The companies we use are companies that are used to doing this kind of work, because it can slow you down. It can be that you’ve got to do work at the weekends, and you’ve got to focus some really noisy, or even perhaps dangerous work during the summer holidays. For example, if there’s any asbestos to come out you can’t do that when there are kids there, and so that is built in and the companies we use are used to that kind of thing. What we are saying to you is that there will be some disruption, absolutely. It’s a fair point, and well made, but first of all, I think we ought to not underestimate the children to work that through, and the two things we can say to you are, number one, we will plan it, as Lindsay is saying, in such a way that we absolutely keep that to a minimum, and then the second guarantee is that the disruption, which is nevertheless there, we will manage very carefully, and plan it carefully, and work that through.

KH Actually there are benefits sometimes, as well. One of the surveyors from a company we use, Mace [?], has been saying at some of the meetings, that he’s just completed a project in Hemel Hempstead, I think, quite a major development there, and six of the sixth form have gone off to university to study building related courses, because they’ve been very involved. He’d been doing projects, and they did some work experience, and quite extraordinarily, because you never get that many kids going off to do that sort of thing, but six from the same school have gone, so they can get very enthused by all this as well.

MF It’s a growth area for jobs, that’s true.

JW The lady at the back there.

MF Just a question. If you’re saying it’s going to start in 2011, or maybe 2012, when will you [inaudible]?

LM Yeah, but not actually to start. I mean we expect to start building work, maybe the back end of 2009, maybe just after 2010. 2011 will be the first thing that we manage to get open, because of that period of building. Yeah, I was asked that the other evening, at another meeting, how long will it take to do the whole lot, and when will the whole of Stevenage be completed? It’s actually quite a difficult question to answer when we haven’t got the private sector contractor signed up yet, and won’t have for a while, but my guess, my very broad guess is about 2013, I would say, something like that.

MF [Inaudible] because my sons are involved, and they [overtalking].

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LM Oh right, yes, I remember it well.

MF So it’s the same group of children [overtalking] that are being affected here.

LM Yes. I mean, I think the chances are that many children from the Shephalbury Meadow Federation, if I’ve got the right name, and I think I have, go to Barnwell, I think. Is that right, Richard? I’m sure that they do, and Barnwell is not really moving, and it already, pretty much is the size, the target size of eight forms of entry. So I think, as it happens, those children are likely to get only a pretty small disruption, if at all, if they go to Barnwell. Probably much less than a school that is going to move to different site, or indeed be substantially remodelled on the site. I think at Barnwell, because we’re intending to use both the current Heathcoat, and Barnwell sites, there is plenty of room to do work with minimal disruption. I don’t want to put you on the spot, Richard, but just nod, and that’s fine. Yes, Richard is agreeing, so I think in that particular case they won’t go through major further disruptions, although I recognise that having been through that [overtalking].

MF But they have also less choice [?] at Heathcote [overtalking].

LM True. No, that’s absolutely right. Of course there will be more places at both Marriot’s and Nobel, as well, because both of those schools will get larger, so there will be more places there. But there’s actually no doubt, and we’ve been quite upfront about this at other meetings, that if you do have a rather smaller number of larger schools you do, to some extent reduce choice. Yes, yes, I mean that’s absolutely right and there’s no getting away from that, that that is one feature of the proposal. Yeah, I accept that.

JW Thank you. I’m conscious of the fact that there’s only about five minutes left before we close the open bit of this meeting, and is there anybody who has a burning question still to ask, because if not we can close at this point, and then perhaps you can have words with the panel, if there’s anything else?

LM Mm, we’ll be here.

JW Or a further continuation of any points. So if you’re happy we’ll close the open part of this meeting at this moment, and thank you very much. The panel are here for your questions. Thank you.

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070705 Round Diamond School public meeting 2 

 Speaker key JW Jane WiltonLM Lindsay MartinPD Pauline DavisRD Richard Westergreen-Thorne, Head of Barnwell SchoolMF1 Member of the floor, Chairman of Weston SchoolMF2 Member of the floor, ex County CouncillorMF3 Member of the floor, female speakerMF4 Member of the floor, male speakerMF5 Member of the floor, male speakerMF6 Member of the floor, male speakerMF7 Member of the floor, female speakerMF8 Member of the floor, female speaker 

JW Welcome to this very exclusive public consultation meeting here this evening. My name’s Jane Wilton and I work with a company called Accent and Accent is an independent market research company, and they have been asked by Hertfordshire to help them with running this public consultation, partly due to the fact that, often, I think, local government is accused of not listening and not being independent, and all the rest of it. So I’m here to make sure that your voice is heard, your voice is recorded; as you can hear, I’ve got a mike and the panel have mikes when they actually speak. And if you want to speak later on, you will also be handed a microphone. So, the way we’re going to run this evening is that we’re going to start with a presentation, which Justin and Pauline will do between them, and… sorry, Lindsay. I know who you are….

LM He often is, but he’s not here this evening.

JW Justin’s not here this evening. Lindsay and Pauline will do it, and then, after the presentation, we go to the open part of the meeting where it’s really over to you to ask as many questions as you want, and the panel will be very happy to answer. I think that’s really about it until the open bit, so if I just hand over to Lindsay.

LM Yes. Thank you, Jane. We’ve made a commitment to record all the meetings so that the record of what everybody says is available. That’s why we have all this palaver. What I think I’ll do, is to… I’ll come among you. I’ve got to use this or else we won’t pick it up on tape, because there are people who want to look and see if I say the same thing every single time - the 12 times that I do it – see if they can detect any change. And it is the same – I’m telling you it’s the same. Why don’t I come and sit down here, and we’ll run through the pictures and the slides? Rather than me standing at the front and talking to you, so that it’s a bit less formal. Why don’t we come and sit here and then talk as we go along? Is that all right? So, as Jane said, this is what

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we thought we’d do. I’m going to say a bit about building schools in the future, Pauline’s going to say a bit about the review, and then you can ask us questions for however long you want, really, given how many there are. Justin isn’t here this evening. We have two parallel meetings and he’s had to do the other one. But Pauline and I have been here to all of them - well, I’ve been here to all of them, Pauline’s done almost all of them, and I’m going to say a little bit about building schools for the future. We’ll sort of sit in a circle, should we? I’ll say a bit about building schools for the future, which is actually the prompt, or the context within which we’re reviewing the secondary schools and the secondary age special schools in Stevenage. I normally start off by saying that this is what Victorian classrooms looked like, and there’s obviously nobody around who remembers those – not even me. But you’ll see the point of this, I hope. I do remember I used a slide rule like this; an early Sinclair calculator, remember? This is an early computation machine that some of my colleagues in County Hall used when they were first into Accountancy. But if you think of how much, over my lifetime, we’ve moved from that to a palm top, or a hand-held computer device. That change is absolutely enormous, isn’t it? And these are the sorts of buildings, all over Hertfordshire, that that sort of period of education was carried on in. This is a typical post war, flat roofed, window walled building. It’s not in Stevenage; it’s another part of Hertfordshire, but we built hundreds of these primary and secondary schools all over the county, post war. In Stevenage, between the early 1950s at Barclay, to the late 1960s in the Valley, and most of those have had extra blocks added on, additions, over the years. But the original structures were all built between the early ‘50s and late ‘60s, so they’re all getting rather old, 40, 50 years old, and increasingly not fit for purpose. Just going back a moment, just imagine how much energy loss there is through a single glazed window ward. These were built at a time when energy was cheap. And this is an example of a design for a school that central government commissioned. When they decided to invest - the amounts of money I’m going to tell you about in a moment – they felt that they’d better commission a bunch of leading architects to design some exemplar schools, and this is one of them. I can’t remember which architect this is, but included people like Will Alsop and some fairly well known architects. So this is what a school can look like, both outside and inside. You won’t see any that look like this in Hertfordshire because we haven’t built a school since 1970 – a secondary school – [unclear] a newly built primary school, of course. One of our most recent, not the absolute most recent, but quite a recent one and quite a nice one, I think. But we haven’t built a secondary school since 1975, so we haven’t got any that look like this, that look remotely like this, and perhaps we never will exactly. We may not like it, I’m not sure I do, but anyway. It shows how designs can be different, more interesting, maybe more stimulating and so on. So, what is this programme? It is the government’s major investment in secondary school and secondary aged special school buildings; £2.2 billion a year. And that is a lot of money, especially over a ten to 15 year period, which is what the programme is. That adds up to a great deal. Total government expenditure, capital expenditure on schools, in 1997 was about £750 million a year; it’s now about £4 or £5 billion a year, including everything, including this. So it’s quite a lot. But the story I’ve told every evening is, actually, I thought that was a lot of money until I discovered how much Terminal 5 at Heathrow

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cost to build. At £4.3 billion, just for that Terminal, it kind of puts these sums into perspective. It is a lot of money, but it’s not absolutely huge. And so we have to make the best use of it. So the first chunk of that money coming to Hertfordshire, which is coming to Stevenage - £145 million, including £12 million for information and communication technology - it gives you some idea of how important government regards ICT for the future, and that it has a ring-fenced amount of getting close to 10% of the total, specifically for that infrastructure and hardware for information and communication technology. So, it’s a pretty exciting opportunity really. It’s an exciting opportunity, but it’s also a burden, isn’t it? Because we have to get it right for decades and generations of children. The schools that were built 40 to 50 years ago are still functioning as schools; they have served generations of school children, generations of staff. If we’re going to spend equivalent sums that were spent post war on building over the next ten year period, the onus is on us, and by us, I mean all of us, in a sense, to get that spending right. Because if we do it wrongly, or we don’t spend the money wisely, or not in the best way, then we’ll be doing a disservice to lots of people coming in the future – not just ourselves. So that’s a fairly heavy responsibility, I think. Now, you wouldn’t expect government to hand out hundreds of millions of pounds without quite a lot of bureaucracy and red-tape attached to it, and there certainly is, in terms of building schools for the future. We have to get three sets of documents approved by central government in order to get the money. The first one we submitted in April, the second one we have to submit around September/October and the third one, called an outline business case, next March – March of next year. And only then are we allowed to begin what’s called procurement. That is the process of going to the market to find a private sector contractor who will actually build the buildings, provide the ICT and so on. And that process, that procurement process, is covered by European Directive process, so again, it’s a lengthy and bureaucratic one that lasts, as you can see, a good 18 months. So, we wouldn’t expect to begin building work, you know, putting a spade in the ground, or whatever happens, until the end of 2009, possibly the start of 2010, depending on how smoothly that process of getting a contract in place with the private sector, how smoothly that goes. So that’s a couple of years’ worth of work before we start building. And then, of course, the building process will take how long it takes, depending on whether we’re building a completely new school, whether we’re remodelling an existing school, depending on what we’re doing – that’s probably another 18 months, so we’re talking about completion of the first buildings in time for perhaps the September 2011 academic year, which is four years away, isn’t it? So, if any of you have got children who are within four years of the end of schooling, then they will have left before this happens. And the building work will be spread out. So the first completions might be in 2011. That process of finishing build and buildings will probably go on, I should think, and I’m speculating here, because until we have the private sector contractor on board, and discuss programming, I can’t be precise, but I would have thought it’s probably, the completions will spread out over a couple of years. I doubt whether the whole thing will be finished until 2013. So, it’s not going to happen, kind of, Tuesday week, okay? I think that’s important that we get that message really. I’ve talked a lot about buildings and money and investment and so on, but it’s actually not primarily about that,

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and you’ve got all this on the slides, of course, because the buildings are only a means to an end. This lovely primary school here is only a means to providing the children who come here with a decent opportunity to learn, and teachers a decent opportunity to teach, and so on. The buildings are about that. And they can help that process, and they can hinder that process, but they’re by no means the main factor, which is the staff and the relationships that students have with staff – those are the most important things. But I do think good buildings can help and I do think poor buildings can hinder. And government thinks that which is why it’s investing so much money. But the starting point is that learning and teaching process isn’t it? That’s what we have school buildings for. We don’t build lovely buildings and then think, oh, we’ve got a lovely building, let’s put some children in it and have a school. It’s not that way around, is it? And so, what we try to start with is the vision for education, rather than the buildings. So we talked to schools, actually across Hertfordshire, not just in Stevenage, but across Hertfordshire, and other stakeholders, to draw up a vision for what we think the future of education should include. And I don’t think there’s anything here that anyone would probably argue with: a focus on excellent teaching and effective learning, commitment to raising attainment, raising aspirations, participation and so on, schools which lead and serve the community, with public services built into them, a commitment to promote healthy lifestyles, active participation in sport, the ability to offer a diverse range of specialisms, including vocational ones; I mentioned the importance of ICT earlier, and of course, light, attractive and flexible buildings. Flexibility is very important because if we’re designing for the next 40, 50, 60 years, who knows what developments will take place? Who knows what the palm top, that used to be the slide rule, will have evolved into in 40 to 50 years time? Who knows what kit we might need and what sort of spaces and buildings we might need to accommodate the new technology? I don’t think people do really, which is why we have to be as flexible as we can. That was the vision. Now, what do we need in order to deliver a vision like that in Stevenage? We need some more consultation with stakeholders, and we came up with a few. This is a small number of main points. Most stakeholders agreed that we needed fewer, larger main stream schools with larger sixth forms, able to offer more specialisms, big enough to be efficient and flexible and all of that, but small enough to support relationships that I’ve talked about between pupils and students and staff, closer links between main stream and special schools, even closer links between the schools and North Herts College, and I say, even closer links, because, I think, Richard, you would probably agree that the links are very good at the moment, but they can always be further developed, and we plan to develop them further. And improve facilities at the Education Support Centre, which is a small centre for children educated out of school that is in very unsuitable, mobile accommodation on the edge of a primary school site, although they’re secondary aged pupils. So we need desperately to do something about that - a really important priority.

PD Hello. So, why do we need this area review then? Well, as Lindsay’s talked about, this investment is the means to an end. It’s about enabling and facilitating the delivery of that vision. But it’s important that, although we’ve got this once in a lifetime opportunity here in Stevenage, that we invest that

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money as wisely as we can. We have to plan for the right number of places and it makes sense to plan for them in the right places, as well, while we’re doing it. So let’s have a look at what’s happened so far. We started talking to people in January of this year; we’re starting to engage those stakeholders Lindsay talked about who were head teachers, both secondary, primary, special school heads, representatives of all of their governing bodies, the college, local borough councillors, County Councillors and such like, and the key players in the education service within Stevenage. And we talked to them about that vision for Stevenage. What aptitudes and requirements would young people have in the future? What sort of provision might be necessary to deliver that? And they came up with a long list of possible ways for organising provision in the future. We took that list away and we evaluated them against four tests, which were developed by our Director of Children, Schools and Families, to make sure that they were robust enough to deliver what we were talking about, and I’ll come back to those in a sec. He then decided, after looking at that evaluation, which of those options he wanted us to come out and talk to people like yourself, to see what you had to say about them. And this meeting, as Lindsay and Jane have said, is the last of the public meetings in Stevenage… last but one. And the consultation period finishes on the 7th August. Now, let’s just have a quick look at those four tests. I won’t read them out, but they’re fairly holistic; they talk about standards, they talk about places, they talk about transition arrangements and such like. Obviously, the BSF programme provides that opportunity for building design and cost to be dealt with. In terms of main stream schools, there is a changing pattern of demand in the town already; it’s something we know about and something we want to use the BSF funding to rectify. The government says that we need to plan for about ten years ahead when looking at BSF investment. So in 2017, we believe that we’ll need about 48 forms of entry. And a form of entry is 30 children into a year group. That 48 forms of entry though, includes a margin for parents to express a preference for a school other than their local school, and to cope with any changes that might have occurred that we haven’t foreseen. We know that the places that are provided by the schools at the moment are unevenly distributed. We’ve got schools of different sizes across the town and we’ve got schools next door to each other, while we’ve got areas of the town without schools. I’ll show you that in a moment. Clearly, the recent housing along the eastern side, the north-eastern side and here, where we are at Great Ashby, have changed the shape of the town, and therefore, changed the pattern of demand for secondary school places. And while we’re at it, we just need to acknowledge that as and when the major development west of the A1(M) comes along, there is already agreement for school provision to serve that community when it happens. That’s the map of Stevenage. You probably know the town even better than I do, but that’s the west of Stevenage that I was talking about. There are some projected fairly large, new developments around the north; clearly there are other infill developments in the town as well. We’ve identified a site in the north of the town which we could put a secondary school building on, and the reason that we’re looking at that is because you will notice by this map, that there’s a whole area here that doesn’t really have local secondary school provision. And we know from our experience and our dealings with parents that there’s a degree of frustration that parents here can’t get into

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schools which they consider to be their nearest and preferred school. What we have, in talking about that pattern, we’ve got a couple of schools here that are, in fact, side by side. Their sites join together. And we have a couple of schools in the south where at the bottom of their sites, they do virtually that as well. So we’ve got a rather strange pattern of schools that probably served the town very well when the town was built, but because of all the new housing and the changing shape, isn’t quite meeting the needs of the people who live in the town now. Now, we’re at a general meeting tonight; quite often we’re in a school where we have a specific proposal, say, for a closure or a significant change, so I’ve no idea which schools you’ve come to with an interest in. But let’s have a look at the main stream proposals first. Our first proposal, and let’s be clear about that, that’s the County Council’s preferred proposal, is to establish a pattern of eight form entry schools. And they’re the schools that we propose to be those schools and you will notice that what we’re proposing to do is move Thomas Alleyne School – that’s one of the two schools in the north, which I said was side by side, across to the site north of Great Ashby, so that we’re redistributing the existing schools and expanding them at the same time. As Lindsay said earlier on though, that vision is for fewer, larger secondary schools, and under that proposal, one school would need to close, and our proposal is that that’s Heathcote School and that’s one of the two schools in the south of the town that are virtually side by side. So what we’re trying to do is end up with a pattern of fairly evenly distributed schools as much as the sites will allow. We do have a second proposal in the document which you, no doubt, have seen, and that’s really a fall back position, because we have two sites; clearly the site in the north of the town doesn’t exist as a school at the moment, and we can’t buy a site until we know whether we’ve got the proposals through, and it’s a bit of a chicken and egg situation. But we wouldn’t have come out to consult you on that if we weren’t confident that we could pull that off. But because we don’t own it at this point in time, we just have to acknowledge that there is a very small risk, and if something goes wrong with that, then we need to know, well, what would happen if we couldn’t acquire that site? In that situation, we would need also to close Thomas Alleyne School, and the other schools would, therefore, have to be bigger to make up the places that we would lose there. In the middle of the town - Marriotts School - the school buildings aren’t really good enough to extend. The road network into that school is not very good. Therefore, if we were to expand it, we would need to rebuild it and open up a new access in the south. We need a bit of additional land for that. The same situation applies – we don’t own it yet, we’re reasonably confident that we can do that, but if there are any problems with that, then that school would need to close and the remaining schools would need to be bigger. So we’ve got a pattern of fewer and even larger schools, with two schools, either/or, depending on which site, if it should ever come about, we end up with a problem over. The important thing to remember too for BSF though, is this is about secondary aged pupils within the town, whether they’re main stream pupils, or whether they are special school students. So we have some proposals for the three special schools that cater for secondary aged children in the town. The Lonsdale School, which is the school for children with physical and neurological impairments, our proposals are that the school can either stay where it is on its current site, or benefit from BSF investment to bring their

Appendix 1B(i)

buildings up to modern day standards. Or the school could consider relocating onto a main stream school site. We’ve named those two sites because they are the sites that will be big enough to allow that to happen. The Greenside School, which is the school for children with severe learning difficulties, is quite a good school building. It’s just not big enough for the numbers of children in it, really, and it’s more conducive to the primary aged children than the secondary aged children. So our proposal is that we build some more accommodation alongside the Barnwell School, which will be the school in the south, and allow the primary aged children to spread out in the existing buildings. So it’s still one school, but with primary and secondary accommodation for it. Now, the Valley School is the secondary school for pupils with moderate learning difficulties, and we’re very conscious that some of those have some other more complex needs as well. And you will notice here that we’ve not identified a preferred option, but there are a range of options that we feel can provide for those children. And what we really genuinely are wanting to do is to get your views about those different options, so that when the County Councillors come to take their decisions, they’re fully informed and they know what you think about them. So the first… as with Lonsdale School, is the school could stay on its own site, and it could benefit from BSF funding. We’re not suggesting that it necessarily needs to be exactly the same as it is, because we don’t expect any school not to develop over time. So there may be all sorts of exciting things in the school’s vision for the future that they could do on that site, but they could stay there and benefit from investment. They could also, like Lonsdale, relocate onto one of those two school sites, the main stream school sites, and co-locate. And what we mean by that is, not to destroy the special school’s identity – it will be the special school in buildings, clearly identified and for them, but it will allow, where appropriate, on a child by child basis, for some sharing of facilities or experience in certain subjects where it suits those individual children. Another way of dealing with it could be to say, well, look, the Valley School is still an entity; all of the children remain on the roll, all of the staff are the staff of the Valley School and they’re a professional entity that concentrate on the needs of children with moderate learning difficulties and their other needs. But those children are based in main stream schools, and that teaching staff and management staff take responsibility for what happens for those children within the main stream schools, and works alongside the main stream schools, to make sure that their needs are met. But there is a clear professional focus on the needs of those children within the town. And finally, an option could be to close the school and open up special needs units for, say, up to 30 children or more, depending on which of the proposals we end up with, and that those children’s needs are catered for within the main stream environment, but with the support from a special needs unit within the school. Now, for those of you here who are parents, and also any of you who are staff or governors, you may be interested on the transitional arrangements because, quite clearly, they are important issues. First of all, in terms of any building plans or work we plan to do, we want people to be involved in developing those school projects. This is about making provision for the school community, and we clearly want the school community to be involved in those future developments. Any work that we plan to do, we will seek to minimise disruption. We know that building work is disruptive; we can’t get

Appendix 1B(i)

away from that, but because we know that, we can plan as carefully as we can to minimise that disruption. But, clearly, where we’re building new school buildings, we would build the buildings first and then move the children and staff into them once they’re complete. For those schools that might close, we’re very conscious that that’s one of the most difficult decisions any local authority would make; it’s something that would need very careful and sensitive handling, and we would want to work very hard with parents and staff and the governors and management of the school to make sure that everybody can be confident that while the children there remain there until the school’s closed, that everybody had confidence in the quality of the teaching and learning that went on there during that period. Now, for staff, we want them clearly to be involved in those transition plans because they understand the needs of the young people in their schools, and we want them to be involved so that they feel part of the exciting developments within Stevenage for staff as well. We want to be clear that this is a whole town development, and just because, for example, a major proposal for change, a closure proposal affects staff in one school, all of the head teachers have signed up to supporting all of the teachers in the town to make sure that they can continue where they want to, to continue to working towards this project that we’ve got going in this town. The Authority’s well versed in supporting staff through redeployment processes; the last one’s we’ve done, we’ve had 100% success in making sure that any member of staff, who wanted to continue to work, could do so. It’s in all of our interests to retain the staff that we have, and to allow them to develop into the future within this town. Now, for the students, we want them to be involved too in those transition plans, and for you parents here – if your child has to move school, because of any of these proposals, and has to acquire a new uniform, the County Council makes a financial contribution to that, and we’ll get the school involved to order in bulk so that there are some economies of scale. And they’ll talk to you about sizes and things like that, and then provide you with some key items of uniform. So, let’s just have a look at how that decision making process will happen. As we said, this is the public consultation phase, and we really do want to hear what you say, so there are a variety of ways there in which you can let us know. And it’s important you do; it’s not just us, but it’s clearly the decision makers who are the County Councillors. What we will do is we’ll collate all of your responses; we’ll distil the key issues and debate those for the County Councillors when they come to make those decisions. But I want you to know that each and every one of your contributions will be made available so that all the County Councillors can read them first hand. There’s nothing like reading your words for themselves to tell them how you feel. So, this public consultation phase, as I say, finishes on the 7th August. Our job is to present your views back to the County Councillors; first of all at a meeting of the Education Panel on the 3rd October, and then on to the Cabinet of the County Council, which is the decision making body that meets on the 15th October. And both of those meetings are open to the public so that you can come along and see and hear what happens. It’s not a public meeting, so you can’t go along, like tonight, and engage in the debate, although we do allow schools to select/elect a representative to speak directly to the Panel and Cabinet on the day. If the Cabinet decide to move forward with any of the proposals, and they’re significant proposals which, by law, require us to take further legal

Appendix 1B(i)

action, we have to publish what are known as statutory notices – they’re notices in the local newspaper; they will tell you exactly what the County Council proposes to do, by when, and what the transition arrangements for students will be, attached to that proposal. They sit there for a period of six weeks, during which any of you have a right to object. And if anybody objects, we then have to refer that back to the Cabinet and they have to consider those issues before they take a final decision. Now, the final decision making process has changed since we published this document, and the final decision now takes place by the County Council’s Cabinet, and that meeting is likely to take place now in January – I just wanted you to know that shift in date. So, this is the part where we stop talking to you and, hopefully, engage in a useful conversation about those proposals, so we hear what you have to say. Thanks.

JW This is the open part of the meeting, and we will run for as long as you have questions, essentially. If we haven’t run out of steam, we will close by nine o’clock, but I think you’re going to find it hard to keep going that long, but maybe not. When you speak, I would like you to speak into a microphone because we are recording it, and these meetings are being transcribed and they’re all being put up on the website so that people can read them. I think you can also get copies, probably, if you want them. This is part of the fair and proper manner in which the whole consultation is being run. So, without more ado, has anybody got a question for Lindsay or for Pauline?

MF1 Hello. I’ve got lots of questions, actually. I don’t know if you want them all at once, but I’m wearing several hats because I have got a child at John Henry Newman’s, and he’s getting on very well. I’m a farmer; I actually farm the land which you’re planning to build the school on, and I didn’t know anything about this until… I’m not the owner; I’m the farmer… but anyway. So I have reservations about that, and I’m also the chairman of Weston Village School, the primary school in Weston. And so I have questions about how that will affect where the children from Weston go. Is that suddenly going to be the nearest school to Weston, and how will that work? That’s question 1.

LM Okay. The owner of the land is some kind of off-shore company that we’re negotiating with. I don’t know a great deal about that, because our land agents are obviously dealing with that, but I’m sorry if you didn’t know about it. When we did this meeting here last week, we did have a number of parents from the primary school as well as the parish clerk and they asked some questions about that, because at the moment, that school seems to go to, or be linked to Knights Templar in Baldock. And if and when we build this new school, it will be within the parish, and it will be nearer. So what I said I would do, and what I have done, subsequently, by sending stuff and messages to the school, is I said, I would be happy to arrange a meeting at the school for parents to find out what they’d prefer to do, whether they would like to continue primarily to look towards Knights Templar, or whether they would like to look towards the new school, because the admission laws work on distance. But we also have priority areas, and my guess is that if we don’t do anything to the admission laws at all, and they’re right on the new Thomas

Appendix 1B(i)

Alleyne site’s doorstep, they’ll all get into that school if they want to, other than siblings who’ve got existing sibling connections, but that’s not normally used more than half of the intake. So… and Weston is not a very large primary school.

MF2 I hesitate to intervene because it’s just from my previous knowledge; I used to be a County Councillor. Weston is part of the Knights Templar priority area; therefore people from Weston would get into Knights Templar as a matter of course, providing there was room, but not in the Stevenage priority area. Therefore, everyone in Stevenage will get into this school before anyone in Weston got in, unless you move it into a different priority area.

LM Yes, a lot of them do. So it will be, in that sense, mixed. But my view is that if parents very clearly want to go to their local school, because providing places in local schools is our general policy, and what your local school’s change is, then I think we should reflect that in a change in the priority area, if that’s what the people want. Now, we consult about the admission laws annually, anyway, so there isn’t a particular problem about that, but what I’ve said to the head, is that I’d be happy to go to a meeting of parents there and see what parents want to do – find out what people want.

MF1 Okay, well just carrying on from that, is that the only site you have ear-marked for…?

LM Yes, it is.

MF1 its unfortunate there wasn’t provision when Great Ashby was built for a site in the Section 106 agreement. This school isn’t big enough.

LM I agree. I know. The Section 106 money went, of course, towards the provision of this school, the move of rebuilding this school, didn’t it?

PD Well, that’s interesting. The developments and the deal that the 106 arrangement that dealt with this, was negotiated about ten years before this school ever materialised; in fact, any of the buildings materialised. It took an awful long time for this development to come about. It was one of the very first negotiations, and in fact, what we got for this school was the land, but no money to build the school. And those of you who know this school will know that what we did, was we moved the school from another part and we sold that site, and that money helped to build the school, because we got the land free. And at that time, there was no provision for a secondary school site. You will appreciate that in order to negotiate for developers’ contributions, you have to first demonstrate that you don’t have enough places in the local area, and at that time I don’t think that was possible to do. And secondly, you have to demonstrate that there is a demand large enough to require a whole new secondary school, and the land and money to go with that. And if you work on our very general rule of thumb, that a thousand houses equates with a form of entry, if you look at the sort of size of schools that we would want to be creating at secondary level, there’d need to be 8,000 houses to support a new eight FE secondary school, and you know that this development is nowhere

Appendix 1B(i)

near that. So it just wasn’t conducive at the time. And it’s also an awful lot of land to set aside out of a development, as you will appreciate, especially for a secondary school.

LM Obviously, our land agents did look at site availability in the whole area and that was the only one that they came up with that was likely to meet town planning requirements, and be potentially available for sale. They did do a search, of course. Because it’s not the County Council’s policy to build in Greenfield sites, unless you can’t build it anywhere else.

MF1 My next question is, how will you get access to this site from all of Stevenage, because… Is that going to need to be a new road developed? And will it enable more houses to be built having… will it be a Trojan horse? Sorry, I speak parochially as someone who lives in Weston, and it’s all green-belt land – I do know from experience.

LM It is. This question came up last week as well from neighbours, I suspect, of yours, probably in Weston. And what I said was, of course, we’re not the housing authority, we’re not the planning authority, except for our own services, so North Herts district council is the planning authority and the housing authority. So in that sense, I’m not qualified to comment. However, on a sort of personal, common-sensical, lay-person’s view, almost, I suppose - because I am a lay-person where, as far as housing and town planning are concerned, is that once you’ve got a school, especially that’s attractive, it, well, in my mind, it’s likely to make the development of housing around that school more attractive to a developer, I would have thought. But I’m not the planner.

MF1 Sorry, just on a nosy point of view, does… you move Alleyne’s, presumably that’s a very valuable site in the old town to… which you can then develop yourselves?

LM Well, we need that site for the enlarged Barclay School which is next door. Barclay School is going to increase, as the others would, to eight forms of entry. It can’t expand on its existing site to that size, it isn’t large enough. We would use the Alleyne site, which would largely be in terms of the playing fields because the listed buildings at Alleyne’s would continue to be used for another purpose as they’re listed buildings. We would probably demolish the accumulation of buildings that are not listed and that wouldn’t be needed once Barclay School was being rebuilt, and the rest be used as playing fields. So, the site actually wouldn’t be sold at all, other than maybe, we might sell the listed buildings for alternative use or something like that. That’s quite a small part of it.

MF1 If I was a student, I’d rather be at Alleyne than out in the country, in terms of nipping off down the High Street for lunch or…

LM Well, in that sense, yes. But, as Pauline will tell you, an increasing proportion of…

Appendix 1B(i)

PD Yeah, about 80% of the year seven and eight students in Thomas Alleyne live in Great Ashby. And a fairly high proportion in other year groups, obviously the lower age ranges, well, there will be more, because of the rate of development here. So a fairly significant proportion of the students already live in this part of the town. That has an issue for parents who don’t live in this part of the town, I’m sure.

MF3 Does this similar large proportion go to Barclay School from the Great Ashby area? If not, has there been a policy of sending people from Great Ashby to Thomas Alleyne School?

PD No. I think that I’d need to check some data before I answered that question. I’m not going to make it up just because you’ve asked me that question. And I’m sure that some children from Great Ashby also go to Barclay School. But my understanding is that one of the reasons why students from Great Ashby end up in a variety of schools, and have ended up in Thomas Alleyne School, is because they can’t get in to what they perceive to be their nearest, or most desirable school, and therefore, they get their second, third preference, or even get written in to a school that has some places available. And because we’ve got two schools close together, obviously, the potential is for there to be more places than are necessary in that particular part of town.

LM The chances are that because they live in Great Ashby, they’d be further away from the schools than somebody living in Stevenage, so they’re less likely to get in.

MF3 Yes, with the two schools being next to each other, you would have thought they would attract the same proportion.

LM They may attract similar proportions overall, but the more the school with the large number of first preferences, more people nearer to the school are going to get that school, because it’s more popular. If you’re less popular, then people from further away can get in because there are fewer people nearer than you who want to, and that’s probably why more people from Great Ashby go to Thomas Alleyne’s which, as it happens, has fewer preferences than Barclay.

PD And it has a knock on effect, of course, because once one child in a family goes to a school, then their siblings will follow on and it starts to build up from there.

MF4 Thank you. Just because we’ve talked about the site, and the site is one of the things I have an interest in, I thought I would jump in. But just before I do, I think the 240, the eight form entry seems, to me, to be a sensible size to get a decent sixth form, and the north of Stevenage desperately needs a local school because the number of people I’ve talked to don’t get their first preference. And any school that’s the first preference of anyone who lives here, they won’t get in to because they live too far away from all of the schools. It’s desperately important that we have a local school,

Appendix 1B(i)

I think. But I’m worried about the site. I think, ideally, the site is within the community, not outside the community – I mean, both from the point of view of the kids getting to the school; riding, walking to the school, not having to drive, but also for the community itself. The secondary school can be the centre of community life if it works well, and I think that will become even more so. And it looks as if it’s stuck out on one side and not surrounded by the community, and what I wonder is, is why it isn’t possible, as part of the new development, because there’s another 3,000 houses going to be built, and I guess, you’re guessing that a lot of them are going to go in that patch…?

LM This is a town planning [unclear]. That patch of green there is going to see development, but that’s only the town planners’ feeling of course.

MF4 I appreciate that, but if we’re going to have a new school up here, ideally it would be in one of those green patches, not stuck out on the edge, and in the Greenfield’s site. So, I just wonder whether it isn’t possible to negotiate with the developer that you’ve got, so that their contribution is to provide a site at the same time that they’re providing houses, rather than hopping to a [unclear]

PD Well, there’s a challenge to that, because that housing, A, hasn’t been determined, has it? It’s part of a plan that’s to last until at least 2021; it’s all still to play for, and as I said to you before, if I can just show you, it’s this area here that there’s a vast majority of people that don’t have a local school. There are already over eight forms of entries worth of children just living in that patch there. [unclear] [over talking] As a school place planner, I would dearly love to be able to start with a blank sheet of paper and to put the schools where I think they should best go, but it’s the landholdings – there isn’t a plot of land that big in the middle of that community. We have to work with what is available and what is possible and we’ve had our professional teams trawling all the plots of land, and that’s the best they’ve been able to come up with. I hear the point and I understand the point. In an ideal world, I would prefer it to be grounded more within the community, but that’s just not possible.

MF4 We’re not talking about an ideal world, [unclear] but this is the future and we have to get it right, as Lindsay said, but sticking the site out here because it’s the only place you could find, I think we should try and do better, I’m sorry, I’m not being [unclear] Yes, because in addition to that, you mentioned earlier that, and this gentleman here said, access roads etc to that new school, and I thought you kind of washed over that a little bit, but it’s not your responsibility. In this world of, kind of joined up thinking and so on, would you not talk to the relevant authority to make sure that the roads are right before we…?

LM I didn’t mean the roads are not my responsibility; what I said is, the housing and town planning is not my responsibility. Providing the access road and making sure that works is, and we can only do that in conjunction with the town planners, North Herts District Council, which, of course, to whom we are

Appendix 1B(i)

already talking to. And, of course, the town planners in Stevenage, as well. Do you want to say something about the access road, Pauline, or not?

PD Personally, I don’t have the detail of what the access arrangements might be, but we’ve clearly got a professional team working with the highways authority, working with the town planning system, and are very well aware of the issues around that. So they are working on the solutions to that. And you’re right to raise it because access is going to be an issue. But they’re telling us that it’s an issue that can be dealt with.

LM That was one of the reasons for the choice of the site, in that both the local town planners and the highways authority had a view that this site, potentially, had the right sort of access. That was one of the reasons for the choice of the site. Now, as I say, I’m not either a highways engineer or a town planner, so in a sense, we take our technical team and their consultees' advice, and others may wish to argue with that, that’s our advice anyway. But we will be applying for outline planning permission on that site in due course, and obviously, the details will be provided as part of the normal consultation around town planning that would standardly happen.

MF3 Also, I’d like to raise my concerns about that new site on a safety issue. It’s rural and it’s away from the housing. I’ve got two daughters and if they went to that school, I’d be very concerned about them coming home after clubs or in winter weather from a site like that. I think it should be within the houses.

LM I take your point. I hear what you say. Again, that’s not that unusual a position that there are schools from which people have to travel to and from in rural areas, or areas that don’t look a lot that well lit and so forth. I entirely take that point, but I think, to be honest, the map shows it, I think. I simply cannot see a 25 acre space in the middle of that housing anywhere. You might put it around the edge, a different edge. You might put it around here, but within this housing… this is the area of housing concerned, there isn’t a 25 acre space in there.

PD But some of the places that look like you could, are actually quite heavily wooded and count themselves out by the topography, really.

MF3 With that amount of money, would it not be impossible to redevelop Dixon’s [?] in that industrial area to put aside within the community, that they could use?

LM I’d need notice of that, I think! Is there an industrial area…?

PD Oh, yeah. I know which area you’re talking about. And the difficulty is that they’re owned, and they’re working and such like. And if there were those opportunities, our teams would have been looking at it. But clearly, they’ve trawled all the area, they’ve looked at those issues and they haven’t been able to come up with it.

Appendix 1B(i)

MF3 It seems absolutely crazy that you’re looking at a future plan for a town, and yet you’re not prepared to go that little bit extra and put it in the area that people need it, which would serve all the people around it, where the school is not now.

LM I hear what you say. I don’t think it’s because we don’t want to make the effort. Obviously, we can’t create sites for sale that don’t exist. But if there is any possibility of another site either becoming available or being available, then our land agents will be very, very interested in that. Because it’s not that we don’t want to, it’s just that the advice to us is that there simply isn’t a site available, and can’t be created. But as I say, I’m happy to explore any options.

MF5 Something I would say on tape is you ought to talk very carefully to your land agents because it’s not that difficult to find how to find someone who would sell that land. I think if they ask the right people and ask the right questions at the right times, it wouldn’t be that difficult.

LM We’ll pass that on. Thank you.

JW If there’s anybody over here who I’ve missed who wanted to speak to the… Please carry on.

MF4 What I want to say is, we’ll be pushing 2,000 houses in Great Ashby with Burleigh Park by the time the two developments are completed. And we talk about another 3,000 on top of that, which is 5,000 which is the same number as that guy in west of Stevenage, where he was saying we’ll have to provide a school west of Stevenage, so we’re talking about pretty big numbers. When you look at where Nobel is, which is the place that people in Great Ashby have their eyes on most of the time, are trying to get into a school, I mean, Nobel covers quite a bit of that area that you’re talking about. What we’re really dealing with is the northern bit, rather than the bit just above Nobel which has Nobel as its local school. So those two new areas, as well, need looking at carefully – the two areas that you’ve coloured in as being possible development sites. We need to think about those as well.

LM Yeah, but Barclay School is there as well, and that covers a bit of it as well. But we’ve identified we need more schools. For 3,000 houses, we’re also going to need a site for a new primary school, I think. So we’re going to have to find another two hectares, or thereabouts, for a primary school site, actually. Yeah, we could. That’s a possibility, yes.

JW Now, gentleman with the microphone, do you have more? Is there anybody else who wants to speak?

MF1 Looking at the brown splodge on there, next to the green one, next door. If you put the secondary school site on the green one, there wouldn’t be a lot left for houses, but at the moment, if that is zoned for development, that seems far more sensible to put it there, and it’s bad luck for the developer if he can only get 400 houses in and not 1,000. But it’s still worth an awful lot

Appendix 1B(i)

more than farm land, so presumably, he’s happy. And it is within the designated boundaries within Stevenage, rather than this Trojan horse of your current site which will, I’m afraid, open up the land behind for development.

LM Yes, I guess [unclear] to green sites. That one would be in Stevenage…

MF1 [unclear] As you said, it’s inside the town and it’s fairly close to all of Great Ashby. And if it’s zoned for development, presumably it’s for sale now, just as the off-shore company that owns the other site is as well.

PD But as a school site planner, I would be expressing concern at having not only that school there, but John Henry Newman, I know it’s a Roman Catholic school, but nevertheless, a proportion of the people living in that new development will be Catholics as well wanting… we’d end up with two schools fairly close together there, and still all of this lot here not having a school near it too.

MF1 If you did it on the site immediately west of the where your current site is?

PD This one? Yeah.

MF1 What’s the difference between that and the brown one? I mean, that is obviously zoned for development; that’s a logical place to build a school, I’d have thought.

PD Well, I think, as Lindsay said, we’ll take your comments back to the technical team that have been advising us so that we can understand why it is there. They haven’t yet been advising that, then I assume there are reasons, but we will challenge them on that. Thank you.

JW Anybody else?

MF6 I’ve got a number of questions, but the first one is how guaranteed is the funding? What I mean by that is, supposing there was a change in government or something?

LM The money is ear-marked for the 2008/9 financial year, so I don’t think there’s likely to be a change in government between now and next April. So, although we don’t start building, the money is ear-marked in the 2008/9 financial year in the government’s expenditure.

MF6 So it’s technically spent by the government as it were…

LM It’s technically speaking, the 8/9 year…

MF6 [unclear]…per annum. Second question relates to the buildings themselves and the work that you propose to do. What have you done to

Appendix 1B(i)

make sure that anything that you build or any changes that you make are environmentally friendly?

LM Very little, at the moment, because we’re not quite at that stage yet. What happens is that we are doing the work necessary to secure the funding, which is ear-marked in the 2008/9 financial year, but has to be approved as a result of getting the set of documents I mentioned earlier, approved by government. In other words, government wants to approve our objectives and our aims for the project. They want to approve the distribution of the schools, the distribution of the places, the sizes we want the schools to be, and so on and so forth. They want to approve which are going to be new build, which are going to be remodelled of existing buildings; they want to approve all of that. Once all of that is done, we will go to the market next March or April, whenever it is, to get a private sector partner to form a joint venture company with the County Council and central government to deliver the building programme. Now, it gets interesting, as it were, when we get to the point of producing the specification against which the private sector contractor will bid. And the important thing is to get into that specification all the things that we want to see a bidder taking account of, like sustainability, environmental issues, reuse of materials, whatever it might be. So we will start work on that in about the end of October, beginning of November, through till March next, and then we will go to the market. We’ll issue the tender documents in about April and we’ll get the tenders in, and they’ll be evaluated and we’ll produce a short list, and all the usual process. We’ve committed ourselves, though, to a couple of things. One is to take on a firm of architects that specialise in standardization, because we’re conscious that all of these buildings, as I showed on that earlier slide, are of a similar type of construction; they’re all built within about, the original buildings, in about 15 years of each other of the same type. Therefore, a lot of the issues on remodelling, where that is to take place - not the new build, because obviously that’s new – but a lot of the issues in the schools that are going to be remodelled are going to be the same as each other, and we ought to get some economies out of standardizing some elements of that. It doesn’t mean all the schools look the same, or whatever. So we’ve got a firm of architects that actually worked on the Heathrow Terminal, as it happens, who will look specifically at standardization. We also have a commitment to sustainability. County Council has a commitment and the project team has a commitment to sustainability, and we have been talking to potential consultants, like Professor Alan Short; he’s a professor of architecture at Cambridge. He has, for example, just built a large central London higher education building which is entirely passively ventilated, no mechanical ventilation at all. That’s the sort of thing that we’re interested in and we’ve already talked to him about him giving us some consultancy about how we can do that, for example. So we have a lot of commitment to both standardization for cost effectiveness, and to sustainability. But we won’t start writing that as a specification until, I would guess, towards the end of October, beginning of November. So it’s early days yet.

Appendix 1B(i)

PD It’s also worth noting, for example, that the building regulations, the thermal and acoustic regulations, have changed even since this building was built. So the specification is being ratcheted up all the time, I would say.

LM For you who know what that is, we are required to aim for BREEAM Very good, and that is not a fantastic standard, actually. I mean, we’d like to aim for BREEAM Excellent, which is the Building Research Establishment’s measure of sustainability in construction. It is, in our view, it has some flaws, in that some of the rating is very difficult to achieve if you’re not building a new building. In other words, if you’re remodelling a building, there’s very little you can do about how sustainable the site is, i.e. where the site is in relation to public transport, all those sorts of things, which all go towards an overall rating. But all new buildings, we’re committed to that Very Good standard, at least. And we’d like to exceed that if we can.

MF6 Okay. On the same general subject, you may not be able to answer this now, but I think we should have some sort of guarantee from you that asbestos removal will be done in the summer holidays.

LM Oh yeah. We’ve always, so far, removed asbestos when the schools have not been in session, and we… Pauline? I think it’s true to say, because we’ve done quite a lot of that, obviously.

PD I’m going to contradict my boss here.

LM We have it on the tape!

PD Well, let’s be practical about this. Take a school that we’re not going to completely rebuild – we are going to build new blocks, we’re going to remodel whole blocks – we do take out asbestos in a variety of ways, but always under safe conditions. And in this sort of scale of refurbishments, we’re likely to be freeing up whole blocks and working on whole blocks, and therefore, containment and all of that will be much easier. But we have an excellent record and we have a specialist department dealing with all of that. And rest assured - it will be dealt with properly.

LM We do try to avoid it because I have to say that sometimes, following on from what my colleague says, seeing people walking around in white suits with stuff over… is a bit sceptic in primary schools – it’s a bit scary, so we do try and do that when, as little as possible when the children are around.

JW Is there anybody else who’s got…? No? Okay, carry on; I think you have the floor.

MF5 Is there any reason why none of the other options considered were put into the consultation document?

LM The options from the long list of discussion with stakeholders, for example?

Appendix 1B(i)

MF5 Yeah, you mentioned earlier that the directors of the BSF had presumably rejected a number of other options.

LM Yes. Do you want to say something?

PD Yeah. As I said, there were four tests there. Some of them were about, do the options provide the right number of places? And, quite frankly, some of the options didn’t meet that criteria, full stop. And if you’re not providing the right number of places, then it doesn’t work, full stop. In terms of buildings and costs, I don’t think that that was a key element, in that sense, because it’s for the further evaluation in terms of BSF that that would come through. They just didn’t stack up in relation to those criteria, and there weren’t that many of them, quite frankly, because there was, by and large, a fairly high degree of consensus amongst the stakeholders about the pattern and the size of schools, and things like that. So there were variations on a theme, I would say, more than anything else. And where they differed in some respects, it was simply about they just didn’t meet the right number of places.

MF5 You talk about proposals for main stream schools and there are kind of options in some of them, aren’t there? Where you’re talking about Marriotts School, or Thomas Alleyne School being moved, or one of them closing, etc. So, I’m a little bit confused about whether the Council are going to vote specifically on one of those options, or are we looking at them voting in favour, let’s say, of the overall principle of what you’re trying to do? And then there’s another consultation on whether Alleyne should close, or the Marriotts should close and so on. Do you see what I mean?

PD Perhaps I can clarify that for you. The County Council’s saying now to you, its preferred option is proposal 1 – that’s the eight FE schools, and the moving of Thomas Alleyne to the Great Ashby site, north of Great Ashby, and the closure of Heathcote School. That’s the County Council’s preferred option. In terms of the second option, and the options within that option, it’s still the same proposal, except that what we’re saying is, that if there’s a problem with any of the land, then one or the other of the schools will close. So, if it’s the problem with the north site, it will be Thomas Alleyne to close; if it’s a problem with the central site, it will be Marriotts to close. If we’ve got a problem with both sites, then we’re back to the drawing board. So, there aren’t options there, in that sense; it’s quite clear what would happen in those circumstances.

LM So basically, Cabinet will decide to either go for Option 1 or Option 2, as far as main stream schools are concerned. Well, they could decide to go for neither, they could say, we don’t like any of it. Go away. No change at all, because these are proposals to members for what should happen. They can always say no, of course, and sometimes they do, actually. But I think there’s usually a reasonable likelihood that they will choose one of the options under consideration. But they are deciding one or the other.

Appendix 1B(i)

PD We’ve been monitoring the responses as they come in, and clearly, we’re not at the end of the process yet. But people are clearly voting one way or the other. And this isn’t a referendum, as well, when I talk about voting – this is about people telling the County Councillors what their views are. We’re not just going to count them up and say, oh, well, they win because more of them say that, but it’s about the arguments and the rationality of the debate.

MF5 Well, we know very well that they don’t normally listen to what the public have to say in the consultations anyway, because it certainly didn’t on the junior schools, did they?

LM Yes, they did precisely listen, because they changed the proposal. The proposal was for one three form entry primary school in the south of the town, and what you ended up with, was a two form entry and a one form entry primary school in a federation with each other. So they did listen to the views of the people who said, no, a three form entry school is too large. And so then they said, okay, we’ll have a two form and a one form, but they’ll be federated. I think that’s listening, actually, because that’s certainly not where we started.

MF5 Okay, but they didn’t listen on Pin Green, did they? So, they didn’t listen on Pen Green.

LM No. I agree. They didn’t listen, they did decide to go ahead and close Pin Green. But over the years, about 30% or 40% of proposals over the last few years since I’ve been at the County Council, four out of ten consultations have resulted in some change from the original proposal.

MF5 Is the situation the same for the special schools, in terms of the question I asked before, about there being some options there? Is there a situation where the Council has got to decide which option to choose?

PD Exactly. So where we’ve articulated an option, then the County Council will have to decide, are they going to propose one of those or the other? You’ll notice for Greenside School, that there really is only one option there and the County Council will have to decide, do they want to go ahead with that or not?

LM Also, you will see there are two choices – retain it on the current site, or relocate to another school. And the County Council will have to decide which of those it wishes to do. Similarly, on the Valley School there are four options and the County Council will have to decide which of those four they want to go ahead with. Or none.

JW We’ve covered a lot of ground actually. I don’t know whether there’s anybody else? Please go ahead.

MF7 I’ve just got one thing. One of the things you propose is to put more specialisms into the new schools, which I find really good, but the problem I’ve had, is that I’m a frustrated parent who’s just been through the admission

Appendix 1B(i)

system; I wanted my son to go to a science specialist school, which happens to be my nearest one, which I didn’t get, and my appeal didn’t win, even though I wanted him to go to a science specialist school. Now, are you prepared to change the admissions process? Because if you’re not, putting a load more specialisms in, will be a complete waste of time because people won’t be able to get the one that they require.

LM Okay. I don’t think changing the admission rules is the way to deal with that issue, to be honest, because let’s say, there’s one science specialist school, and it has 240 places – an eight form entry school – but 300 people want a place there, then whatever rules we use, 60 people are going to be unsuccessful. It’ll just be a different 60 from the 60 the way the rules were before they were changed. There’s no way you can get 300 people into a school with 240 places, no matter what you do to the rules. So I don’t think that’s the way to approach the issue – because it is an issue and it is a problem, and I agree with you. I think there is another way, and I think that other way is to make specialisms in… and subjects and courses in schools available to people in other schools. And in fact, there’s quite a good level of co-operation between schools at the moment to enable that to take place. Richard, do you want to…? Richard is the head of Barnwell and, do you want to say something about how it works? Because I think it works well.

RD Yeah. I’m the head of Barnwell. What we’ve tried to do, I think, quite successfully, is develop across the town a 14 to 19 partnership, we call it, where students already go to different places to do work. Let me give you an example. We’ve got a new construction facility on our East Campus and next year’s students from Thomas Alleyne and Nobel School will be doing some of their options using that facility one day a week, as an example. But there are lots of others. I can just quote my school, but you’ll find lots of others elsewhere. I think, what we’re looking for is to have every school having a good quality minimum and sharing resources, because one of the issues that we’re conscious of is that, if you take sports as a good example, if you try to get the very best of every single thing at every school, the money wouldn’t go very far. But if everybody has a very good basic entitlement and minimum, you then can get some specialist facilities on one site, which are then shared, and they’re used full time, but by everybody. Another example at my school is the leisure centre we’ve got. Although it’s a very attractive option, we haven’t got enough children for it to be used every minute of the day between eight o’clock and five o’clock, which is when we’ve got it. So Heathcote School and Greenside School also use the leisure centre on our campus during the day so that, in practise, it’s used almost 100% of the time. So that’s the sort of way I think that the head teachers and the schools would like to go. And the other thing which is on the slide is that it talks about more specialisms, and schools are now going to be in a position to try and get a second specialism. And what we did when we first started is, we almost divvied up the specialisms around the town. So, rather than three schools who all want to be expressive arts, or three science ones, and then there isn’t one of something else, we decided to rationally share out the specialisms, so when we applied, it was one of each, as it were. There’s now more specialisms that you can apply for, so I think our aim is that we’ll divvy them up again, and so we’re

Appendix 1B(i)

covering the town with all the specialisms, or as many as we can, between us. Because if everybody’s got two, that spreads it better, and then the aim would be that we share some of the resources that we’ve got. So trying to aim to have a minimum good standard, and then share some specialist facilities which other children can use. And that’s something that we already do, both at key stage four and post 16, is that students go for half a day or a day to another school to use the specialist facility. So that’s the way we’re trying to do it.

JW Thank you. That was a very good and full answer, with some good examples.

MF8 Just a small comment, really. If that 14 to 18 partnership, and sharing of resources etc is working so well, why did the head teachers think that bigger schools is the answer, and not that structure that you’ve got in place? If you need to increase your sixth forms, if you’ve got two schools next to each other, they can just share.

JW That’s for…Do you want to…? I promise you I will redirect questions after this one!

RD As you may be aware, Barnwell is a school that’s grown and I think it is important that the size, that school Barnwell now is, and the other schools will become - although it’s bigger than what there is around in the local area - isn’t big by national standards. It’s a sort of typical size of school, nationally. Hertfordshire has lots of relatively small secondary schools and I’ve noticed a very big benefit for our students, both at key stage four and in the sixth form, by being that bit bigger, because you can offer more courses. Now, we as a school, because Heathcote School’s next door, have had a joint sixth form for a number of years. And that has given us a sixth form of the size of, between us, upwards of 200, which is great. And it means you can run courses which we otherwise couldn’t do. But what this does… the size we are now allows us to have a sixth form of perhaps nearer 300. Now, you don’t want it to be on and on and on, in that sense, but it does mean that you can offer, say, 25 or 30 different A levels, rather than 15 or something. And the other benefit is that if you offer more courses, you encourage more people to stay on at school. And one of the things which there’s still plenty of work to be done on is encouraging a bigger percentage of young people in Stevenage to stay in education, 16, 17, 18, and to go to university. So, I’m not advocating schools becoming enormous at all, I’d never do that, but I think the sorts of size which Barnwell now is, which is the size that’s proposed, does give the size to have a decent size sixth form, and still offer the chance for the schools to collaborate across the town. If I take A levels as an example, the sorts of subjects which struggle in Stevenage are music and languages, because in any one secondary school of the size we are, there aren’t that many children who want to do music A level, and there aren’t that many children who want to do French, German or Spanish, or whatever, A level, and it makes it very difficult to run those. So that sort of subject is where it benefits to offer somebody across the town, because you can get a [unclear] music group of 15 or 20 students who benefit, in fact, by being together rather than three or

Appendix 1B(i)

four of them, because they get the benefits of that. So that’s the sort of model I think works quite well, where every school’s got quite a lot of choice for students, and then some of the more specialist subjects, where you just struggle to run otherwise, you can then run across the town. So that’s the way we’ve tried to work.

JW Thank you.

MF3 I noticed on one of the slides, you mentioned about the Educational Support Centre, and that this site is not appropriate for secondary aged children, but there’s nowhere in the consultation where it actually mentions that. It’s a personal question; I was just interested.

PD No. And you’re absolutely right. And we say to the head of the Education Support Centre, don’t worry, we’ve not forgotten you. They need better facilities, let’s be clear about that. We all understand that and we have to find them for them, but we’ve got a bit of a property jigsaw going on here, haven’t we? And when the wheel stops spinning and we know what the proposals are, then we will fix the facilities for that centre. It’s not a reorganisation proposal in the sense that we’re not planning to close it, enlarge it, whatever; we’re simply looking for property to improve its facilities. So, we will be dealing with that, but we’ll be dealing with that when we settle the rest and we know what property, and where we’ve got land and buildings and can best meet their needs.

LM And it is small, for people who don’t know what the Education Support Centre is. How many pupils, typically, will it have?

JW 30 or 40.

LM No, it’s less than that, I think.

PD It’s less than that at the moment, and it should be aiming for even less because they’re really there to help young people, who have, sort of, come out of school for a period, to get back into main stream school. So, the idea is that they’re there to support them when they need them, but they are helping their transition back into main stream.

LM It should also be small, because there’s a development of a key stage four learning centre in Hitchin, so the ESC should only have key stage three aged children in it.

MF3 Right, so that clears that up. The only other thing I’d say was that, as everybody knows, I’m quite behind the whole idea of using this as an opportunity. My only worry and concern is that by being fixed to… you’ll have a couple of new schools, but lots of the other schools will be refurbished, and you talk about flexibility, and I would just really like it to be used as flexibly, because we are looking at a change, and if the footprint remains the same, we’re actually limiting the flexibility and the inhibitive way that we could use the sites.

Appendix 1B(i)

LM Yes, and you’re right. The remodelling will be extensive remodelling; we’re not talking about spending £2 or £3 million pounds, we’re talking of spending sort of double figures millions of pounds. And we’re not even necessarily talking about retaining that much of the existing buildings. If you take Barclay, as an example, as a listed building, so we will have to retain the listed parts of it, but my guess is that much of the rest will be rebuilt. So, even with Barnwell, I don’t know what proportion yet of the existing buildings, other than the leisure centre, we would keep, possibly not very much. We shouldn’t get the picture that all we’re doing with the buildings that are not brand new, is to, sort of, repaint them and tart them up a bit. Indeed, by remodelling and major refurbishment…

PD What the team are talking about, in some instances, is actually stripping the whole thing back to the steel frame and starting again, which means you can create whatever spaces you like within that, to meet the new requirements.

LM Almost! I mean, you are constrained by the steel frame, with columns, but other than that…

PD But other than that… and also, we’re expanding every school, and none of the school buildings are large enough for that expanded size. So, even though we are almost stripping it back and starting again, there will still need to be some other accommodation built new to support the extended size of the school.

JW Okay, thank you. No, that’s all right. We have time. If you want to use it, it’s your time.

MF8 Are there going to be any changes to the admission rules for Thomas Alleyne School, for people who won’t want to move schools half way through their education? Or are they still going to be allocated that place?

LM To move, they’d have already to be there. So the admission rules wouldn’t… I mean, we’re not closing the school and opening it; we’re moving it with its school community. So if they’re in year nine, then for the start of year ten, they’d simply start year ten in Alleyne School on another site.

MF8 Yes, but some people who are local to Thomas Alleyne may not want to do that.

LM Well, they can opt out, yes.

MF8 So will they have priority to join another school?

LM No. They won’t have priority. They’ll have the same right to a place in another school where there’s a place in the year group available. That is a legal right to everybody, all the time.

Appendix 1B(i)

MF8 But you also mention Thomas Alleyne not being full up, effectively. A lot of people go there who perhaps didn’t want to. Will there be any changes in view of the fact that they might not want to move?

LM No, I don’t think so. I think it very unlikely that we would change… well, there are some things that we can’t change because they’re legal entitlements. So, anybody has a legal entitlement to change schools at any time if there’s a place in the year group at the school they want to move to. And similarly, the receiving school doesn’t have the legal right to turn them down. So we can’t change that even if we wanted to – that will be standard. I very much doubt that we would do anything else, would we? Because the Thomas Alleyne move, in itself, is not a prescribed alteration, is it? It’s not a statute matter. The statute matter is the enlargement, but the actual move is not a legal change to the school; it’s not moving far enough. In other words, it’s within two miles, therefore that’s just considered a change of site. That isn’t a legal change to the school. What is a legal change to the school is the fact that we’re making it larger, but we could have been making it larger on its existing site, of course. So the move to a different site isn’t a legal change, so I wouldn’t have thought that we would have any grounds for changing the normal arrangements for people being at that school because it’s simply on a different site.

MF8 Okay. Is it two miles as the crow flies? I thought it looked an awful lot more than two miles.

LM Between the two sites?

MF8 Yes.

LM No, it’s not actually. No.

PD It’s just under two miles.

MF8 So you could walk it in 40 minutes? I’d be surprised.

LM Yes, it really is under two miles, I can assure you of that, if I can get there. I don’t know what the scale is. I don’t think we’ve put the scale up, have we? No, we haven’t put the scale up, but basically, there to there… I don’t know what… no scale, I’m afraid.

PD There’s no where in the town that’s much more than two miles away from anywhere, so…

MF8 I think it is.

PD Katie’s done the check. It’s just under…

JW I think you’re going to have to go and measure it.

MF8 I think I will.

Appendix 1B(i)

JW Go and check the measurements yourself. Okay.

MF8 Just one last… for the record. Can we get any guarantees that the buildings that are going to close, or be demolished, get a sufficient level of maintenance in the intervening years? I mean, my daughter already mentioned buckets catching drips, and in four years that could be [unclear] [over talking]

LM Yes. Sure. We’ve got a lot of schools not destined for closure where we have difficulty maintaining them totally. Yes. I mean, for example, the money that the school itself receives for general maintenance, called devolved formula capital, will remain exactly the same because that is a pupil based allocation. So, and that’s part of the funding formula for schools, so that will remain exactly the same as it is now. The schools are going to have exactly the same amount of money to spend on that purpose all the time until the changes take place. The only thing that we won’t do… we wouldn’t build a new block for some reason, for example, on a school that we knew we were going to demolish the buildings, and build a new one, because there wouldn’t be any point. So we wouldn’t do new initiatives, but we will maintain the funding to schools for the things that are the schools responsibility. And we will continue to do the repairs and maintenance things that are our responsibility, because there’s a split of responsibility between the local authority and the school. Some things the school’s responsible for, some things the local authority’s responsible for, and both we and they are committed… I’m sure Barnwell is, I’m sure we are. I’m sure all the schools are committed to maintaining all the buildings to an adequate standard during the run up to the main change. Yes.

JW Thank you. Right. Is there any…?

MF1 Well, it’s just a question of interest, really. How good is your demographic information when you choose…? You’re obviously planning ahead, and you’re saying in 20, 17 and this many years, or whatever, Stevenage is obviously a very unusual town; there was nothing much there until 1946 and wham! There it was – a big population bulge. And there’s a lot of houses in Stevenage now, full of very old people, and by 2017, who knows who’s going to be living there? I imagine it’ll be young families with young children, and rejuvenating these areas where they’re building these schools.

LM Yes, there is a turnover. And different places, as you say, have different demographic characteristics. As you say, Stevenage was a new town developed, built from 1948 onwards. And it is that kind of age. But we do have some fairly sophisticated demographic information and we have a full time demographer, somebody who is a professional statistician, whose job it is to do precisely that kind of thing. So we actually do two things – we do pupil forecasting, which is only five years ahead because it’s based on known live births that we… information from which we collect from GPs, and every GP sends us their registrations, so we can predict pretty accurately pupil numbers for five years ahead using that sort of real actual data. Beyond five

Appendix 1B(i)

years ahead, you have to do population forecasting, which is a slightly different thing, because you can’t do forecasts based on real children because they haven’t been born yet, obviously, for ten years ahead. So for that purpose, we use, as the government does when it does national population forecasting, you use a statistician to do that work, and obviously there are a lot of factors that go in to that. For example, the proportion of new estate type housing that tends to attract younger families and has a higher proportion of children, the more established housing areas is just one example of a piece of demographic sophistication that we would build into our forecasting.

PD And also, the people in the government who are responsible for building schools for the future have actually looked at our methodology and satisfied themselves that we know what we’re doing.

MF1 Thank you very much. And just one last question. I’m sorry, it’s slightly off piste but I understood that the Burleigh Park Section 106 Agreement was to give you, the local authority, £1.3 million towards primary school provision. And I think, in fact, it’s been notched up to something like £1,45 million now. But it’s again, with a rather parochial hat on as the chairman and governor of Weston School; we educate quite a few of the children from Stevenage – we are now full; I had to go to appeal to get my own son in. But that appeal process has resulted in it getting rather full, and is there any chance of having some of that money towards...? Sorry, we’ve got class sizes of 38 this coming September, we’ve got to do something. We have got a proposal which won’t cost an awful lot of money, but I understand there’s no money forthcoming from County Council.

PD Right. We have been working with your school, as you know, and talking about those needs. I will go back. I mean, it’s pointless me trying to answer the question without knowing the detail. I will go back and have a look at that for you. I know that from the County Council’s own resources, there isn’t the money to pursue that because we’ve, as a floor authority, we’ve been inconvenienced - is a mild term – about our capital programme, and therefore there isn’t cash to do that. But I will go back and take that point on board and have a look for you.

MF1 Because I don’t know… I mean, there was a proposal to spend £300,000 and I think our old head teachers were doing something about it. We have a new head and a new proposal and a much cheaper scheme, but anyway… I’m sorry to bore you all about it now, but I… [unclear]

PD We’ll pick that up off-line. I don’t blame you!

JW Anybody else with a wild question? No? I think we’re going to close the open part of the meeting and the recording part of the meeting, and if there’s anything you’d like to say, or discuss with Lindsay or Pauline now, then please do. And thank you very much. It’s been a really interesting, informative discussion. Thank you.

Appendix 1B(i)

Marriotts 1 19-06-07 

  Speaker key AP Andy PearyJW Jane WiltonLM Lindsay MartinKH Keith HuttMF Member of the FloorJD Justin Donovan  AP Right, we can make a start. Good evening folks. My name’s Andy Peary. I'm the Chair of Governors of Marriotts School. And [overtalking] County. We have Lindsay Martin, Keith Hutt, Justin Donovan and…

JW Jane Wilton.

AP [Unclear] the county. We'll go through a full presentation about the changes being [unclear]. And then open the talk [unclear] ask any questions if you wish. So without further ado, over to Jane.

JW Yeah. I'm going to kick off. Just to say, I'm not actually from County; I'm somebody totally different. I work with a company called Accent, and they are an independent market research company, and Hertfordshire County Council have asked us to facilitate the meetings, so that they're done in a fair and proper manner and make sure that your voices are heard, so to stress, I'm totally independent and that's why I'm here, which may mean something later on, when I'm trying to shut you up it won't be because I'm really wanting you to shut up, I'm trying to move to other people, but it won't be because I don’t want you to say what you want to say. Microphones, all of us. The reason for this is that we're recording all of these meetings so that they can be possibly, I think they might be streamed on to the website, but certainly there will be transcripts up of the meetings, and so everybody here will be speaking into a microphone throughout the evening.

JW The evening will start with a presentation, which will be led by Lindsay, first of all, and then after that we will go to an open session, where we'll have your questions, and then we'll close the open bit of the meeting by about 8:45, and that means that anybody who has got any individual concerns about their own children or circumstances can perhaps talk to the panel, or if you haven't had an opportunity to have your say, by then, you can pin one of them down and tell them what you think. So without more ado, let's pass on to…oh. Mobile phones could you please, if possible turn them off? If you need them on for baby-sitting purposes, then please do leave them on. But if you leave them on silent, they interfere with the recording. They make a buzz on the recording. Thank you.

Appendix 1B(i)

LM Hi. Thank you Jane. Welcome to this consultation evening. Pleased to see so many of you were able to get here for this evening. As Jane has said, this is pretty much the agenda for this evening. I'm going to do some introductions, I'm going to talk to you a bit about building schools for the future, which is the context in which this is happening, my colleague Keith is going to talk about why we need an area review of secondary school special school places, and what our proposals are, and then, as Jane said, the bulk of the evening is going to be your opportunity to make comments, ask questions, and so on. So. Who’s here? I have, on my extreme left, on your right, Justin Donovan, who is Deputy Director of Children, Schools and Families, Chief Education Officer; Keith Hutt, who has been part of the team working on the review in this particular town, because we have reviews going on in other parts of Hertfordshire at the same time. Keith has been working on the detail of the review here. I'm in the middle, in the school planning, and responsible for the BSF programme. And that's what I'm going to talk to you about. I don’t suppose any of you, any of us, who are old enough to remember what education looked like 100 years ago, or so, but this picture gives us some idea of what it used to be like, but some of you may remember a bit more recently some of the sorts of equipment that was around. Anyone remember slide rules? I do. But a calculator, you know what a calculator is, that's quite an early one. Four-figure tables? I can scarcely remember what they were for now. And these are what the buildings are like. This isn't this school. This isn't a school in Stevenage. It’s a school somewhere else in Hertfordshire. But they're all much like this; flat roofs, lots of window walling, a bit grotty really. A bit elderly. In Stevenage the ones were built between about 1954, starting in Barclay, running through to 1968 in The Valley School, with blocks obviously added on after that. But the original buildings were all built between about the early 50s and the late 60s, which means they're all nearly as old as I am, i.e. old. And getting increasingly less fit for purpose, increasingly difficult to deliver in them what teachers and heads want to be able to do. Schools can look like this. This is a model, not an actual school, but there are schools like this around the country, but you won't see any of these in Hertfordshire because we haven't built a new secondary school in Hertfordshire since 1975. But these buildings are possible. This is what a school can look like. And that's what the government’s major investment in secondary school buildings is all about. It’s a huge investment of central government funding in secondary schools and secondary age special schools. £2.2 billion a year, which is a huge amount. Well, I thought it was a huge amount, until I found what Terminal Five cost at Heathrow, which was £4.3 billion. But it’s still a very large amount. And the first lump of that money to come to Hertfordshire is coming to Stevenage, and it’s £145 million, which includes £12 million for information and communications technology, as a ring-fenced funding specifically for that, in recognition of how important to the future ICT is.

So that's the biggest investment in school buildings in Stevenage, indeed in Hertfordshire, for 40 or 50 years, since these schools were originally built. So that's a huge opportunity. It’s a once in several lifetimes’ opportunity to invest that sort of money for the benefit of our children. So it’s vital that we spend that money in the best possible way. Because if we make mistakes, if we get it wrong, we will have let down generations of pupils and teachers and parents

Appendix 1B(i)

and employers who could have benefited from better facilities than we have managed to deliver, so it’s quite a heavy responsibility. But it’s not, oh, sorry, and this is the time scale. You don’t expect to get hundreds of millions of pounds from central government without quite a lot of red tape attached, and there is quite a lot of red tape attached to this, and there are various sets of documents we have to get approved, various processes we have to go through, and we're not likely to start building work until late 2009, maybe even early 2010, somewhere round about there. With the first buildings being opened in 2011. It’s quite a long way away. This sort of scale of investment doesn’t happen overnight. But what I wanted to say particularly is that this is not just, this is not even primarily about buildings, because schools do a fantastic job in the buildings they have now. Patrick and his staff do a fantastic job in this building, despite its shortcomings. It’s not just about buildings. What it is about is delivering a vision for education. And we, as officers of the County Council, have been in discussion with the heads, with governors, with other stakeholders, throughout Stevenage, to develop a vision for the future of education, the future of learning, not just what the buildings should look like. In fact, and I'm sure Patrick will confirm, we haven't discussed in detail with him what the buildings will be like, yet, because we're starting with this; what the vision is for education. A focus on excellent teaching and effective learning, a commitment to raising attainment, schools, which lead and serve the community with a range of public services available in them and from them, a commitment to promoting healthy lifestyles and active participation, a diverse range of specialisms, including particularly vocational ones. ICT I mentioned the importance of earlier. So that we can provide more personalised study opportunities, and community access to learning programmes, and of course buildings that provide light, attractive, and flexible spaces. We're going to be building buildings for the next, hopefully, 50, 60, 70 years, who knows what education will look like in 50, 60 or 70 years? So we need buildings that are as flexible as possible.

What do we need, then, to deliver a vision like that? Well, the majority of stakeholders that we've worked with, so far, have agreed on these things. That we need a rather smaller number of mainstream schools, which are larger, with larger sixth forms, and more specialisms, big enough to be efficient, and flexible and offer a curriculum range, while small enough to support the important relationships there are between students and staff. They’ve agreed that we need closer links between mainstream and special schools, and we may want to come back to that later on. We can develop even closer links with North Herts College, that's been part of these discussions all along, the links are already good in Stevenage, but they can be even better than they are now, and we need in particular, improved facilities for the education support centre that provides for children out of school, which is currently housed in a double mobile classroom adjacent to a primary school, not really a very good idea, so we need to do something there. Okay, I'm not going to hand over to Keith, who will talk about the need for an area review.

KH Okay, well, the really exciting thing about all this is the vision that Lindsay was just talking about, and what we want to do to provide really high

Appendix 1B(i)

quality, 21st century education. And the really exciting bit is that we've got the money. We've got money to provide what we want to do, so our first reason for reviewing the provision in Stevenage is to make sure that we use the money we've got as efficiently as we can, and provide what we need to provide for the 21st century. And we need to make sure that we get the right number of school places, in the right places in the town. And at the moment the distribution of schools no longer matches where the population lives. It’s a long time ago since we built schools, and the spread of schools doesn’t actually fit what we think we need for the future. So that's what we've been thinking about. How can we invest this money really wisely? How can we make sure we've got school places in the right areas, and in the right numbers?

So we began last January, we started our review then, and we consulted a very wide number of groups and a wide number of individuals and took all their ideas about what we might do, and worked with them to think about what our vision for education for the future might be. And from that we got a long list of possible options, all the ideas that people had, and then we tested those against four tests that are on this slide. And from that the Director of CSF took, against those tests, the options that are presented to you now, in the consultation document. So the consultation document sets out for you what we believe is the best way forward for Stevenage and what we would like to deliver. And at the moment, of course, we're now out consulting you and there are lots of meetings like this, where we're getting feedback from people about what they think of our ideas. So the tests, the first one I already mentioned, that we have the right number of places where they need to be. It’s about educational standards. Buildings are not what deliver standards. It’s about the quality of the teachers, the quality of the curriculum, but of course if people have got high quality resources to use, and they're in really good buildings, it makes the job much easier, and it makes everybody feel much better, the whole ethos of the place is better, so it’s important that we keep that at the heart of what we're doing. We want to make sure that standards, which have been steadily rising in Stevenage, continue to rise. We want to make sure that all schools are equally good, performing to high standards. And that the buildings we've got, this building, for example, is a very inefficient building. It was built at a time when energy use wasn’t really much of an issue, so in terms of running costs it’s not at all efficient. In terms of educational provision, it's not very efficient. We can build much better buildings, much more efficient buildings, and much better suited to the way schools are run now, much more flexible buildings, for example. And the last thing on there, we need to make sure whatever we do we have appropriate arrangements in place to make sure that how we get from where we are now to where we want to get is as smooth as possible. There's bound to be some disruption, there's bound to be some anxieties on the way, and we need to make sure that we deal with those as best we can, and already we're thinking about those things.

So, talking about what we’re going to need, we need to think forward, the government expects us to think forward, at least ten years. So we're projecting to 2017, as you can see there, and we know that we're going to

Appendix 1B(i)

need 48 forms of entry. A form of entry is 30 children. So we're talking about 48 lots of 30 across the town. That includes, as you can see there, some freedom for parents to express preferences. The expectation is that most parents will choose the school nearest to where they live, but they may not, and we've allowed 10% surpluses to allow parents to have some options if they want. I've already said that places are distributed unevenly. We have two schools in the south. We don’t have a school, at the moment in the Great Ashby area, for example, and we've got a map to show you in a minute on that. So there is this housing development, which is steadily moving the population north. And lastly there's a new school that will be needed eventually once the west of Stevenage development actually takes place. That's not in these proposals. There are separate arrangements for that time.

So there's the current distribution of schools. I'm sure you know it very well. At the moment in the south, here we've got Heathcote and Barnwell, Barnwell West, and Greenside Special School. And over there there's Valley Special School. At the moment Barnwell is on a split site. So Barnwell East there. We've got the education support centre there, the school we're now in, Marriotts, there, and Nobel there. Lonsdale Special School and then Barclay and then Thomas Alleyne, although the writing’s a long way apart, the schools are next to each other, and John Henry Newman just over here.

So the proposals are that taking them in that way, we have eight forms of entry schools. The Barclay school would stay on its present site, but expand on to the Thomas Alleyne site, because it needs that greater space for that. And Thomas Alleyne School will be relocated to a new site, and you saw that on the previous slide, up here. So Thomas Alleyne moves, Barclay is expanded on to the site that the current two schools have. Nobel School to be expanded, again, to eight forms of entry, so new buildings to happen there. Marriotts, since we're in it, I'll come back to Marriotts in a second, because that's the most exciting, I think, of all our proposals. Barnwell School, as you know, it says at the bottom there, Heathcote School to close, because we have more schools at the moment than we need, and so the school that we're choosing to close is Heathcote, and we will expand Barnwell School, again across the two sites, so they sit alongside each other at the moment. So an expansion there. And then John Henry Newman, the Catholic school, also to be expanded.

Going back to Marriotts, the proposals for Marriotts that you will see in your pack are that we build a brand new building, brand new school, on this site. It’ll be on a different part of the site. These buildings would then be demolished and this will become playing field, and we'd have a new, really exciting building, probably towards the south of the site. So that's our ideas for Marriotts.

What you’ve just seen is what we want to do. They're our intended proposals, and that's what we're hoping to do. That's what we're consulting about. For technical reasons we also need to share with you a couple of other thoughts, and this is because, were we not to be able to secure some land that we don’t currently have control of, we would have to start the consultation process

Appendix 1B(i)

again, and I'll explain that to you. But this is very much a fallback position, should we not get what we expect to be able to get. So the problems might be…the piece of land we want to move Thomas Alleyne School to, on the Great Ashby site, is not owned by the County Council. We expect to be able to buy it. The person who owns it has already said that they're happy to sell it to us, but it’s still not ours, so we have to take into account that things could go wrong. What would we do were we not to be able to buy that site? So that's why the proposal is there. If that were the case, we would have to close Thomas Alleyne School. That's not what we intend, that's not what we expect to happen. The same is true for this school. We need to create a new access on to this site, and at the moment we don’t have control over the piece of land where we’d need to do that. Again, our expectations are, the indications are that we will be able to gain access. That's what we expect to happen. So this is very much a fallback position. Were we not to be able to do that, then we would have to consider closing this school.

MF Can I ask what the access is?

KH It would be from the southern end of the site, through off Six Hills Way. That's not what we expect to happen, and we can talk about the timetable of when we'll know for certain about that. So that's there just in case, and it’s important for you to know that. That's not what we expect to happen.

Just to think of the…we have three schools serving children with special educational needs, at secondary level, in Stevenage. One of our proposals is Lonsdale School, PNI school to be relocated to share a site with another school, and one of those sites is this one. The other possibility is Barclay School. That brings all sorts of exciting possibilities about how we might have a separate school on the site, but where some of the facilities are shared, and where children, students from each of the schools could, when it’s appropriate, work across the two phases, so it might be that children from this school could work some of the time in the other school, could use some of their facilities, and vice versa, but they would still be separate schools located on a shared site, so we’d get the benefits of them working much more closely together. They already work closely together, this school and Lonsdale, but they would just be physically much closer together, and there are lots of advantages to that. So that's a possibility. Issues about whether we can afford that or not.

We have a similar proposal for Greenside School, where the secondary part of that school located on the new Barnwell site, and again that would be a separate school, separate department, but actually sharing many of the facilities across the two schools. For Greenside, the primary children would stay in the buildings that they already currently have. The proposal for Valley school, which is the school for children with moderate learning difficulties, we’re genuinely not quite sure which way to go. There are various ideas about how we might move forward with Valley school. And so we're very interested to pick up as many ideas and people’s thoughts on this as possible. We could keep it where it is, leave it as it is. We could relocate it in the way that I was just talking about, so it shares a site with another school. Another

Appendix 1B(i)

idea is that although the children stay as part of that school, the children are actually located in mainstream schools, and the staff would go out into those schools to support the children. So there are various ideas there, and we're very interested to hear what people think about those.

I don't want to spend too long on this, but transitional arrangements are obviously very important. What happens while all this is going on? Because it’s fairly disruptive, so there's potential for unrest. What happens in the period, like now, where we're still consulting and people are a little bit uncertain about what might happen? So we're very conscious of those things, and we're working very hard; we've just come from a meeting with all the head teachers of Stevenage, for example, where we've been taking about some of these things already. But we will, obviously, make sure that everybody is involved as we go through the process, including parents and students. We will obviously plan things to minimise disruption. And we're very used to building. We've got 550 schools. We're not used to building on this sort of scale, in Hertfordshire, Lindsay mentioned it's 30 years since we built a secondary school, but we're very used to lots of building work going on in schools, and to organising things to minimise disruption. For this school, of course, it’s going to be great, because the school would carry on working as it is now, in these buildings, and when the new buildings are ready, the school will move. So in that sense the disruption will be pretty minimal for this school.

The arrangements for the closing school. Obviously there’ll be issues there. Unusually we're not closing that for any other reason it’s in the wrong place. It happens to be in an area we no longer need two schools. But we will be putting into place arrangements to make sure that the staff and the students move smoothly from the school they're in now to whichever school they're going to next. And we're already talking with staff about that at the schools.

Okay. I just said I came from a meeting with the heads of all the schools of Stevenage, and one of the great things about Stevenage is that all the heads are working very closely together, and have been doing that for many years now, not just with each school, but with the college as well, so they're very used to being one group of people. And they're very committed to Stevenage, not just their schools, but the education of people across Stevenage, and they share a collective view about their responsibility for all the students and all the staff working in Stevenage, and that's going to help us a great deal as we move from the situation we're in now to our new arrangements in the future.

So. How is it all working? Well, we're currently in this consultation period. And it's very important that you share your views with us, and if you do have views about how we might…what you think of our proposals, please make sure we get them. There is a form in the back of the booklet that you've been given. Once we've evaluated those, they go to the education committee of the County Council in October, and they will make a decision about which proposal they think should go forward, and you'll see that the final decision by the cabinet of the County Council is made at the end of this year. In terms of what will happen, in the longer term, it’s quite a long process, so although

Appendix 1B(i)

we're consulting you now, the funding for building schools in the future takes quite a long time to roll out, so the first school that opens through this programme is not likely to open until 2011. We're expecting it to open in the autumn of 2011. So that's the current time scale. There are quite a lot of hurdles we have to go to, quite a lot of bureaucracy we have to go through before we get the money and start digging in the ground and putting the first bricks down. So now it’s your turn. Over to you. Thank you.

JW Okay. Thanks very much. So now it’s over to you, as Keith was saying, to ask any questions, clarify anything that you want to. Can I just reiterate that we're recording, and therefore if you could put your hands up and Katie will bring you a microphone so that you can speak into it? And this is really important, because we want it recorded. I would ask you to be patient and not talk over one another. If you could stick your hand up and I'll try and come to you all in order, and take as many questions as we can throughout the next hour and a quarter or so. If we don’t need to stay that long, then we can close the meeting early if you run out of questions, but we'll just see how it goes. So who’d like to ask the panel a question?

MF Hello. What will happen to the children who go to Heathcote when it closes?

LM We will offer all the children in Heathcote at the time that the school closes, at the point of closure, a place in either one or two alternative schools. And I say one or two, because the number would depend on which of the proposals we have before you this evening goes through. But it will be either one or two other schools. Parents will know that in the autumn term of this year, and we will make it clear how that process would work. If it’s one other school, then all pupils will simply transfer to that other school. If it’s two other schools, we will run the normal admissions process, to allocate pupils to either one or other of the two schools.

MF What will happen to the teaching staff and what will happen to any future intake? So will you have less and less pupils as time goes by?

LM Well, at the moment we're in discussion with the school itself, Heathcote, about how that would work. What we can say is that we wouldn’t do anything that interrupts a child’s key stage. So we would guarantee continuity of key stages. Key stage three or key stage four. We are in discussion with the schools about how that would work, and with other heads around Stevenage to maintain staffing levels in Heathcote through a cooperative arrangement.

JD If I can pick up on staffing. It’s a key issue for us. The thing to bear in mind is that we're talking here about not a reduction in children, we've got the same number of children, in fact we're expecting a slight increase in children. So we've got the same number of kids, if we can, we want to hang on to as many of the staff from Heathcote as we possibly can, because, A, they're very good, and doing a great job, and, B, they know the children. We would love to keep that relationship going. So what we will do in the coming years; and we

Appendix 1B(i)

are talking here four or five years, so it’s a long way away. We will put in place a set of arrangements to try and convince staff to stay, and we think we can do that; not all staff, clearly, and there is some anger and frustration, but we think we can do that because if you're a young teacher or a teacher with a career ahead of you, it might sound a bit corny, this, but Stevenage will be the place to come in the coming years. There's nothing quite like this; a town, full of new schools, all working together at key stage four, and the sixth form, together with the college and with the university, so if you come to Stevenage, if you're a young person in Stevenage, in the future, you have a coherent progression route right through into university if you want. The nearest that comes to it, there are three schools that are trying to do something similar in Manchester, but not on this kind of scale. So that's the first thing; we want staff from Heathcote to stay and be part of the Stevenage project, and we've been talking to the head teachers in Stevenage and they are keen to work with the local authority and Heathcote to try and maintain as many of the staff as we can. There is of course turnover of staff anyway, over the next four or five years. But that's what we'll try to do.

The one thing I would say is, and we say this every night, and I hope I can keep saying this, in years to come. So far in Hertfordshire, every time we've had a review of schools, any member of staff, teaching or non-teaching, that wants to stay and work in Hertfordshire as part of that review, we've been able to secure a post so that they can carry their career on. And we've a 100% track record. Now, some staff decide that they need to go and not stay. But if staff want to stay, then so far we've been able to pull that off. I suppose the shorter answer is, we'll work very hard to keep as many of the Heathcote staff as we possibly can.

JW Justin, there was the question of intake as well.

MF Yeah, are you going to keep the same number of children coming to the school, or are you going to tail it off so that you get…?

JD Right. We suspect the number of children in the school will go down slightly. But we want to keep the numbers in that school as near to the levels that they currently are so that we don’t have a fizzling out of the school. We want to have a managed arrangement, and as Lindsay said, we're going to meet the next year’s year seven parents, I think on 9th July. And then they parents who are thinking about to go to Heathcote the following year, we're meeting them in September. And we'll give them guarantees so for example we would not move the children during their key stages. And if we do move them across, we'll make sure there's continuity, so the schools they're going to, the departments have had a few years, two or three years, to work together to make sure, for example, their reading the same books in English literature, studying the same period of history and doing the same courses, so that if the children do move across in key stage four we're ready for that. One of the advantages, as I say, we do have a number of years to work that through. Now, we can't start planning that detail yet, because currently all we're doing is consulting with people like yourselves on the number, the size and the location of schools. Once we've got that through and we know what

Appendix 1B(i)

the number size and location of the schools, then we can work on that detail quite rigorously, but at the moment we’re just consulting on that broader picture.

MF On one of the first slides you said about a stakeholder, I wondered who it was or…?

LM We included headteachers, senior leadership team and governors from schools. We included the borough council representatives, the County Council representatives, voluntary organisations, health service, a range of public sector organisations, within Stevenage. We did invite parent governors to be part of the governor representation at the stakeholder groups. Have I left anybody out?

MF Teachers’ unions? Were they involved?

LM Yeah, they were. At all of them, I think. So it was that kind of range.

MF I've got a couple of questions. Who has [inaudible]?

LM Borough council.

MF [Unclear] so it shouldn’t really be a problem?

LM Correct.

MF Right. And then also, the building on this site, I would [unclear] so my concern is still the same, obviously if you're going to be building next door, on the site, [unclear]

LM In a sense I think here is easier than the Longmeadow project because we were building cheek by jowl with the pupils there. They were right there. Here it would be the other end of the site, so it will be very much easier to compound that off.

MF It’s not going to affect things like [unclear]?

LM No.

MF [Inaudible] does that mean, are you still [unclear]?

JD That's something we will discuss with the school. What we want to do is have an admissions pattern, which means that the last intake…we won't be taking children in the year before or two years before it closes, because we want children to complete their key stages. So once we've got the business case in place, and we know the actual date when that school will no longer be needed, we can work back from that, so that the last children that go into the school…now, we're talking ahead now, because this is work we still have to do, because as I say, we're only consulting, at the moment on pattern, but what we suspect would be the last children to go into the school would be the

Appendix 1B(i)

children who could finish key stage three uninterrupted. What we wouldn't want them to do is move before their SATs, or even worse, move just before their GCSEs. We want the children settled for those two periods. So once we know the date by which the school will no longer be needed, and at the moment we're working on 2011, we've got a lot of work to do yet, then we'll work back from there. But this is something we'll work very carefully with the school, and obviously we're already having those conversations, but very informally at the moment, because, as I say, we are yet to confirm the pattern of schools that Keith was discussing earlier.

MF [Unclear] my son goes there now, and the teachers quite clearly are already starting to leave, and I just find it’s very concerning that it’s affecting the school already [unclear] it's going to be four years down the line [unclear].

JD Obviously if you're a teacher and you know that your school is going to, or the proposal is to close your school, then clearly you're going to react negatively to that. What we'll do is do everything we can to make sure that those staff who want to stay and will work with us will stay. The other thing to bear in mind is you can be quite imaginative in a town like this where all the heads want to work together. We can appoint staff to the new school, and agree that they will then carry on to Heathcote School. And they will know that there are future career opportunities elsewhere in Stevenage because of the overall project. So we're confident that we might lose some staff…I hope we don’t, because we’d like to keep all the Heathcote staff because they really are very good, and moving the school forward, but if we can't, we're confident that we will be able to recruit some really good teachers to Stevenage, because once we've gone through this consultation and we know what we're going to do in detail, we'll make sure the country knows about it, because it’s a really good news story. And we're hoping that teachers will be queuing on the A1 to come and work. No, on a serious point, we do think that teachers will want to come and work in Stevenage. Certainly if I was back in my early teaching career, it's certainly something that would draw me in. It’s going to be a great place to teach, in Stevenage in the future. It is now, of course.

MF [Unclear] my son’s got five subjects [unclear] countries [unclear].

JD It’s not unusual to have teachers overseas; that's true, across all of our schools.

MF [Unclear].

JD Well, I'm not sure we've had quite the exit. We haven't had that many teachers leave in the last six months, because these proposals are weeks old not…you know.

JW I think perhaps if you want to take this one forward you can chat with someone [overtalking].

JD Yeah, because we've got four nights at Heathcote.

Appendix 1B(i)

MF [Unclear] they said you can't go to Heathcote, go to any school.

JD Oh you're welcome to, yes, I know.

MF [Unclear] being recorded. I tried to get to Heathcote meeting and I phoned really early and they told me it was totally full and I couldn’t go, I could go to any other meeting because they were discussing the same things.

JD Yeah, you're welcome.

MF [Unclear] those letters in the paper last week and a lady saying, us Heathcote parents got to stick together but I couldn’t even get to the meeting [unclear].

JD Okay. The point I'm making is you're very welcome here, but we need to make sure that we discuss all the schools that we've got around the town. We've put on two additional nights at Heathcote to make sure that if people haven't been able to get in…

LM There are still places available.

MF [Unclear].

LM What we've done is to limit…the halls look part empty because we limit the meetings to about 60 people so that everybody gets an opportunity to make their point. But as Justin said, we are holding four meetings for Heathcote, and when I looked just the other day, and Katie here is keeping a check every day on the booking, there are only 18 people booked in for the fourth meeting, in which 60 places are available. So there are still 42 places available.

MF [Overtalking]. [Unclear].

LM I'm sorry that was inaccurate information given to you by the help line, but if you phone them now, or tomorrow…

MF [Unclear] they’ve got their own meeting next week, so it's [unclear] all together, just for Heathcote parents.

LM Yeah, there are two more for Heathcote parents, as I say, one of which has 42 places in it available now, so if you'd like to go to that meeting, you can book a place tomorrow.

JD And the meeting next week you're talking about has been organised [inaudible].

JW Yeah, there's a governing body meeting and there's still other Heathcote meetings, open meetings. If you want to check on the dates at the end, talk to Katie.

Appendix 1B(i)

MF [Unclear] how many children do you think will [unclear] the same amount?

LM Yeah. What we're proposing is they're all eight form entry schools, which is 240 children per year group, which produces a total school size of about 1,500 or thereabouts, and they will all be pretty much the same size.

MF Just to follow on from that, they’ll all be the same size but they’re going to be far bigger schools than they are now. And the point that I'd like to make; bigger schools aren't necessarily better schools, and I work for children with special educational needs, and I know how difficult they find it coming to a transition from a very small primary to a secondary of this size. And I think that needs to be taken into consideration as well, how a large sized school like that impacts on the relationship between students and teachers [unclear] increases as well, school refusals and another thing that needs to be taken, you know, bigger schools aren't necessarily better education for children. And also, you were saying that the stakeholders make a decision [unclear] agreed the decisions, well, my MEC [?] local secretary, he said at the stakeholders meetings that he went to, no decisions were made, so I would like to ask who were the stakeholders involved in the final decisions?

JW Can we take those two, and then if other people don't pick up on your points we'll come back to you later on. Remind me.

JD Okay, can I take the first point, because this is of concern. The first thing to say is an eight-form entry school is not a big school. It’s an average sized comprehensive school. It’s simply that in Hertfordshire we have quite a long history of having quite small schools, and it’s the current pattern of schools were developed in the post war years, and the world, in terms of the curriculum and the way schools are financed has moved on. An eight form of entry school is not big. A ten form entry school, if our back up proposals have to come through, which we don’t expect, but have to put there, that's not unusual either. I accept for Hertfordshire, eight forms of entry schools are not unique in Hertfordshire, but they're uncommon. I accept the point you're making to a certain extent, but I would disagree with your conclusion. I think the size of school; children with special needs can flourish in very large schools. Children who are shy and slightly fragile can also flourish, but the school has to be managed and organised in a different way to a small school, so when you have a bigger school, you have to have slightly different pastoral systems, form tutors become much more important, heads of year become very important, the way in which the school organises its lunch breaks. So I accept, if you try and run an eight or a ten form entry as if it’s a four or five form entry school, you get yourself into difficulty. The school has to take on a different tack. But I would discourage you to thinking that eight forms of entry schools are particularly big. They're really not. It’s a standard size comprehensive school for the UK.

LM On the stakeholder bit, the stakeholder process is consultation process, not a decision making process. No decisions are taken at stakeholder meetings. The point of the stakeholder consultation and the range was the

Appendix 1B(i)

range I gave in answer to a question a short while ago. Stakeholders have the opportunity to suggest to us what the options for the future could or should be. We collate those, and at the end of the stakeholder consultation process, in a kind of plenary meeting, we feedback to stakeholders all the ideas that have been given to us through that stakeholder consultation process from whomsoever they have come. We share that with the stakeholder group. Then the director looks at all of those in relation to the four tests that Keith showed earlier, and the director decides, from that complete list of options that have come from stakeholders, which ones he feels meet those tests, and which ones the County Council should consult the public about. So it’s a whittling down from that longer set of ideas that have come out of the stakeholder consultation process to this consultation that we have now. But the decision about what to consult on is the director’s. The stakeholders is a consultation process, you're right, it’s not a decision-making process.

MF So it’s just the Director of Education who makes the final decision [unclear]?

LM Yeah. The Director of Children, Schools and Families has the delegated authority, on behalf of the County Council to decide what should be consulted on. Of course the decision about what to do following the consultation is then, as Keith said, a Cabinet and member decision.

MF I have two questions. The first is did the County Council consider incorporating a Church of England secondary school in their proposal to increase choice, as there are no Church of England secondary schools in the area? And the Roman Catholic school is, I believe, having a [unclear].

LM We did have discussions with the Diocese of St Albans, which is the diocese that covers this area, for education purposes. Through the BSF proposals we are not actually creating a new school, we are relocating some schools, but we're not creating a brand new school, so the opportunity for another provider to provide a new school doesn’t arise through Building Schools for the Future. However, we did have discussions with the diocese also about the new school, which is outside the BSF funding arrangement, but is part of the west of the A1(M) development, the 3,600 house development, possibly 5,000 houses eventually, on that site. That, as part of its master plan, will have a brand new school, and we have been in discussion with the diocese about them proposing to run that school as an Anglican voluntary aided school. But that will be outside the actual BSF project, and on a slightly different timetable.

MF My other question was the transitional phase going from the old school to the new school. My daughter will be going to the school in 2010, and how are we going to make decisions about which new school to apply for when the new schools will have no track record to go by? Or not much perhaps idea [unclear].

JD Yeah. But bear in mind what Lindsay just said, we're not proposing any new schools here. So the track record will be the track record that the

Appendix 1B(i)

schools currently have. They’re the same schools, but we'll be enlarging them. So it will still be Thomas Alleyne, for example, but on a different site. It will still be Marriotts, on this site, but at the southern end of the site. So the track record for the sites remains the track record, so I think the key decision will be having a good idea of when the schools will be finished, and therefore what level of disruption there is. But if you were to opt, for example, for a place here at Marriotts, then you’ll still be coming to Marriotts. But when the school then moves as a whole school, on to its new site, it’ll have room for two more forms of entry. So they're the same schools. It’s quite an important point, this, because if we're to open a new school, under the new arrangements we would open up to competition, and what we're trying to do here is create a pattern of schools that work collaboratively together. And to go back to the size of school, the lady was asking earlier, one of the reasons we want at least eight forms of entry is so that each school generates a big enough key stage four cohort to be able to afford a much wider range of vocational courses at key stage four, so children who want to do some academic courses will have a wider choice because the schools will be able to afford to run them, and also, if they wanted to, they could work with…they could attend some of those courses on a different site, so the idea, there would be much more variety, and also there'll be a lot of collaboration in the sixth form. Now, if we open up a brand new school, we, as a local authority, haven't got complete control over what that school might look like, and we can't guarantee that school will sign up to the town-wide approach. So that's one reason for doing it.

JD Having said all that, if we can create eight form entry schools, with only having to close one, rather than create lots of new schools, that's far less disruptive for the children. And on the whole, particularly here and in Thomas Alleyne, we think we can complete all the buildings work on a separate site and then transfer the children across.

MF You said that there's going to be 1,500 children approximately in a school, but if Barnwell’s already got that now, how can you propose to close Heathcote and where will those children go? How are you going to determine who goes [unclear] Heathcote already?

JD What we're doing here is creating a pattern of schools for the future, i.e. Building Schools for the Future, rather than simply replace what we've already got. If you look at the map, and we've done this, of where the children actually live, we call them, in a rather technical term, our dotty maps, because there's a dot where each child lives. And we can see which schools they travel to and where. At the moment there are too few places in the north, and too many places in the south, so you’ve got children moving from north of the town down to the south of the town, to take up those places. By increasing the number of places in the north of the town, at Nobel and here, what we're trying to do is create a pattern whereby parents go to their nearest school, because there are spaces there for them. At the moment, some parents have to travel across Stevenage to get into schools, not because they don’t want to go to, say, Nobel, but because the spaces are taken up. So what we're looking to do is create a pattern for the future, because the residential shape

Appendix 1B(i)

of Stevenage has changed since these schools have been built. So the reason there would be more spaces in the enlarged schools in the south is because fewer parents would have to select those schools from the north, if you see what I mean. And in terms of how you decide which parent goes where, we would go on the admissions rules, and of course if you apply to go to your nearest school, then you have a much higher priority than if you apply to a school the other side of town. So we expect that when these schools open, there will be a little bit of transitional period because children will tend to want to follow their older brothers and sisters, so it’ll take, and there's a pattern of peer groups travelling to the same school, and certain primary schools having loyalty links. So it will take some while for the pattern to unfold, but that’s what we're looking to do. One last thing to say on that is that if you look at the number of places we're creating, if you think back to what Keith was saying earlier, we will leave about 10% surplus places across the town as a whole, so that there's some flexibility in terms of where parents can…so there's some parental choice within the system.

MF A couple of points that have just been raised on what you said, you're saying you don’t want to move kids in Heathcote [unclear] I can't get the words, sorry.

JD Do you mean at key stage?

MF Yeah. But in September 2011 the children that start in September this year will be starting year 11, which means [unclear] GCSEs, so will you keep them, just year 11, on that site, for that simple reason? [Unclear] two terms [unclear]?

JD It will depend on the date when the buildings will be complete. We're saying 2011 at the earliest, and you're quite right, if 2011 is the date that the children can move, then that would mean moving part way through a key stage, so in that case, we would move them earlier.

LM 2007?

JD Yeah. For the 2007.

MF This September’s?

JD Yeah.

LM This September 2011 is half way through key stage four. In other words we wouldn’t move them [overtalking].

MF I don’t want my child going into [unclear].

JD No, we will give a guarantee, and it’s on the record that we wouldn’t move them during that period.

Appendix 1B(i)

MF [Unclear] outside Stevenage and I chose not to send my child to Barnwell. I can't stand it. I put down for Barclay, which is obviously oversubscribed to go from one side of town to the other [unclear] Marriotts, but this was our first choice. By removing Heathcote, you’ve basically told my younger daughter that she goes to Barnwell or she comes here, because she won't get any of the other schools because even with a 10% surplus they will still be too small to take her, and as you say, [unclear] and we don't want that.

LM I don't think we are probably saying that. I mean Barnwell in a sense; Barnwell is full now. It’s virtually up to its eight forms of entry. The extra places, the additional two forms of entry each, or thereabouts, will be in Nobel and Marriotts. They will be the schools where the extra places are, because Barnwell, effectively won't have any extra places because it’s already been increased to the sort of size that it will be after this all happens.

MF What I mean is on your rules you're saying that places [unclear] but I do not want my children going to that school because I don’t [unclear].

LM Well, at the moment you’ve got a child here…

MF I've got a child that's starting in September.

LM We ought to talk about this probably afterwards, separately, but there is the sibling rule, of course that will override the nearness rule.

MF But she doesn’t want to go to the same school as her sister, that's why [unclear].

LM Right. I think we’d better talk about this afterwards, let’s see if we can work out something.

MF You were saying about the schools in the north being oversubscribed. Is it still true that you're taking a lot of children from Letchworth, because [unclear] places for their schools?

LM I don't think we're taking a lot of children from Letchworth. We may be taking a few, but not a significant number.

MF [Unclear].

LM No.

MF Thomas Alleyne, Barnwell and [overtalking].

LM Well, if they were going anywhere in Stevenage, I guess they’d go to the ones in the north. But I don’t think it’s a large number.

MF [Overtalking] two or three.

LM Yeah.

Appendix 1B(i)

MF Classes.

LM But the point is that the 10% surplus would be surplus on the pattern of occupation of places that it is now, so in other words even if [overtalking].

MF [Overtalking] specialist places that I'm assuming you take into consideration for children coming from Letchworth in this arrangement?

LM Correct. Yeah.

MF And I'd say that one of the reasons my daughter didn’t get a place, at Barclay was because of the fact that priority goes to people living that side of town [unclear].

LM I don't think that's how it’s works. If it’s not your nearest school, and it’s not a Letchworth parent’s nearest school, then it will go to whoever is nearer of the two of you, all things being equal.

MF [Unclear].

LM Well, is it? I don’t know. It might depend whereabouts in Stevenage, whereabouts in Letchworth you are. But literally it comes down to measuring, and how many metres it is, and we'd have to talk about that individually, I think.

MF My question is about Heathcote again [unclear] build on two sites, but through people in our area there seems to be [unclear] that actually Heathcote school field has been sold off for housing.

LM Yeah, I heard that the other week. It's absolutely fascinating. Every time we do a review, I've been doing reviews of this sort now for four and a half years in Hertfordshire, and I can pretty much guarantee, well, certainly nine times out of ten, a rumour has come out about what's going to happen to the sites that I haven't known anything about. Like, oh, you're going to knock a house down and produce new access through there, or you're going to do this, or whatever. I heard that for the first time last week at a public meeting that is was actually Barratts, I think I was told last week. It’s absolutely not true. We want the whole of both of the sites for ourselves.

MF [Overtalking] the benefit of [unclear].

LM Absolutely. That's what we want. Absolutely no intention of housing whatsoever. MF Just to say, obviously the buildings are perfect, and that we would love to have a new building, but I think we've got to say at what cost? Keith to quote you, you said, this is a high quality, 21st century provision, and that we have the money to do it. But you haven't pointed out there's £145 million is on the proviso that these schools become trust schools, and I'm quite surprised

Appendix 1B(i)

that not only have you mentioned that in your document, but you [unclear] local authorities are not running the schools. Perhaps you'd like to add why [unclear] trust school [unclear].

LM We haven't said it in the document because it’s not true that the money [overtalking].

MF We were told at a meeting last week…

LM Yeah. It’s not true that the BSF money is conditional upon trust schools, or upon the community schools in Stevenage undertaking trust status. That is not true. It is true, however, that there is quite a strong expectation on the part of government that that will happen. It’s not formally a condition, but it’s a strong steer in that direction. Trust schools, I'll go into briefly, I think, are like foundation schools in that they own their own land and buildings, but their revenue funding still comes through the local authority. So they're different from academies in the sense that they're completely outside the local authority, but they're like foundation schools in that they do own their own land and buildings, employ their own staff, and determine their own admissions arrangements. They do all of those things, but their revenue [overtalking].

MF [Overtalking] but they're not representatives of the local authority.

LM Who aren't?

MF The trust members.

LM The trust members may or may not be. There is a limit on the number of local authority trust members that there can be, but it's not the case that there can't be any. I can't remember the exact number. Is it two? I think it’s two members may be local authority members. But I think the point that I need to make about trust status is that that is something that is initiated by the schools themselves. Although there is a clear steer from central government that they expect that as part of Building Schools for the Future the schools, the community schools at the moment, will seek trust status. That is a decision for each of the schools to make for themselves. It’s not a local authority decision.

MF And who in the school makes that decision?

LM The governing body.

JD Can I just make one or two points on this? It is an important point. Absolutely you will be particularly interested in individual schools. As an authority what we're trying to do is create an overall pattern. And the advantage of trust status and an overarching trust for the town as a whole, what we want to do is formally capture the excellent collaboration between schools, which currently exists. We had an area wide inspection some time ago, and we were told that Stevenage was an example of national get best

Appendix 1B(i)

practice in terms of the collaboration between head teachers and governing bodies. And it goes on quietly, and the students in the schools at the moment just take it for granted, which is great. What we're concerned about is much of that really good practice is based on the personal as well as professional relationships between the head teachers, and to some extent, governing bodies. What we want to do here is capture that in a formal structure, so that schools formally sign up to an overarching structure to make that work, so that as an authority, we can then delegate additional resources and services to that trust, so that people who work and live in Stevenage can start making decisions about Stevenage and Stevenage education and I suppose the bottom line on this is, as a local authority, we trust the schools in Stevenage. We think they're doing a great job, and in a sense, by giving those schools greater freedoms, it’s a way of saying we do trust schools to make decisions about their own futures. But as Lindsay said, it’s quite clear, we would like, as an authority, to create that pattern, but it’s not a deal breaker. If the schools say, we're not going to do that, it doesn’t stop the BSF funding. One isn't reliant on the other.

MF This isn't actually a question, it’s a statement, [unclear] White here, who is the head of Lonsdale School. And one of the proposals is that there are possible co-location schools, and really what I'm trying to say that Maria and I are working very closely to look at the feasibility of that co-location in really quite an exciting way forward, for both students [unclear] and students. Don’t ask me [unclear] work for it, but we are looking to see where there could be some real, some very exciting stuff, because we are fairly sure it doesn’t exist anywhere and we could be able to do something really powerful and possibly even unique, certainly groundbreaking, and even world groundbreaking in terms of provision, which is way beyond all [unclear].

JW Thank you.

MF A couple of questions. I'll do the easy one first. If this is quite possible, the incoming Prime Minister only has very short sighted [unclear] change of government, will that make any difference [unclear]?

LM You're right. That is an easy one. It’s easy because the money for Stevenage has been allocated to the 2008-9 financial year, i.e. the very next financial year. The government spending plans for that financial year are already decided and in place, and central government, it’s a bit like turning an oil tanker around, it doesn't change that quickly. The new Prime Minister might have new priorities, but he's going to have very little scope to change the spending pattern for the very next financial year, because there isn't time to do it. In fact, he's shown as much commitment to the BSF programme as the current Prime Minister, so I don’t expect any big changes, but even if he wanted to, I think the funding for 2008-9 is totally secure.

MF We were at a meeting earlier and we were talking about dates when things are going to be decided. Now, I'm not a parent of a BSF child, in September, meetings will happen in September and October, for people to decide for secondary education [unclear] we at one time went right through

Appendix 1B(i)

[unclear], my son is in year eight, and over the years that they’ve been here, it’s gone from a school in the gutter, through the hard work of Patrick and his predecessor and the current staff and governors into becoming a school of choice, probably first choice. I just wondered, there's a slight doubt come October the school is still [unclear] the parents of the [unclear].

LM Yeah, sure. We are committed to writing to year six parents who will be coming to parents evenings in September, October time, prior to filling their secondary transfer forms for the middle of October and we expect to be able to give year six parents more information about the future, more certainty about what is happening about Marriotts in time for those meetings and for that decision. Of course, the decision over things like the land availability is not a decision over which we don’t have complete control. We don’t control the timetable for that because we're dealing with another party, so the borough council in one case and in the case of the site in the north, a private land owner, but obviously we’ll be doing our utmost to get a position of certainty in time for those parents. And as I say, we have undertaken to write to all of them with that information before the meetings take place, and before the secondary transfer forms have to be filled in. We can't give a guarantee that we'll know the answer, but we're working our utmost to get there. Do you want to add anything to that, Justin?

JD Yeah. I'm, grateful for the point you made about the quality of the school, and I just get it on the record as a local authority we're delighted with the progress the school is making, and to be frank, this is a school I'd be more than happy to send my children to, which is in the end a key thing. I think this is a great school. It’s improving, it’s one of the fastest improving schools in the town, in fact across the county, and that's not just down to Patrick, although he is a bit of a star. Apparently he can walk on water. But his staff have done a fantastic job. They’ve good heads of department here, a good senior management team, and it’s part of the reason…we think it’s an easy decision to make to give Marriotts a brand new school, is a very easy decision for us to make.

MF When the two new schools are built and the existing have been assembled, will they all look the same?

LM No. They all look a bit the same at the moment, because they were built originally at the same time period, and they're all of a similar style, with flat roofs and glass walls and things like that. Some of those features in the remodelled schools, like glass walling and so on, will doubtless remain, or they may be double glazed rather than single glazed, so it’s more thermally efficient, and so on. But we are not expecting them all to look the same. The two new schools, wholly new built school, this one and Thomas Alleyne, we would expect the architects to respond to the site in which they have to build, and to the education vision that the schools themselves have. So what we're doing later this term is asking two firms of architects, each one working with four to five schools in Stevenage, breaking the 11 schools, the existing secondary mainstreams, the three specials and the education support centre, that makes 11, so we're asking each firm of architects to work with four or five

Appendix 1B(i)

or six schools, and visit each of them and talk to the school head, and senior leadership team, and governors, and so on, about their vision for the future, the future of education, and then translate that vision into buildings design, which they will then share with the schools, to criticise, to compliment on and so on, and so I think the schools will be quite individual ones, responding both to the education vision that the school has, and to the site, and the site characteristics that the buildings have to be built on, including, of course, any town planning constraints on the shape and size of the buildings, because there may well be some in terms of heights, type of roof line and so on. So they won't all look…we're not proposing to build a set of kind of out of town Asdas, all look the same.

MF [Unclear] you’ve got the wow factor [unclear]. So do you think that if the [unclear] Marriotts go ahead and build the new school, that's going to have a wow factor, it’s quite near Nobel, [unclear] Nobel getting the extra two entry forms, Nobel is going to have the existing buildings, [overtalking] has got an excellent reputation now, it has come up, it is providing [unclear] education, that's my view, [unclear] school, but again Marriotts that is a tall tower at the moment, [unclear] last year, everyone was just talking Marriotts, and if you have the new school, brilliant education, [unclear] have that wow factor, do you think that this school would then become oversubscribed because people want to get in because of the education and it’s a brand new, wow [unclear] as opposed to sort of like Nobel is up the road, but it seems to [unclear] dump but that's it, [unclear] building.

LM A possibility, it would make a change for Nobel, wouldn’t it? Not to be as oversubscribed? Sorry, I shouldn’t. But schools go up and down all the time. I would have thought that the extent of the remodelling of the Nobel will be pretty transformational. It’s supposed to be. Even though we [overtalking].

MF It’s got to get a bit more wow?

LM Yeah. They should all do. That’s the objective that they all do. But you're right, there is nothing like a completely new build, try as one might to refurbish and remodel an existing school, you never get quite the same as a completely new build. But I think there will still be a wow factor there; at least I hope so. If there isn't our architects haven't done the job that we want them to do.

JD To add two points to that, firstly, I like the word, wow. What we're saying here without getting overly excited about it is the children in Stevenage, from 2012-13, those kind of dates, will have some of the best schools anywhere in the country, and quite right too, and about time. And it really is very exciting. There are some difficult decisions and painful decisions on the way. The kids who are currently in our primary schools, who are currently seven, eight, nine years old, will go into some of the best schools there are in the country. Your point about, and I'm always delighted to hear parents say what a wonderful school it is, and how happy your kids are, and better here than elsewhere; there are parents in all the schools in Stevenage who say the same thing. We were in Thomas Alleyne recently, this is the best

Appendix 1B(i)

school in Stevenage, we love it. And so there’ll be other parents who are just as happy as you with their schools, so I don't think we're going to see mass migrations from one school to the other. And the other thing is, as Lindsay was saying, we're going to spend millions on the schools on refurbishment. It’s more than a lick of paint. It’s a big investment. And with an imaginative architect, they could be a kind of a wowette, a bit of a wow. The other thing, we haven't had this conversation, but I shall be encouraging my colleagues to involve the kids in the design. Because four or five years ago I was involved in developing a new secondary school elsewhere, and it looks like it does now because of the ideas of the children. The shape of the classrooms are different because of the children’s view of teaching and learning. The fact that it's got a chill out area with fossils in it is because some of the naughtier children said, look, if we had somewhere just to go and chill out and get rid of our anger, we could go back in. A lot of what's in that school, the way the dining room is set out, is very different from the idea of offices, and it’s based on kids, and so we would like to involve the children, and that clearly means talking to the children who are the young children who are going to come up, as well as the existing ones. Kids are some of the best designers there are.

LM [Unclear].

JD In the autumn term? Oh, right. I don’t need to encourage my colleagues then.

MF I'm assuming that the new builds will have full disabled access [overtalking]?

LM Oh yes, of course.

MF I have a question when you brought out all this information because we felt when we were looking at schools for our year six child, that we had a choice, and actually we had no choice, because we chose Heathcote, and that was after we had been to lots of meetings at lots of different schools, spent hours and weeks and months finding out what our choice was, to find a month after we’d made our choice and had it accepted and were really pleased we had accepted that the school’s closing, we're facing disruption for our child just before his GCSEs, although you said that hopefully that won't happen, and we're also worried what will happen to his sibling, will he be caught in sibling rule as well as the location rule; will she follow him, and then we've got two children going through lots of disruption to a school that's going to close? We feel we were robbed of a decision [unclear].

JD Yeah. I'm conscious of the overall fact that all the children across Stevenage, particularly those in Heathcote, if these proposals go through, in a sense are going to have disruption, and then they won't benefit from that disruption because what we're proposing here is a model of schools for children who are currently very young, so I absolutely accept that point. I think that whenever we kick into the cycle of planning, we are bound to have some disruption, and really what we will do as officers, is two things, one, develop plans, which keep that disruption to an absolute minimum, so we

Appendix 1B(i)

disrupt as few pupils as we possibly can. And secondly, those children who will suffer some form of disruption, do everything we can to manage, it in the ways I was talking about earlier. And we are going to talk directly with the parents of the children who are due to start in Heathcote in September, to talk in some detail about that, and get a view from them on the best way to manage that. So I accept that if you reduce the number of schools by one, and you take four, five, or six years to complete the work, then the children who are currently in the system will face some form of disruption. It’s a fair point, well made.

MF [Unclear] with the sibling rule, the point that [unclear] management?

LM Yeah, the sibling rule is enabling, rather than compulsory. In other words the sibling rule allows you to get in on a higher rule, but obviously you don’t have to apply for the same school as the sibling. That doesn’t preclude you from applying for other ones. So the fact that you have a sibling in a school doesn’t make it less likely that you'd get another school, it just makes it easier for you to get the school with the sibling in. Does that make sense? If not, I'll be happy to talk further about it afterwards about how the rules work.

JW Can I just say that Patrick has just given me these for you to have a look at? So I'll put them on this table when we close the meeting. These are examples of new builds, I gather. Some interesting ones here. So you can have a look at those. Right. Is there anybody else? Because we've heard from this lady.

MF I'm a parent with children from a rural area, and I [unclear] the same as before. We were given a choice of schools, when we came here [unclear]. Does that mean we're going to lose that choice and they just purely go to the new school? Because at the moment one of my boys [unclear]?

LM No. The rules haven't changed.

MF So you still get choices of schools?

LM Oh yes. The schools, the admission rules haven't changed at all, so the rules [overtalking].

MF [Overtalking] still be the case at the new school [unclear]?

LM Yeah, the way the rules work at the moment, as you know, other than having a special need, having a medical reason, having a sibling, once you get past those special circumstances, then basically you're into distance. That’s the way the rules work. So the closer you are, unless you have a higher rule, those things I've just mentioned, the nearer you are, the more likely you are to get in. And that hasn’t changed at all.

MF I have another question, and this goes to Justin, because I do have a child with a specific need, [unclear] I need [?] the one child. Physically there will surely won't be enough funding [unclear] children with special needs can

Appendix 1B(i)

apply to them, which indeed they can, but there's limited funding now. Are you going to go on another [unclear] special needs, or you’ve got some spaces specifically [unclear]?

JD Well, the answer to that is, I'm not sure about a boost, but there’s an increase in twofold. One, whether these proposals went through or not, as of April of this year, we've changed our SEN funding arrangements. You say you’ve gone through a lot of difficulty. We've dismantled a lot the hoops that schools had to jump through to demonstrate that they’ve got children with special needs before we fund them. So what we're doing now, from April, is agreeing with schools what their predicted needs are, especially with secondary schools there's a pattern. Each year they have a cohort of children come through, and the number of special needs children, the type of need, doesn’t change that much. It might change from year to year, but not over a cohort. So what we're saying to schools is we will put virtually all the money into your budgets in advance, before the children arrive, for you to manage how you would think best. And we allocate that money to the cohort, so if the children’s special needs start to be addressed, and the children make progress, under the current system, the school has to give the money back, which doesn’t seem much of an encouragement. Here they keep the money, and reinvest it in special needs, so whether this review took place or not, there's a better system in place now. It’s early, it’s only literally been running weeks, and we have mixed responses from schools. Overall, schools are very happy with the process, and the principle, but we will still need to tweak the formula. And when we did that, we took an opportunity to put an extra £1.7 million into the overall SEN budget, so there's more SEN funding into schools. We're holding back money for children with very complex needs, what we're calling exceptional need, and holding that back at the centre, so that children with exceptional needs can also get support.

JD In terms of an eight form entry school, we could talk about this all night. My background is in SEN. I started work in SEN units and have done a lot of work in SEN over the years, when I had a proper job, in a school, some people say. And I found it very much easier to work with special needs in a larger school for a number of reasons. Firstly, there's much more flexibility in the budget, and if you’ve got a senior management team that believe in inclusion of special needs, because of the efficiencies of a larger school, they can invest, so you have a SENCO for example, without teaching responsibilities. You can invest in your lower math sets, so you can get the numbers right down to manageable numbers. So there are advantages to having large schools. But going back to the point the lady made about half an hour ago, which is a very important point, if you run an eight form of entry school as if it’s a four or five entry school, then the children won't benefit from those. So there is greater flexibility, and more stability in the budget of a larger school, which, if managed properly, can have a great impact on special needs, but it has to be managed properly. That's the line I would take.

MF I think it is criminal that [unclear]. I look at Marriotts, and I've watched Marriotts over a number of years, and I've watched them struggle, I've seen the team of people here, the staff [unclear] governors, with the [unclear] and

Appendix 1B(i)

it’s now a successful school. Let's suppose that the borough council do not want this [unclear] wouldn’t that be a terrible shame if Marriotts [unclear] goes back to the option. I'm also told that, well, the reason for that is there's no more space. What will happen, because no one’s raised this in the meetings I've been to, what will happen to Barnwell East when Barnwell West, or Barnwell, are finished with Barnwell East? Because that is at the moment a secondary side of town, and I can't really think that we're going to have a lot of success of expanding the Nobel site when on their doorstep there is what I believe still is an excellent site. [unclear]

LM The Barnwell East site would almost certainly be used for decant purposes, in other words, when work is done on other schools, we will need to use that site quite probably to put pupils in so that work can be done on sites that they would otherwise be occupying. It doesn’t apply to Marriotts obviously because building a new school on another part of the campus there isn't a decant issue, but let’s say you're doing major refurbishment and remodelling of Nobel school, you probably can't do that with all the pupils on the site. They need to be somewhere else while all that's happening. And we would have to use the former Collenswood site, the current Barnwell East site, I would expect, to decant pupils on to, to make space available for the builders on the Nobel site. So there would be quite a few years while that site is being used as a decant site. I don’t know how many years, because it depends how long the building programme is, and what the decant requirements are, but quite a few years.

MF [Overtalking].

MF [Overtalking] surely if that's the case, and it is possible to build a new school on the Collenswood site and move Marriotts there, that you could use the old Marriotts building as the decant site?

LM Say that again? I didn’t quite get that?

MF This gentleman was saying if you can't get the access to Marriotts here, to build Marriotts on the Collenswood site [overtalking].

LM Yeah. The Barnwell East site, the former Collenswood site, isn't a big enough site for an eight form entry school.

MF All right. Fair enough.

LM Simple as that.

JW I'm conscious of the fact that we're heading towards the time when I'm going to close the meeting. I've got hands that I know a couple of people want to speak who have already spoken. Is there anybody who hasn’t yet spoken, who would like to? In which case I'll go to this lady.

MF I'd like to express my concern that yet another school in Stevenage is up for closure. I think it’s disgraceful. I speak to parents with children in

Appendix 1B(i)

Collenswood, and they feel like second-class students. I'm sure the Barnwell staff are doing nothing wrong. It’s just that in this situation they don’t feel as if those teachers are [unclear] teachers. And we should learn from that experience. Have they been consulted about how they feel about the closure of their school? And also the Heathcote children, what's going to happen to them? I know relocation has its own problems, and Heathcote children have to relocate to another part of Stevenage when they're local to that area. Well, why didn’t you reconsider the relocation of Heathcote?

JD We did, actually. Just pick up a couple of points there. Firstly I think it’s unfair on Heathcote to compare the closure of Collenswood and the proposed closure of Heathcote. They're quite different circumstances. The closure of Collenswood was purely and simply intervention in terms of standards. We felt that the standards in the school got to the point where…I said, for example, earlier, I'd love to send my kids to this school. I should have said, I've had four, and only one is now still at secondary school age. But I'd be very happy to come here. I couldn’t have said that in Collenswood. There was an issue there of standards. And that was an intervention on standards. Heathcote is a good and improving school. It’s [overtalking]. If I can just finish the point? And I accept that it's unfair in the sense of, it’s a good, improving school. What we're saying to you though is, and this is the point we're trying to make, is that the current position, size and location of schools is based on a pattern of where people live of 40 or 50 years ago. The size and shape of Stevenage has changed. This is an opportunity to get it right for the next 40 to 50 years. And simply to rebuild the existing buildings, without looking ahead at the shape of Stevenage, we think is an opportunity we should not miss. Another point you made…oh, relocating Heathcote. We did consider that, so for example we could have moved Heathcote up to the Great Ashby site, but the problem with that is the children would have to travel right across the town to get there, and the other thing, we would have to have closed Heathcote anyway, because under the new rules, if you move an existing school a distance so far away that you couldn’t argue that they're dealing with the same community, it becomes a new school. And that would be opened up to competition. So if you're going to relocate a school on a new site, so for example Thomas Alleyne, you can do that because we can make an argument to say that broadly speaking it’ll be the same children in the same community because at the moment they travel down from that. But we couldn’t make that argument. And if you start from the point that we would like to create a pattern of eight form entry schools, with a collaborative key stage four and post-16 arrangement, then there's a choice between Heathcote or Barnwell, and when we looked at it in a hard-nosed way, Barnwell was already at eight forms of entry, and had already gone through quite a lot of disruption, which is why, in the end, we went for Heathcote. But I do accept the point that on the face of it, it looks very unfair to a group of hard working teachers who are doing a great job there, which is why we will do all we can to try and keep as many of those teachers within the Stevenage project as we can.

MF I just want to take into consideration going into [unclear] there's a particular school year [unclear] most interruption [unclear].

Appendix 1B(i)

JD Yeah. The most concern I have is the parents who have selected to go to Heathcote this coming September, because that's difficult, because, first of all, they're the kids that will get to year 11, possibly when the school closes, which will mean either delaying the process, because we're determined not to move those children, or moving them early to their new schools, and we need to talk to parents about that. And they would need to know what those school destinations are, really well within year seven, so that those departments can start working together. And the second reason why I'm most concerned about those children is because they chose the school without having the knowledge of the review. So I think they're the group that are likely, if we're not careful, to be most disruptive, and I think who, in a sense, are most unfortunate. So we're going to focus on that group of children.

JW Okay, I was going to close the meeting, but we've got one last hand up, so let's go for it because we've still got a couple of minutes.

MF I know you saying you'll close Heathcote because you’re not so much in need from that area, but how can you say that? I come from the village and I chose Heathcote, so how do you know if some people from the north of the town aren't choosing the south school because it’s a school that they want, rather than the location of where they living? Actually [unclear] choosing, because I chose that one [unclear] really because it’s an engineering school. [Overtalking] my son.

JD Yes, it’s a fair…what we're saying here, we think this is a really exciting opportunity, and we're really looking forward to getting on with it. But it isn't without impact, and if we close the number of schools by one, then you're quite right, in that sense we are reducing parental choice. We accept that point. So there's a down side to all these proposals. What we're trying to do is create a pattern of schools, which, remember, will evolve in four or five years’ time, so there's time for us to do the adjustments, where people from the north might well choose to come to a school in the south, but if the schools in the south are full, with children who live nearer, they won't be able to do that. At the moment they can do that because there are empty spaces, but once we start putting the places where people live, then there won't be quite the same opportunity. One of the phrases we keep using, and I understand why we use it, but it’s an unhelpful one, we talk about parental choice. Actually that’s a misnomer really, if you think about it. What parents do is get an opportunity to express a preference for a school. And then we have admission rules to sort out those preferences there are a lot of parents in Hertfordshire that get their first choice school, but a lot of parents who don’t. We've got a good track record in Hertfordshire of parents getting one of their three choices, but if you then break it down to the number of parents who got their very first choice, it starts to come down. So what we're saying here is an opportunity to express a preference rather than actually select a school. And I think it’s quite unhelpful. I use the phrase; everybody does, but actually it gives the impression that parents can send their kids to any school they want, and sadly they can't, which is why we have to have admission rules to sort that out.

Appendix 1B(i)

MF So what would happen with…how do you put an engineering school in another school that's already specialising in something like [unclear] business?

JD Oh right. In terms of specialisms. Yes, you’ve got to bear in mind that school specialisms are in place for three or four years. The idea of specialist status is that they are directed at the children who are in the school at the time, and then they are replaced. And so in terms of the specialisms, we will have time to work with the schools and say, what pattern do we want to get to in terms of specialisms? It’s a really important point you raise, because we would like all the schools in Stevenage to have a specialism and agree that pattern between the schools, because whilst this is going on, one thing we haven't discussed yet, while this is going on, North Herts College is also investing in its property, and once we get all these decisions out of the way, they may well be in a position to say, well, rather than build a construction unit on the college, if one of the schools in Stevenage, or two of the schools in Stevenage have a specialism in that area, we will locate our courses there, so that the children have access to more facilities, and greater expertise, which is why, going back to the trusts arrangement, across the town, that's why we want that arrangement, because the college can invest in the long term, in a site, then they're not going to build a construction department in a school because the head at the time says it’s a good idea. They might do that if we've got a trust in place and they secure that for a period of years; they can invest the millions that need to be invested. So what we will do, as soon as we've agreed the shape and pattern is negotiate with the schools, on the spread of those specialisms across the area. One thing worth mentioning, because it’s a real achievement for the schools in Stevenage, Stevenage is only one of, I think ten areas nationally that in 2008 the children, the young people here, will have access to all five of the new specialist vocational diplomas. There's a whole range of specialist diplomas coming our way. They're start in 2008. This is an area where the schools bid to deliver all five of those courses. And as I say, it's one of only ten places in the country where that’s being delivered. And we want to build on that, so in a sense we're going to negotiate that to create a coherent pattern across the town.

JW Thank you very much. Right. I'd like to thank you very much for all of your questions this evening. If anybody would like to continue to talk to the panel, then please, by all means feel free to do so, but I'll close this open part of the meeting now. Thank you. Oh, and don’t forget you can look at these schools here.

Appendix 1B(i)

Marriotts School 2 27-09-07 

  Speaker key BW Beryl WallLM Lindsay MartinPD Pauline DavisJD Justin DonovanPM Patrick MarshallMF Members of the floor, one to nine

  BW Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Marriotts School, or a kind of Marriotts School I think actually, for this second meeting here, part of the public consultation, and part of Herts review of secondary school places. My name is Beryl Wall, and I work for Accent, and Accent is an independent market research agency, and we are working for Herts – I’m getting to the phones in a minute, but in the meantime, could you turn yours off – and we’ve been asked by Herts to facilitate at these meetings. That’s the only part of our involvement, we have no part in the decision making or anything else, I’m just here to facilitate this evening. The meeting is being recorded, and transcripts will be made available in due course. It’s digitally recorded, so you can actually listen to it on the Herts website as well. Because it’s digitally recorded, here comes the phone message, if you’ve got phones on silent, please can you turn them off, because it does interfere with the sound system, if that’s okay, unless you’re desperately waiting for some urgent message. We’re going to start the evening with a presentation from Herts, given by Lindsay Martin, and after that, then it’s your opportunity to put your questions to the panel, so I’ll hand you over to Lindsay. Thank you.

LM Thank you, Beryl. Now is your chance. If you should be in Bugsy Malone, you can go now, and I won’t be offended, because I can’t promise you it’ll be as exciting as that. I’m just going to put this so it’s kind of more on the screen. Is that all right? Can you hear me? You could probably hear me without this anyway I suspect, it’s not a very large room, but as Beryl says, we are recording this so it will be helpful if it was all picked up on the microphone. As Beryl said, I’m going to give you some introductions and talk a bit about Building Schools of the Future. My colleague is going to talk about the area review, and the County Council’s proposals. And then the main part of the evening’s over to you for questions and comments. And I have with me Justin Donovan, Deputy Director of Children, Schools and Families, Chief Education Officer, Pauline Davis, my area planning manager who has worked on the detail of the review of provision in Stevenage. And I’m in the middle.

So, Building Schools for the Future, the context within which this review of provision in Stevenage is taking place, I just want to say a bit about what it is, and apologies to those who’ve heard it before, I’m afraid, at other meetings, as it’s going to be pretty much the same. This is what education looked like

Appendix 1B(i)

before your time, before my time even, about 130 years ago, it’s a Victorian classroom, that’s what it was like. And they were dressed in these wonderful pinafores I suppose, and so on and so forth. Moving on a few years, some of you might remember slide rules at school, I certainly do, I had one. I was never very good at using it, but I had one that looked very like that, probably the same model I suspect. Some of you may only have been at school after the introduction of calculators, this is an early Sinclair calculator. Goodness knows how much it cost, but at the time I do remember somebody saying, you know, one day, calculators are going to be cheaper than shoes. You’re joking, you’re kidding, but look at the price of them now. Four figure tables, an early calculating machine that if anyone’s an accountant, or accountancy technician, might remember those, they were certainly used in County Hall, I’m trying to think, 25 years ago, something like that I think. And these were the sort of buildings that education has been carried on in since the war. This is a typical Hertfordshire flat roofed, window walled building, this isn’t a school in Stevenage, it’s somewhere else in Hertfordshire, but these are all over Hertfordshire. We’ve built hundreds of schools like this, post war, both primary and secondary to cope with the growth of new towns around London, like Stevenage, and in lots of other places. And they’re all getting quite old now. In Stevenage, they were built, the secondaries that is, were built originally between the early 1950s at Barclay, to the late 1960s at Valley with obviously additions like this afterwards, where the architect has copied this structure, from the original design, the building type. Despite those additions, nice additions I’m sure, like this and I’m sure Patrick’s pleased to have a modern building like this, the original buildings are all early ‘50s to late ‘60s, that is quite a few decades old, and increasingly, not fit for purpose really, not ideally suited to the sort of teaching and learning that staff and pupils want to take place in them. Schools can however, look like this, this is slightly futuristic I suppose, this is an exemplar design that the Government commissioned by a firm of architects to show what a school might look like, really quite exciting I think. That’s a bit of an interior, can’t see that terribly well, and we haven’t got any schools that look like that in Hertfordshire. I can tell you now, we don’t have any, we haven’t built a new secondary school in Hertfordshire since 1975, so we’re not likely to have anything that looks like that. But schools can look like that, they can be stimulating, interesting, attractive places, where pupils and the community actually want to go and want to use.

So, how’s the Government going to deliver those sorts of things? Well, Building Schools for the Future is the Government’s major investment in secondary schools and secondary age special schools. £2.2 billion a year is being spent on this investment over a ten to 15 year period. It’s a lot of money, a great deal of money. Well, I thought it was an enormous sum of money, until I discovered how much Terminal Five at Heathrow cost, which is £4.3 billion, just about two whole years away, what the whole of the country’s spending on secondary education. I couldn’t imagine how you could spend that much on one building, but it’s a very fancy building, I won’t go into the details. But the first chunk of that money nationally to come to Hertfordshire is coming to Stevenage, 145 million pounds worth, including £12 million specifically for information and communications technology. As an indication

Appendix 1B(i)

of how important ICT is for the future provision of learning and teaching, it’s quite a significant sum of money I think. So, it’s a very exciting opportunity for us, and a very exciting opportunity for Stevenage, and for all the pupils in all the schools. So, it’s pretty important for us to get it right, because like these schools were built 40 or more, 50 in some cases, years ago, and are still going strong, we hope that the buildings that we build will last a similar length of time, in other words, for generations of pupils to come. So it’s pretty important that we spend the money in the best possible way, and we get it right, or else we’ll be letting a lot of people in the future down. And you wouldn’t expect to get £145 million from the Government without some strings attached to it, or certainly some red tape attached to it, if not strings, and this is a bit about the process and how long it takes. Things like this don’t happen overnight either. We have to submit three separate sets of documents for approval by Government, the first set we submitted in April, the next set we’ve got to submit round about September, October, and the final set here, round about February to March of next year. And it isn’t until this last one here has been approved, that we are allowed to start what’s called the procurement process, that is, preparing to sign a contract with a private sector organisation that will actually do the work, will actually build buildings. And that procurement process will itself take some time, there are again, European directives to meet, that takes time, and we don’t expect to actually start building, putting a spade in the ground, if that’s these days how a building starts, I’m sure it’s more sophisticated than that, but we don’t expect to start doing that until late 2009, possibly even early 2010, depending on how long this process takes.

Now, I’ve said a lot about buildings and quite a lot about money, but of course, the buildings are only the means to an end aren’t they? The buildings are only there because we have pupils who need educating, we don’t start building a building and think, what shall we put in that building? I know, we’ll have a school in there, it’s not that way round is it? We have pupils who need educating, teachers who need to teach them, and they need the right facilities, the right environment to do that. So, the starting point is education, the starting point is what pupils, teachers and staff want to achieve. And so we started with a vision for what we wanted teaching and learning to be, and this was developed very much in consultation with schools in Stevenage, and other stakeholders. And we came up with a focus on excellent teaching and learning. I don’t think you’ll be surprised by any of these. A focus on teaching and learning, a commitment to raising attainment, aspirations and participation in education, improving employability, producing schools which lean [?] and serve the community, and have a range of community services, a commitment to the promotion of a healthy lifestyle, active participation in sport, offering a diverse range of specialisms, including vocation ones. Having up to the minute, state of the art, whatever the phrase is, information and communications technology. I mentioned earlier how important that was, to enable more personalised [unclear] opportunities, allow community access and so forth. And to have light, attractive and flexible buildings in which to do all these things, buildings that can be adapted to the changing needs of education over the next 25, 35, 50 years.

Appendix 1B(i)

So, what do we need to deliver that vision? Again, we had a discussion with stakeholders, a range of stakeholders, and most stakeholders agreed on these four things, that we needed fewer mainstream schools with larger sixth forms, and more specialisms, big enough to be efficient and flexible, but small enough to support those all important relationships between students and staff. They agreed that we should have closer links between mainstream and special schools. They agreed that we should develop even closer links with North Herts College, and I say even closer, because the links are good now, but can be even closer than they are now. And we need improved facilities for the Education Support Centre, which is a centre for those children who are out of school, currently in mobile accommodation on the edge of a primary school site, entirely inappropriate. So that was what most stakeholders agreed we needed to deliver that vision, and my colleague, Pauline, is now going to tell us about how that gets translated into actual packets of schools.

PD Hello everybody. So, why do we need an area review? Well, this investment that the Government is providing is simply a means to an end, it’s the means to realise the vision, it’s not building new buildings for buildings sake, it is a way of creating new buildings that support and facilitate that vision that Lindsay’s been talking about, and as he said before, it is important to spend that money wisely, because we’re not likely to get another opportunity like this for an awful long time. And while we’re doing that, it makes sense that we build the right number of places to meet the demand for them and to make sure we, as best as we can, build in the right locations.

So, what have we done so far about this? Well, as Lindsay said, we’ve had discussions with the key stakeholders, they are key people in Stevenage who are currently responsible and participate in providing the education service across the county. And we started that back in January, all the secondary heads, governor representatives, primary heads, college, politicians, they all came together and they talked about the issues, they talked about the vision for Stevenage, and Lindsay’s talked to you about the outcome of those discussions. And they came up with a list of possible ways of organising schools provision within the town, which we then evaluated against four tests that my director wanted us to use to make sure that whatever options came up, we looked at them in a fairly holistic way, and I’ll show you those. Once we’d evaluated all of those suggested options, he chose the ones he wanted us to come and talk to you about and to hear what you have to say about them. And this meeting is one of a range of meetings, as part of our public consultation, which started back in May as you know, and consultation documents I’m sure you’ve all read, and it finishes on 7th August. I’ll leave you just to read those tests for a second or two, but you’ll notice that they cover things like achievement, standards, places, building design, transition arrangements, they’re fairly holistic, and any of the options would need to satisfy those sorts of criteria.

Within the town, there is a changing pattern of demand. In 2017, we’ll need about 48 forms of entry, and a form of entry is 30 students entering the school in each year group. 2017, because the Government have suggested to us that what we need to be doing is planning for ten years ahead, so that we’re

Appendix 1B(i)

not building schools now and then finding a year after we’ve built them, we need to expand them almost immediately. We’ve got about 43 or 44 forms of entry, in terms of provision now, so you’ll see by that that there is some expansion in the town, because of housing, but that 48 forms of entry includes a 10% surplus, so that you as parents have an opportunity to express a preference for a school other than your local school, and have half a chance of getting in to it, and also just in case something else happens that we weren’t expecting and we need a bit of spare capacity. We know that the places that we’ve got available in the schools in the town at the moment are unevenly distributed, we’ve got schools of different sizes. And we also know that they’re not in the right places for where the children now live, because of the housing developments in the north and east of the town. We also know that the big development that’s due west of the A1(M) is likely to sustain its own school, and agreement has already been reached that as and when that happens, there will be another secondary school to support that very large community that will develop there.

So, I thought it might be helpful just to show you the map, and just explain. The map’s in your consultation documents and you will be able to get there. This is the west of Stevenage. There’s more housing planned in the future to the north of the town as well. We’ve got a couple of schools close together here, and we’ve got a couple of schools close together down here, so we know that we’ve got an uneven pattern of schools, schools virtually next door to each other, while at the same time up here with this whole area up here, there’s no school to serve that growing community there. And you’ll see in your consultation document that we’ve identified a site right at the north of the town for the building of a brand new school building, and I’ll come back to which school we expect that to be. So, the important thing here for you tonight is what the proposals are for mainstream schools and in particular, Marriotts School. As Lindsay said, what we’re trying to achieve is a pattern of schools of the right size, to not only be efficient, but also not to be too small or too big, in a sense, so a pattern of eight form entry schools, they’re the schools listed there. As I said to you, we are planning to move Thomas Alleyne School to that new site in the north. And then that’s one pair of schools sitting side by side, where we’ve moved the provision around to where the young people now live.

For your school, here at Marriotts, we want that to be an eight form entry school, so it’s an expansion of your school, and just so that you know, we expect that to be a brand new school building, because the existing buildings, the older buildings, not the gym, we won’t knock the gym down, don’t worry, but the older buildings aren’t that good, they’re not easy to remodel or expand and the road network just outside them is not really going to sustain even more people coming onto site. What we want to do is build a brand new building further down the fields, with a new entrance at that end of the site. And hopefully that will give you some really exciting opportunities while we’re doing that. Under that pattern of course, as Lindsay said, fewer larger mainstream schools, we’re proposing the closure of one school, and that’s Heathcote School.

Appendix 1B(i)

We’ve got a second proposal in the consultation document, and we’ve done that not because we want to worry you, let’s be clear about that tonight, we’ve done that because we have to, we have to say to you, we don’t own all of the land down there, although it looks as if it’s all one piece of land, we don’t own all of it, and we will need to acquire that, but it’s a bit chicken and egg, we can’t acquire it until we know exactly what we’re doing, and vice versa. So, this is a just in case, if anything goes wrong with that land transaction, and we don’t expect it to, we have to just say, if that happens, we would need to have another proposal on the table, and that would be one fewer school. So, if anything went wrong with the land, then that’s why we’re saying in those circumstances, another school would need to close. The same thing applies to the land in the north of the town, up at the top of Great Ashby, if anything went wrong with that, we’re proposing that Thomas Alleyne would close. But I need to stress to you here tonight that we’re not expecting that to happen, but we have to put a 'what if' scenario in there, just in case.

So, this review is not just about mainstream schools though, this is a review for secondary age children, whether they’re in a mainstream school, an ESC or a special school, so we have some proposals for special schools. Lonsdale School is the school for young people with physical and neurological impairments, and two proposals there, they can either stay on their current site, and we’ll do some work to improve the buildings there, or that they could relocate alongside either this school or Barclay School. I know that there has already been some discussion between the two schools about what would that mean if that was ever to come about, and where would the benefits be of doing that. And we can explore that with you a little later if you wanted to. For Greenside School, it’s the school for young people with severe learning difficulties, it’s based virtually next door to Heathcote School, between Heathcote and Barnwell School. Their buildings aren’t that big, and so what we’re proposing is to build more buildings alongside the newly expanded Barnwell School, so that the secondary age young people can go into there, and then their existing buildings, the primary age children can spread out and have better use of those buildings, because they’re quite good buildings actually.

For the Valley School, which is the secondary school for young people with moderate learning difficulties, we’ve got a whole range of things. We’ve not making any proposals for one or the other of them, we’re just asking people what their thoughts are about a whole range of options, including keeping them where they are, and perhaps developing their facilities and services there. Again, a similar thing, they could relocate with a mainstream school, and you may ask, why do we keep picking out Marriotts or Barclay here? The reason being that they’re the two sites that we believe would be big enough to hold both the mainstream school and a special school. We could keep the school as one entity but the children on roll and the staff belonging to the school, but the children actually being in the mainstream schools and the staff supporting those schools and those young people on a professional basis in other schools. Or we could actually close the school and open up special needs units for those young people in each of the mainstream schools.

Appendix 1B(i)

For those of you who are parents of young people here, the transitional arrangements are going to be as important as to what the proposal is I suspect, certainly in terms of building plans. We’d want you all to be involved in developing those plans, developing those school projects. This isn’t us doing it to the schools, it’s us working with schools, so that they work out what they want to achieve, and we develop the buildings around those ideas. So, we know that building work can be disruptive, and we will minimise that disruption as best we can, but for this school, as I’ve said, we plan to build a brand new building, so apart from knowing that you’ve got a building project on at the other end of the field, you carry on as you are, until it’s ready, and then everybody just moves into it. So that would be perfect [?]. For those schools that would need to close, it’s one of the hardest decisions, or one of the hardest things to achieve. Closing a school isn’t an easy decision to take, so we need to make sure we deal with that carefully and sensitively and we need to make sure that while those arrangements are working their way through for the young people still in those schools, that we maintain confidence in parents, in the quality of the teaching and learning that goes on in them during that period.

For staff, we want the staff to be involved in working through those transition plans, we want the people in the schools who know what it means to help us with those plans. And we also know for staff, who may be affected by any changes, that it’s not just about the one school that might close, because all of the other schools in the town are expanding. So in terms of that, it’s not just a single school issue, it’s a whole term issue, all the schools will be involved in working out what those transition plans for staff can be, to make sure that they continue to work, to thrive and to contribute to the service within Stevenage. If it comes to it, obviously the authority will assist every redeployment and they’ve got an excellent record of doing so, I think almost 100% of making sure anybody who wanted to have a job, gets a job, so we’re committed to doing that too. For students, we want to work with the schools, so that we develop clear transition plans for any changes. For this school, that won’t be such an issue, but if for example, you’re a parent of a child at another school where you might have to move your child because of the school closing, and you have to get a new uniform, we will make a contribution to the cost of that uniform.

We’re nearing the end now, because this is all about you tell us what you think. We’re having these public meetings, you know they’re being recorded, and we’ll put those tapes on the website, we’ll put transcripts on the website, and they will be available to the county councillors that make the decisions, so they can hear firsthand what you’ve had to say. But we’d also like you, if you want to, to respond to us, there’s a form on the back of the consultation document, or you can respond online, email us, whichever way you want, the important thing is, we hear and understand what you have to say about these proposals. My job is to make sure we then report back your views to the county councillors when they take their decisions, and we will distil the issues that we’ve heard here and through the responses, and present those in a report. But we also make every single one of your responses, your written responses, available to the County Councillors, so that they can read them

Appendix 1B(i)

firsthand and get a real feeling for what you’re saying, rather than how I interpret what you’re saying.

And so, we’ve got this public consultation period running until 7th August, it’s a key date, please get your responses in by then. We’ll report back, first of all to the Education Panel, which will have a fairly wide ranging debate about the issues that have arisen, that’s going to be on 3rd October, and they will give their views to the Cabinet of the County Council, which comes along on 15th October. That’s where the decisions get taken. They’re both open to the public, so you can come along and hear what goes on, and we’ll make arrangement, but if a representative from the school, and it’s usually one representative from the school, and it’s up to the school and the governors how to decide how best that is handled, to say something. But it’s really for you to hear what goes on, not to participate in what goes on, as you would in a meeting like this. If the Cabinet decide to take forward any of the proposals that are large changes like a school closure for example, we would have to publish that with notices, their adverts in the newspaper, telling you this is what we propose to do by such and such a date, and you have six weeks in which to object if you wanted to. And if any single person objects to a proposal, we’d have to refer that objection and the issue that was raised back to the Cabinet of the County Council, and that’s now likely to be in January. So, I hope that gives you a flavour of what decisions get taken when, and how you can get involved in that. At this stage, this is where we stop talking to you, and hopefully we get to hear what you have to say.

BW So, it is your turn to put your questions to the panel, and just one thing, can I ask that, we have a roving microphone, Karen will bring the mike round, and although it’s a small room, we still do need you to use the microphone when putting your questions to the panel, and to wait until you have the mike until you do that. That’s the only way we can ensure that your questions and comments are on record, that they’re recorded. So, it is important. So, your turn, who’s first? Thank you.

UF [inaudible] you’re going to purchase the land.

PD The answer to the first bit of the question is, yes, that’s where the County Council decides what it wants to do and that’s the [unclear] that says we intend to close such and such a school. But in terms of whether we’ve got the land or not, it’s not quite as straightforward as that. What we’ll know by then is how confident we are that everything’s going well, because you don’t buy the land until you sort of get to the next stage, and we can’t get to the next stage, until we take the decisions about the proposals. And it’s unfortunately just the process, it’s a little chicken and egg. But it’s about the confidence that the County Council has that it will go through, and there’s no problems with that.

MF1 [inaudible]

PD We realise that for some parents, that’s going to be quite a difficult thing to get their minds around, certainly in the case of Heathcote School,

Appendix 1B(i)

which is the one in our preferred option, option one, it’s the only school we’re proposing to close. We will be keeping the school open until 2011, and we’re conscious that parents who are selecting schools, and wanting to express a preference, are going to find that a little strange, in some respects. What we’ll do, and what we’ve promised the school we’ll do, is we’ll come along to the open evenings in September, so that we can give parents who are looking at the school and wanting to know about it, the absolute latest information that we have, so that they’re as fully aware and prepared as they possibly can be when they’re making those decisions.

JD Can I just reinforce something that Pauline said, and that’s that we really don’t expect to have a problem. We’re doing this frankly, just to make sure that if we do have a problem, we’ve been upfront with you and said there’s a very slight risk. But as Pauline says, it’s chicken and egg, we can’t press ahead with these proposals, without knowing there’s a risk there, but we can’t buy the land until the proposals have gone through. We’ve just been extra cautious.

MF2 [inaudible] to go ahead, [inaudible] and if that’s the case, have you looked at the access at [unclear] for people getting into the school?

PD They are only proposals for Greenside School, but you’ll see that there is only really one proposal there for that school, and that’s to build some new buildings for the secondary age children, alongside the Barnwell School. The issue about access, of course, we are conscious of that, we know that it’s not particularly easy round there, and we’re clearly looking for alternative access, probably off the 602, so a brand new access, because obviously if we’ve got more people going to that part of the town, we need to make sure we’ve got adequate access, and if we’ve got a special school alongside, and remaining where it is, with all the taxis and things that have to go, we’re very conscious we have to solve that. We’ve had discussions with the Highways Authority, they’re aware of that, they’re okay about that, so the plans are very much in place. Where the buildings for Barnwell School will be, is still finally to be determined, so what we’re planning to use is both the site of the current main Barnwell site, and the Heathcote site, both of those sites for the Barnwell School that remains in the south. And where the buildings are and where the access will be, would depend on how those building plans progress.

LM I think the first part of your question was, does it go ahead, irrespective of which of the two options for mainstream schools are chosen, and the answer would be yes. Because it wouldn’t really be affected because Barnwell is there in both of those options, yes.

BW Any more questions? Yes, the gentleman here.

MF3 If the proposal to expand the school does go ahead, does that mean the entrance [inaudible].

PD I think, not necessarily, but it’s probably a little early to be too definite about that. There will clearly be a new entrance on that side, because the

Appendix 1B(i)

buildings will be down there, and there’s no point in having an entrance here and then having to build something that goes all the way down the other end of the field. But whether we keep this entrance in, it seems to make sense, but that’s for the development work, where the architects and the Highways engineers and everybody else gets involved in the next stage of planning exactly where the buildings are, and how you get in and out of the site.

MF4 Can I just ask, if obviously the second proposal that we have has the same [unclear], at what point would you decide whether it was Marriotts or Thomas Alleyne that was closing?

LM That would be decided on the site, in other words, if there’s difficulty with the Marriotts site, it would be Marriotts, if there was difficulty with the new Thomas Alleyne site, it would be Thomas Alleyne which closes. So it would be determined by where the problem is.

MF4 Right, but if for instance the land adjacent to here wasn’t obtainable, then Marriotts would close. So what would those pupils then do?

PD It would be the same as any closing school, I mean, the one thing you saw on that second proposal is, the remaining schools would then get larger. So, whenever and if ever a school is closed, what we’d have to do is make very clear transitional plans for where those young people who remained in that school, went on to, on the point of closure. We can’t tell you exactly right now, because obviously we’re waiting to know what the proposals that go through are, so that we can make some detailed plans, and also when the building work for every school gets under way, so that we wouldn’t want, for example, if that was the case here, to move children from this school into another school which is then going to have a lot of building work, and even more disruption. We want to move to a school that we’ve finished, so we’re back in that chicken and egg thing, that we need to do a bit more work on the building plans, know the sequence of events, and then plan the transition plans very carefully. But we keep saying this to you tonight, we’re not expecting that to happen here for this school.

JD The other thing worth bearing in mind is that for the great majority of the children, if you take Heathcote, which we are proposing to close, for the great majority of those children, they will have finished at school before that school closes, because if you think back to the timescale, we’re not talking about the first buildings being open and ready for kids to walk into, until 2011 at the earliest. So, that’s why we’re concerned about the kids who are wanting to go to Heathcote for example next September, because they’ve made that option without knowing that it was closing. But for the majority of kids, it’s…

MF4 Yeah, I mean, my son’s just started his senior education, so he’s obviously going to be towards the end, and if he’s got aspirations of staying on to sixth form and A levels and so forth, then obviously, he’s then having to start at a new school, and I know he’s going to go [unclear] and what have you, but there’s still something that [unclear].

Appendix 1B(i)

JD A disruption, yes.

MF4 And that might obviously change his options, and he might decide that it’s going to be better to…

LM Go somewhere else.

MF4 Go somewhere else in the city, than stay on within sixth form.

JD The bottom line on this, for the whole of the town, is that actually the kids who are really going to benefit from this work, are the kids who are currently in the junior schools, the lower end of the junior schools. So, they’re going to come into schools which are open, running, organised. It’s still exciting for the kids who are there, because we’ll involve them in the design and they’ll have a say in what the school looks like.

PD And if he comes into the sixth form at the point where the move takes place for example, be assured he would be going into a sixth form that has been fully refurbished, or fully rebuilt with all the exciting things in there anyway.

BW Any more questions? The gentleman over here, thank you.

MF5 I’m just wondering whether on the transition arrangements you’ve thought about transport if a school is closed or moved?

PD Nationally there are rules about when young people qualify for free transport and if somebody has to move the triggers of that sort of threshold, then they will qualify for free transport. In terms of laying on transport specially say, between a moving school or a closing school, we’re not proposing to do that. But what we will be doing is talking to our passenger transport unit who plan all the routes around Stevenage so that they adjust the pattern of buses to meet the new pattern of schools so that young people can get around the town more easily.

MF5 There seems to be growing evidence that the design of building. I know we’re a long way from this, but there seems to be growing evidence that the design of buildings can be quite critical in terms of the well-being and behaviour of children. What steps will be taken when it comes to [inaudible]?

LM I’m glad you asked me that because it’s a really interesting hobby horse of mine actually. Yes, you may have seen recent BBC articles. I was looking at one only today because I think it was yesterday that it was on there about the potentially beneficial effect of good design. Yeah, it’s obviously very important and that was a very important consideration with these buildings that were originally built in terms of the amount of light, the amount of space, and so on, which they’re actually quite good I think. I don’t know if Patrick thinks that about these, but this is good. Mindful that the government is investing billions of pounds in secondary schools, even they have realised

Appendix 1B(i)

that actually you need to spend that money rather carefully and rather well. So they have commissioned – and that picture that I showed of a fancy, modern school earlier was one – whole series of exemplar designs for urban designs, rural areas, compressed sites, examples of how to use the landscaping, examples of how to integrate community use, a whole range of examples. There are a number of interesting schools around the country that have been built recently and that are open to visits from other people. So you can see both what they’ve done well, and also where they may have made mistakes to avoid. There are a number of, pressure groups isn’t quite the right word, but particular interest groups like the British Council for School Environments, for example. There are a number of bodies like that that organise visits, including some abroad which sadly, I haven’t benefited from yet, but I live in hope, particularly to places like Denmark. There are some very interesting examples of architecture in Denmark. In fact, there’s one school there. I think it must be sick and tired of being visited because everything I read is about that school. So there is that sort of practice around. But you’re absolutely right. I mean, it is very important that we learn those lessons. Another way of doing it, that we are committed to, is involving staff and particularly pupils in the design process. There is some very interesting work that’s being done where pupils challenge architect’s ideas. I’ve seen video material of architects kind of standing outside a classroom, waiting to go in, and show off their designs. They’re actually quite nervous because the children are really challenging. Why have you done it that way? Why haven’t you thought about this? Why haven’t you thought about that? We are committed to involving pupils in all the schools in that initial design thinking process, and the staff of course because it’s the users of the buildings that know most about how it works. The government has also used something called CABE, which is the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment. They have developed design quality indicators that we have to use. They have established a design quality assessment panel that all our designs have to be assessed by. Only in the last few years actually as the investment has grown, so the Government’s concern to get it right has grown and they’re not seen to be wasting, rightly, millions or even billions of pounds. So it’s a bit of a growth industry, but perhaps it’s an important one. That’s a rather long-winded answer, but I did say I was keen on this.

MF5 You’ve obviously thought about it.

LM We have, yes.

MF6 I have a couple of questions. Firstly, you said just now staff and pupils. If this all goes through, what I want to know is, will there still be [unclear] or entrances, or is it going to be closed off?

LM No, absolutely. We will be consulting schools about all aspects of the design process. As I think Patrick, for example, here at Marriotts can testify I hope, we are putting in place a process where the whole school community will be involved in the design work which happens, whether that’s what the building are like, what you have in them, how the grounds will be used, where the entrances might be. I mean, thinking about your question earlier about

Appendix 1B(i)

entrances, you might think, for example, under the plans that you want vehicular access from the south and you want a pedestrian access from the north. So you separate pedestrians and cars, for example. You might think of that. You might prefer to do something else. That will be something we will consult the whole school community about. Yeah, absolutely.

MF6 The other thing was, I did some reading up of some of these schools in Hertfordshire. One thing that came across was there’s not a lot of space and that [unclear] is not encouraged.

LM Well, yes, if you’re thinking about that particular school in Peterborough…?

MF6 Yes.

LM Personally, I think the head is absolutely bonkers. Sorry, this is on the tape. Sorry. I shouldn’t say this. There are divergent views about what you should do and each head in Stevenage will have their own view about how they want times and spaces used. But most of the opinion that I’ve seen is about the need for pupils, students to have social spaces, to have good circulation spaces, to have good outdoor spaces where they can, for example, if they wish to eat sandwiches outdoors when the weather is nice. I don’t know if you allow this. I’m speaking generally. I can take you to schools in Hertfordshire, quite posh schools, if you like, where the girls, because it’s a girl’s school, can be seen sitting on the pavement edge with their feet in the road eating sandwiches because there’s nowhere on the school grounds for them to do that. That’s just not acceptable, is it? We need to create spaces that the pupils can use all of the school day and use productively. But exactly what that is and how it works will be part of the design process that we engage the whole school community in – pupils, staff, parents, governors, managers, the whole lot.

MF7 This is just a point on [unclear]. What has actually happened to that? Is that still going to be a Barnwell campus?

LM In the short-term, for the next couple of years, yes. Beyond that, no, it won’t. Barnwell will consolidate on its west, I think it is, campus and ultimately onto the combined campus, if that’s what happens. I guess your next question is, what are you going to use that site for then perhaps? No?

MF7 Not so much what you use the site for now, I would probably guess it’s going to be housing.

LM Not to begin with.

MF7 The Barnwell west campus is going to [unclear].

LM Well, no, it’s not.

Appendix 1B(i)

PD What we’re doing is we’re expanding all the remaining schools. So, for example, Barnwell has a lot of former Collenswood pupils in it obviously, and people from the area around the old Collenswood School are all sort of basically going to Barnwell. But in the future this school will be expanded. Nobel will be expanded, Barkley will be expanded, Thomas Alleyne will have moved and expanded. So the whole pattern of attendance will shift. The people living in the area around Collenswood will be more able to get places into Marriotts and into Nobel. The people in the north of the town, which have looked to Nobel and other schools in the past, will be able to go to a new school up there. So the whole pattern will shift, which means the places that all those places have occupied in Barnwell in the recent years will be free for the people who live in the south and near the villages around it.

LM I’ll just say a bit more about the site, if I may. I think you’re absolutely right. I think probably ultimately it will use that for housing, but it’s a very valuable site for us for decant arrangements. By that I mean that if you’re doing work, remodelling, refurbishment work on a school when the pupils are there, you may well need to decant some of them temporarily to another site. And it could be that Collenswood buildings are particularly useful for that purpose after Barnwell have ceased to use them.

PM Three points; one about community access. We, as a school, and let’s just assume we would be as a school, we’d be totally committed to make both the site and [unclear] the school fields and space that people use, and they use it very responsibly and I have no problem with that. So it won’t be a case of there’s this thin fenced entity in the middle of your community. [unclear] It’s not appropriate. That’s not what we’re talking about and indeed, the whole concept of schooling, we talked about extended schools on the slides. Regardless of whether you’re parents, and some of you won’t be parents at the end of this year, if you live around here this is as much your school, your community access, your resource as the area [unclear], a whole range of subjects, from childcare through [unclear], to fitness. So it’s a very different, a 21st century model of schooling, which probably isn’t a million miles away from what the original 1960s buildings intended to do. They put them in the middle of communities. [unclear] It’s very much about what you need. That leads me to point two. I am very interested in what you say about that too. Not just the authority, and the County Council, and the Borough Council might want to know from you what you want, and you want to put in our proposal. We have to write a document at the end of this term, which then goes off to the Department for Education and Skills in October. The final point is we are working very closely with Lonsdale School, and Maria White is the head teacher there and she was at our meeting last week and the chair of governors, and I was at her consultation evening last week as well. And we are looking for, it’s quite an exciting change [?], and we don’t know, it may not be feasible because we have big plans for how you can, not exactly join schools, and by the way, this is not a takeover, this is co-location. This is not us taking over any school. This is not another school taking us over. It’s not an amalgamation. It would be co-location of two separate schools in a way which means you maximise dining facilities. [unclear] The problem is you’re always going to look at me and think [unclear], and I know that’s an issue. But

Appendix 1B(i)

it could well be that we can come up with a design which could be world-class. They are the things that are happening and we’re making sure that there are aspects on Lonsdale’s proposal for where they see their future, and our proposal for where we see our future, which include both schools.

MF8 When Lonsdale [unclear] changes, all the teachers have to apply for jobs, and there will be change of head master. I’m just wondering if that’s the plan for these schools going forward because all the children [unclear] the changes, the changes of head teachers and the school structure [unclear]?

JD Well, bearing in mind the long-term plans here, between now and when these new schools open there will be a turnover in staff because there’s a turnover in staff anyway. We would dearly like to hold on to the head teachers we’ve got because we think they’re a very talented bunch and work really well together. They’re a very impressive group and it’s interesting, Partnership for Schools that work nationally supporting BSF are quite open and said they’ve never worked with such a group of heads. Because what we’re doing here is starting with the kids, teaching, learning and then working up the buildings. So we want to hang on to that. We also want to hang on to teachers from the closing Heathcote School, A, because they’re very good, because we’re not closing that school because it’s not a good school. It’s a good and improving school, and B, because they know the kids. So if the children are going, they are the families. Also, because we’re going to need the same number of teachers across the town because we’ll have slightly more kids in the future. So we’re working very hard to hang on to the staff we’ve got whilst the project goes through, but there will be some turnover in staff. You mentioned the primary schools. The head teacher was leaving anyway because he was retiring. So heads do go.

LM But I think the point is that the Longmeadow schools were closing and new schools were opening. In most cases in Stevenage schools the schools are continuing, like Marriotts and so on. So there’ll be no interruptions in staffing contracts at all. They will just carry straight on through.

JD The only exception to that is Heathcote.

LM The exception to that of course is Heathcote.

JD What we would need to do is recruit more staff overall. We think that it’s difficult to recruit staff to Hertfordshire because it’s quite an expensive place to live. But we think this is a very helpful recruitment because the model we’re proposing across the town is something which I think is, from an educational background, very, very exciting. I think it’s going to attract a lot of teachers who have got good careers ahead of them. So we don’t see a problem. The main thing across the Stevenage project is convincing as many Heathcote staff to stay with us and work within the town, which is not going to be easy because they’re going to be angry and frustrated understandably. But we’ll work hard on that.

Appendix 1B(i)

MF9 My question is really about the eight form entry. A lot of the current schools can’t [unclear] forms of pupils. [unclear] and the current schools would want to keep, all at the same time.

LM We are going to be remodelling and refurbishing any school that is not completely new-built, but we’re not necessarily doing it all at the same time, no. There are a couple of reasons for that. One is that whichever private sector company is going to undertake those works is inevitably going to have some capacity that they can use to do that and they might not be able to do all of the work at once. That’s slightly less important than phasing things over transitional arrangements aright. So that, for example, if Heathcote does close, then providing the extra places in other schools to which they might go should be brought on-stream first and other things, if necessary, are done after that. If you take another example, if you take Barclay and Thomas Alleyne next to each other, the ideal thing to do there would be to build the new Thomas Alleyne on the new site first, move the Thomas Alleyne pupils into it, and then when you’re remodelling and refurbishing the Barclay School, the Alleyne’s buildings are there for that period for decant and overspill while the works are being done, and then the buildings can be knocked down, or whatever. So, it makes sense to do some phasing so that the disturbance arrangements for pupils are at a minimum.

JD It’s worth saying that here at Marriotts, is the ideal solution, because the building will go on at the other end of the site, and once it’s built, the fence comes down and the kids move in. It will be an ideal situation really.

MF9 So, when you’re talking about this eight form entry, [unclear] when you move back to the [unclear]. There’s going to be two schools.

LM When would it all finish?

MF9 Because not all children can move in, Thomas Alleyne children are not necessarily going to want to move to a new site, [unclear].

LM Yes, when would it all end? Yes, there will be, as I said, that phasing will work I think, and taking that example, if some parents don’t want to move to the new Alleyne site, although actually a lot of parents live nearer that site than near the current site, but if they don’t, because we’ll have the Alleyne’s building, there’ll be plenty of capacity in the Barclay School if people want to stay, or switch there for example. But if what you’re asking is, when will it all be completed, when will we have this complete set of eight FE schools, I can only make an estimate at this stage, because it’s so far away, but my estimate would be around about 2013. Not that far I suppose, it seems like quite a long way, I mean, I think I’ll be retired actually, but…

MF9 [inaudible]

LM No, you’re absolutely right, so if that’s six years from now, perhaps or thereabouts, so your seven year old would be 13, so still very much in the system, yes.

Appendix 1B(i)

MF9 [inaudible]

LM Of course, but actually of course, you see, by the time you have a decision to make about secondary transfer, at least what is happening will be totally known, which is slightly easier than some parents, who have got to make decisions kind of now, for either next year, or the year after. You’ve got others, have you?

MF9 An eight year old, and a seven year old, so it affects me through the school.

LM I understand that.

MF9 So, I want to know how it’s going to affect.

LM Sure, maybe we can talk afterwards if you want to about particular circumstances and particular children in particular years, and we can maybe work that through.

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Thomas Alleyne 04-06-07 

  Speaker key JB Jonathan BlockJW Jane WiltonLM Lindsay MartinPD Pauline Davis?F Female questioners?M Male questionersJD Justin Donovan

JB [Speaking with no microphone] Good evening everybody. I’m actually not very involved in the proceedings. I’m just here to welcome people and I wanted to welcome our guests... [inaudible] here to facilitate the discussions. I just wanted to give you a quick welcome and say I hope you... [inaudible]. It’s nothing quite like... [inaudible] two, there’s no litter around. If you actually look round there are some fantastic bits of history, 450 years worth of history, as you walk up here. This originally wasn’t the original place of the Thomas Alleyne’s story, in fact its second home. I think that’s quite an interesting thing to remember, but the spirit of the school moved from its original home to this home and it’ll be 450 years old next year and we’ll be celebrating that. But please do, when you walk back out, have a look around and see what a wonderful site this is. It was very, very appropriate for education 450 years ago, that’s what I will say. That’s my comment again to the... [inaudible], whilst trying to run the place there are certain concerns. At that point I’ll hand over to Jane. Thank you.

JW My name is Jane Wilton and I work with a company called Accent who is an independent market research company. I’m a freelance with them. It’s important for me to stress the fact that I’m independent, and the reason that I’m here is that Hertfordshire County Council have asked Accent to help run these consultations to make sure that the consultation process is fair, and that we can actually help your views be heard. I just want to reassure you that it is an absolutely independent role that I will be taking tonight. As you can see I’m wearing a microphone. This is not because I don’t have a loud voice, but because we’re recording this and, again, this is part of the process of the consultation being your views being heard because during the evening obviously some of them will get lost to the panel, and they can go back over the transcript. The transcript will be available, I believe, on the website as has been done in the consultations before. We won’t waste a lot of time on introductions. I’m just going to tell you that the meeting will run till 9pm. We will finish around 8.45 so that if there are any people who want to have an individual word with the panel, they can at that point, but I hope that’s going to give you plenty of time to air your views. So, without more ado I’ll hand over to Lindsay Martin who is going to give you a short presentation about what is actually happening and why, and then we’ll go to an open meeting which I will

Appendix 1B(i)

facilitate. Could I ask you all to turn your mobile phones off, not on silent, but off because apparently if they’re on it interferes with the microphone system and you just get a buzz. Thank you.

LM Thank you, Jane. I think I can hear so I guess you can as well, so I’m obviously wired up for sound. Welcome to this first public meeting in a series around Stevenage. It’s good to see so many of you here on what’s turned out to be a rather nice evening. What I’m going to do is to do the first part of this presentation, and then my colleague is going to take over from me and I will introduce them as I go through the slides.

This is our agenda for this evening; introductions, very briefly what Building Schools for the Future is all about because that’s the context in which this review is taking place. Then my colleague is going to deal with why we need an area review and what our proposals, and then as Jane said, she will facilitate a question and answer session. Who is here from the County Council? Can I introduce Justin Donovan who will wave his hand at you, Deputy Director of CSF and the Chief Education Officer. I’m Lindsay Martin and I do what it says on the slide, and my colleague, Pauline Davis, is the Area Planning Manager responsible for this review in Stevenage.

So, what’s the context for this review in Stevenage in the meetings that we’re having? What’s Building Schools for the Future all about? This isn’t 450 years ago, it’s probably 100 years ago, or thereabouts, and obviously none of you are old enough to remember what education was like then, but that gives you some idea of what it looked like. Some of you may remember some of things, some of the technology that was used at the time. I certainly remember slide-rules, in the bottom right-hand corner and up here. Many of you will remember four-figure tables. Of course, some of you may have been at school since these happened and calculators came in, and some of you may have used the computational machine. Certainly I have colleagues in County Council who, in their early days as accountants, used these, or so they tell me. This is not a very good slide, but this shows you something of what typical post-war school buildings looked like with the sort of flat-roofed, single glazed window walls, often a mixture of buildings, a bit like this site, and that is a pretty typical Hertfordshire, and a fairly typical Stevenage school. This isn’t actually a Stevenage school, it’s in another part of the County, but the schools looked like this. All the secondary schools in Stevenage were built between 40 and 50 years ago, Barclay along here was the first, in the early 50s running through to the Valley Special School in the late 60s, and then additional blocks added to schools in the 1970s, so they’re all 40-50 years old. And, as Jonathan has said, there are certainly issues around their use.

This, again not a brilliant slide, but this is to give you some conceptual idea of modern school buildings, recently built buildings, and the way they are designed. Quite a contrast, I think you’ll agree, from that to that. That transformation, and I stress the word transformation, is what Building Schools for the Future is all about. It’s the major government investment programme in secondary and special schools, funded at over £2 billion per annum. The

Appendix 1B(i)

first area in Hertfordshire to receive funding from this programme is here in Stevenage. Stevenage will get the first wave of funding, and that is about £145 million, which is certainly the biggest investment in secondary schools in the town since these schools were originally built 40-50 years ago. In that sense it’s an exciting, once-in-several-lifetimes opportunity to rebuild and substantially remodel our school stock. It is vitally important, therefore, to get it right because we’re going to be doing this for generations in the future, and so we bear a heavy responsibility to spend that money in the best possible way.

This is the timetable. I’ll go through this fairly quickly. I don’t want to bore you with the technical aspects. There are a number of central government hurdles that we have to get over in order to get our hands on the money, and they’re set out here. Strategy for Change documents which set out the educational vision for Hertfordshire, and it’s important that that comes first, because transformation is about transformation in learning and teaching, it’s not just about transforming our buildings from the rather grotty ones you saw on one side to the rather flashy ones you saw in the next slide. If nothing else changes in the fabric of the buildings, then we won’t have achieved what we want to achieve. We want to achieve a transformation in learning and teaching which this money will help us to undertake.

First of all, we have to submit these documents and then, in this autumn to spring period, we have to set out the detailed business case for how we actually want to spend the money, and only when that is approved, in about March 2008, can we start the procurement process. That is, getting the private sector partner onboard who will actually do the building works. We don’t expect to complete that process and to begin the actual building work until late in 2009. Yes, that is rather a lengthy timetable, isn’t it? But I think you would appreciate that, when government is spending pretty large amounts of public money, it has to do that rather carefully with a number of careful approval stages built into it.

What then is the education vision for both Hertfordshire and particularly for Stevenage? You can read these as well as I can, so I’ll go through them fairly briefly. Obviously, a focus on excellent teaching and effective learning that has to be number 1. Commitment to raising attainment, aspirations, participation including employability, employability of young people, people leaving our education system; schools which lead and serve the community with a range of public services, so it’s not just about teaching learning your people, it’s about schools as a whole community resource which we see they are now, and we hope they will have an enhanced role through the facilities that we would be able to build into new and substantially remodelled school buildings; commitment for promotion of health lifestyles; active participation in sport; a diverse range of specialisms. This is very important that we offer the range of specialisms in conjunction with North Herts College that are appropriate to the aspirations and the needs of young people in Stevenage.

ICT is also a very important element of Building Schools for the Future. There is a dedicated amount of funding just for ICT - it’s actually just over £12.5

Appendix 1B(i)

million - to put in both the infrastructure and the hardware, the actual computers, for ICT provision. That’s quite a substantial sum of money and clearly ICT is a division of information, and future communications technology is vital to the future of our education system, the future that young people would join when they leave school and need to be able to handle in a most competent way.

We also need light, attractive and flexible spaces. We have to build buildings that young people are happy and comfortable to learn in because they’re going to learn better then. We have to have flexible spaces because we’re building for decades to come when, inevitably, things will change. It’s impossible to predict exactly what those changes will be so we want, in the jargon, future-proof, or make as flexible as possible, those buildings so they can respond to changes over decades to come.

What do we need in order to deliver the vision? We have already had a stakeholder consultation process. We have already consulted heads, governors, community representatives, District and County Councillors, and a range of other organisations with an interest in the provision of education in Stevenage. Stakeholders have agreed with us that what we need is fewer mainstream schools with larger sixth forms, and more specialisms big enough to be efficient, flexible yet small enough to support good relationships between students and staff. We need close links between mainstream and special schools. I should say, perhaps at this point, that the Building Schools for the Future funding covers both the mainstream secondary schools and the three special schools, The Valley, Lonsdale and Greenside, that have secondary age special needs pupils in them. We need to develop even closer links with North Herts College. The links are good now but they can get even stronger and improved facilities for the Education Support Centre which is in pretty poor accommodation at the moment.

At that point I will hand over to my colleague to talk about the area review specifically.

PD Hello. As Lindsay said, why do we need an area review? Why can’t we just rebuild the buildings we’ve got? As he said, this is a substantial investment from the government in secondary education in your town. It’s important that we spend that money wisely. It is investment to realise the vision that Lindsay’s just been talking about, it’s not just investment for investment’s sake. It’s there to facilitate the schools in the town, doing the best for the children in the town. Therefore, we need to make sure that we get it right, that we invest that money wisely, and we need to make sure that we have the right number of places in the right locations.

As Lindsay said, what we’ve done before is we’ve talked to stakeholders. We started this review in January of this year, and all of those people that Lindsay referred to, came together on more than one occasion and started thinking about what children in the town would need for the future. What would the students of the future need? What will society be like then? What will learning be like then? What will teaching be like then? Therefore, what will

Appendix 1B(i)

they really need? They came up with a list of possible options in terms of school organisation. They put those together for us and we joined with them in that, and we evaluated those against some tests that our Director devised to make sure that any proposals that came forward were actually robust and would actually do the business in the future. I’ll come back and show what they are in a minute. We then evaluated those against those four tests. We returned to the Director, he had a look at them, and he decided which of those options we would come out to consult you, as the public, about. That’s why we’re here. This is the first public meeting, as Lindsay said, in the town.

I’m not going to read out those four tests to you. Take just a few moments to read them. You’ll see that what they do is make sure that we have what we need in the right place, that it is focused on educational outcomes, that concentrate on students and transition for them and, in this case, obviously have acceptable buildings and design, and for once we have some substantial investment from the government to make sure we can do that.

In terms of the pattern of demand, when we said we want the right number of places in the right locations, the government said to us, when planning for building schools for the future, you need to look to the year 2017, you need to look at least 10 years ahead, at the number of places you need, even though we will be building them beforehand, we don’t want you just to build something for now and then two years later we need to build even more, look far ahead enough in the future. So, in 2017 we believe we will need 48 forms of entry. For those of you who aren’t au fait with a form of entry, that’s 30 students in each year group. That’s a long time in the future. The Audit Commission recommend to us that we make some surplus provision generally anyway, somewhere between 5% and 10%, and that’s to allow you, as parents, an opportunity to express preferences to go to schools other than your local schools. There needs to be a little slack in the system to allow you that flexibility. Those 48 forms of entry includes 10% surplus for those purposes.

With the town, what we know is that the places that we’ve got at the moment are unevenly distributed. We have different size schools. We’ve schools that are just over five forms of entry and we’ve got schools that are nearly eight forms of entry already. We have parents who are frustrated because they can’t get their children into the school that they consider to be their most local school, or the school of their choice. We know that the distribution of places isn’t quite right in the town. One of the reasons is because there has been more housing in the town, and there are areas in the town where there are great tranches of housing with no schools immediately available, and the way our admissions rules work is that those parents can’t get their children into what they consider to be their nearest school. We just need to recognise that there is a large development due on the west of the A1(M), and as part of that planning process a new school has been agreed for that community. It won’t be developed until the community starts to develop, and we don’t expect that to be for some time, but just so that you know that that is planned.

Appendix 1B(i)

Let’s have a look at the town. Not the best slide, I think, but nevertheless, that area there is what I’ve just been talking about, the west of the A1(M), and so there will be a school eventually, some time off, there. You’ll see what I mean about the new housing because all of this is new housing, Great Ashby added on there, Chells round there, Chells Manor round there, and so we believe that that whole community that, at the moment, is so far away from any school that they can consider to be a local school, needs a new school, and this actually identifies here a location for a proposed new school building. I’ll come back to that in a minute.

What are our proposals for mainstream schools in this town? Our first proposal, the proposal that we prefer and the one we want to consult you on, is a pattern of 8 FE mainstream schools. That’s eight times 30 per year group, that’s why it says 240 places. That goes back to the vision that Lindsay talked about before, where all the stakeholders agreed they wanted a smaller number of slightly larger schools. This is a pattern of 8 FE schools, and they’re the schools that we are proposing to be those 8 form entry schools, and for those of you, I know we’re in Thomas Alleyne but there might be the odd person who is not particularly interested in Thomas Alleyne, but for those of you here who are Thomas Alleyne people the significant thing for you is that what we’re proposing is that your schools moves to that new site north east of the town. Fewer schools mean that that some schools will have to close and our proposal is that that’s Heathcote School.

We do have a second proposal, and let’s be clear about this. We are proposing this because we need to because, at this point in time, there is a degree of risk, a small risk, because on two of the school sites we don’t yet own the land required to develop those schools. One of those is a piece of land connected to Marriotts School, and one of those is the new site for the new school. We’re confident that we will achieve those sites, but at this particular point in time it would be unfair of us not to tell you about that element of risk. Therefore, in putting forward proposals to you we have to say, what would happen if, and this is the what-if situation. We’d end up with a pattern of larger schools, 9 and 10 FE schools, and then two schools would need to close, depending whichever of the two sites we had a particular problem on. I must stress we’re not expecting that to happen.

Building Schools for the Future, as Lindsay said, is not just about mainstream schools, it’s also about special schools that cater for secondary age children, so I’ll briefly run through these for you. Obviously, if you have particular queries we can come back to it. For Lonsdale School the options are either to retain it where it currently is, or to relocate it to either the Barclay or Marriotts School sites. For Greenside School the proposal is that the secondary age children relocate with the Barnwell School buildings, and also the primary age students staying in the buildings of Greenside School as it currently is.

For the Valley School we genuinely want to encourage a discussion and a debate about the future of this school. You’ll see here along a spectrum of it can stay as it is to it can close, there are a range of options around that school to encourage that debate and to get to the right solution for that school. I’ll

Appendix 1B(i)

just give you a moment to read that; the things that will be important to you, what are the transition arrangements? What does it actually mean for children, students, staff, and you as parents? In terms of building plans and work, this is quite an exciting time because all the schools will be developing projects, and that students, staff and parents will be involved in the development of those projects, which is going to be quite exciting. Obviously, the building works will be planned to minimise disruption, but we have to say, generally, it’s fair to accept that building works do come with a degree of disruption. It’s how well it’s planned and by planning those projects with you we can make sure we take on the issues for you as best as we can. The other thing which, for those of you connected with this school, will be more important, is that any new school buildings that we’re building we’ll make sure that we can complete them before we try to move any children from the existing schools into the new school. So, for those of you from Thomas Alleyne, if the school moves across to the new site, then you’ll just stay here, carry on as normal, until the building is ready and then you’ll all move over to a new site.

Clearly, for schools which are at risk of closing there are some serious issues to handle. We need to do that very carefully and very sensitively. We need to make sure that we collectively maintain your confidence in the quality of teaching and learning that goes on in those schools until such time as those schools are closed. In that situation, for staff, we will make sure that we involve people in developing those transition plans. As I said, we will work together to make sure that they work to the best advantage. We mustn’t forget that what we’re talking about here is a whole town situation. We talked about needing 48 forms of entry; we don’t have 48 forms of entry at the moment. Pupil numbers are expanding. Although schools may close, it doesn’t mean to say that the children aren’t there that need educating, or the staff won’t be required to teach them, and we need to deal with that. It will be town-wide issue, and the arrangements between schools will be a critical factor in those transition plans. Obviously, as a local authority, we will facilitate redeployment of any staff if necessary. For the students; we’ll work with the schools to make sure those transition plans are very clear and work for them, and that for parents who are worrying about, what will happen if I have to move my child, there will be a contribution towards a new school uniform, if that is needed.

So, we get to the final slide. You may be saying, how would this decision be taken? That’s why we’re here tonight. That’s why we’ve issued a consultation document. We really want to hear your views about these proposals. We’re having these public meetings. You’ve got consultation documents - that has a form on the back of it. Please send them in. You can communicate with us online, by email; a variety of ways. They’re all described in the consultation document. Please be assured that every one of your responses will be made available to the County Councillors, all the County Councillors in the County Council, so that they can see what you have said directly. We will analyse that and interpret that, but they will have every single one of your forms to see, as well.

Appendix 1B(i)

These public consultation meetings are happening right up to the end of the term. The consultation actually finishes on 7th August. A meeting of one of the Cabinet panels, called the Education Panel, which is open to the public. It’s not a public meeting but it is open to the public and you can be present. This will take place on 3rd October where your responses will be analysed and reported back to County Councillors sitting on that panel so that they can take a view and give their recommendations to the Cabinet of the County Council which is meeting on 15th October, again, another meeting which is open to the public. The Cabinet will take a decision whether or not to proceed with any of the proposals, and to publish statutory notices. They are notices that go into the newspaper, they last six weeks, anybody can object to them, and what will happen if there are objections is that the Local Authority, the Cabinet of the County Council, will take that into account when they make their final decision which is likely to be around the end of this year.

At this point we’ll open the floor to questions from you.

JW Thank you very much, Pauline. We’ll now have the open meeting bit where it’s open to your questions to any member of the panel. They’ll pass the questions between them to whoever is the most appropriate person to answer them. Because we’re recording this we’ll have a roving microphone so if you want to make a point, please can you indicate by putting your hand up? If everybody speaks at once, or you speak without the microphone, then it won’t go on the tape and we’d really like as full a record of the meeting as possible. The other thing is that I will try and take as many views as possible, and that might mean going to new people who put their hands up even though you’ve had your hand up for quite a while, if you’ve already made a point, but I will try to get back to you for extra points, so we’ll just pitch in and see how it goes.

We are aware that often these kinds of occasions do rouse quite strong feelings, so if I can ask you just to sit on your hands and wait for the microphone because I will get it to you. Is there anybody who would like to start with a question to the panel? Has anybody got a question?

?F My child is coming up next September and we’ve chosen Thomas Alleyne. When he came home with the form that you sent through the school, he is extremely nervous. He was worried about coming to secondary school anyway. Are you doing anything for the children? Are you going to be talking to them as well?

LM That’s a very good point. We are very committed to involving young people in the process. Young people are the users of the buildings. We are in discussion with a national organisation with a national reputation for involving young people in discussions about the design process. We want the architects to work in schools with both staff and pupils to get their views, to take those on board, to have their own ideas challenged, and I’ve seen that work very effectively. Some very nervous architects being quizzed by pupils about aspects of their design, because they know how their buildings work and they also know what they want. So, yes, we have a strong commitment

Appendix 1B(i)

to involving pupils and staff in that process so that, I hope, that through that process your child will become accustomed to the ideas and the thinking and the notion of a new school and some change. Of course, it’ll be several years through the school before anything actually happens, and he should be well settled, I suggest, here before anything actually starts.

?M Firstly, yes, really pleasing to see new investment into the schools. I was quite disappointed when I visited the schools when my kids were going to move up. It’s about time. However, as a parent of a child that is likely to be affected by this I have a number of questions. You were talking about risk in terms of maybe the new school might not happen, there are two areas to develop; you’ve got Marriotts and obviously the new site. What sort of risks are they, and what is the combinations of problems that you could have, i.e. if you don’t get Marriotts but you do get the new site, how does that affect Thomas Alleyne?

PD Let’s take the Thomas Alleyne one first. The risk to the site is that currently it’s not in the County Council’s ownership. There have been negotiations with the owner and the owner has indicated and agreed a willingness to sell, so we’re confident on that basis, but we do have to get outline planning permission which we’re working on at the moment. Until we can do that there is an element of risk around that. That’s all. If that doesn’t come off then that’s the Plan B, Proposal 2, which would mean that we wouldn’t have a site big enough for this school to expand and this would be a school that the proposal is to close. If we took Marriotts school site we would need to build another new school on the Marriotts site, on a different part of the Marriotts site because it needs to be bigger. The buildings aren’t up to it. The site isn’t quite large enough. Somebody else owns the land that we need to expand that school. Again, we’re working on that. We’re fairly confident that we can achieve that and if that doesn’t come off then it will be Marriotts School that would close. The risk of closure is directly related to the site concerned. But I want to stress that we’re not expecting that to happen, and that’s our fall-back position.

JD Normally when we consult on area reviews like this we can look members of the public in the eye and say to you two things, one, we’re absolutely clear that the proposals we’re putting forward are a done deal, that’s what we can normally say and, two, we know we’ve got the money. It sometimes makes difficult evenings a little easier. On this occasion we would like to have waited for this consultation so that we could’ve got over these risks first, so the fact that we don’t own the land yet, and we’re not the planning authority, means that there is a very small risk there. We’d like to have waited; we can’t do that because in order to draw down the money that Lindsay’s talking about, we need to go through the review process and so we have to run the two processes in parallel. Having said that, we wouldn’t have consulted, we would’ve waited, unless we were pretty confident that we’re going to get this option through. We were talking earlier, Lindsay and I, about the documentation. We felt that rather than call it the officers’ preferred option, in hindsight, we’d like to have called our expected option because we expect this option to go through. We don’t want to be dishonest with you,

Appendix 1B(i)

though, and go out to public consultation and say, we own the land, and we don’t yet, and we’ve got planning permission when we haven’t, so it’s a very slight risk, and it’s a backup plan, but we’re confident that the preferred option is the one that would be developing.

?M What I’m trying to establish is that it’s dead easy to see Great Ashby, Thomas Alleyne, if Great Ashby doesn’t happen you’re closing Thomas Alleyne. What I didn’t quite appreciate was if you don’t get the land to expand Marriotts, does that mean you close both schools or just Marriotts?

PD Just Marriotts.

?M Even though you might not get the land of Ashby as well? So, if Marriotts closes, Alleyne stays here in that scenario?

PD I think what you’re saying, and let’s be clear about this, is what happens if we don’t get both pieces of land? Then we go back to the drawing board.

?M I’ve got a number of questions, if I can carry on.

JW Do please and then if there are any other questions afterwards.

?M You mentioned there are £145 million to spend, I would suggest you’re putting an awful lot of that £145 million into a new school. Wouldn’t that be better spent shared around all the schools?

LM I take your point. There are some rules about this which are not ours but the government’s. The government assumes, in funding Building Schools for the Future, that there will be a mixture of new build and remodelling and refurbishment, and the whole financial equation is based on that central government assumption. It would be extremely difficult for us to get the money at all if all we were doing was remodelling and refurbishing all the existing schools. That would also, of course, not address the need to redistribute places that Pauline talked about earlier. We really do need a site further north because of the large Great Ashby development, and if all we did was to remodel the existing schools we wouldn’t get that pattern of places where the demography demands them, so there are two reasons, really. One is the central government funding rules and the way they work, and the other is the need to distribute places. Also, to be honest, some of our school buildings, Pauline referred to Marriotts, are getting towards the end of their lifespan and in some instances probably remodelling and refurbishing wouldn’t be a cost effective way to spend the money for the future.

?M It’s just when I look round at some of the schools, they’ve actually built new buildings, new wings, and to me that could’ve been the way of sharing.

LM I take your point.

Appendix 1B(i)

?M I want to move more close to home, Thomas Alleyne, potentially is going to move, or close, how do you see that affecting the school? This is a number of things like student intake over the next few years. To me, that would decline.

LM I don’t think we’re expecting that to happen, actually, but I’m happy for colleagues to pick up this as well. I think the expected prospect of a brand new school and all the facilities that that brings will probably be an attractive proposition, as well. Yes, there is a small degree of uncertainty but by the time parents are expressing preferences for future years that uncertainty will be settled. We will know by the end of this year which of these options is actually going to happen. We expect the preferred or expected option to be confirmed, and the other option to drop away, so after that point, parents wishing to choose a school are going to have as much certainty, in a sense, as they have now. I wouldn’t expect it to have a depressing effect on intake.

?M I would’ve thought people would take that into account. They want to get their kids settled in a school. They don’t really want them moving half way through.

LM Yes. Justin?

JD There is experience nationally. There are very few secondary schools been built over the last decade but there have been some built and I’ve been involved in one or two of those in previous jobs. What you find is that once, as Lindsay says, the uncertainty is out of the equation, and certainly as soon as we can during the next academic year that’ll be out of the way. When parents who are selecting a school know that it’s going to have a brand new building, especially when they know it’ll built away from the site so that the children won’t move until it’s finished, it’ll be far less disruptive. History tells us that it’s a magnet to schools. It becomes very popular because parents like the idea of knowing that at a certain point during the school career the kids will move to a brand new site. The year group that it tends to have a fairly neutral effect is the kids who would be moving at the start of Key Stage 4 where parents worry about kids moving in years nine to 10. So, history elsewhere in the country tells us those figures remain about static, but the other year groups that will come into a school knowing it had a new building coming its way, tend to go up and it’s a problem for the other schools. Where we’re lucky in Stevenage is because all the schools that will be put in place will either be new or remodelled. That impact, we think, will even itself out. But the overall experience of new building is that it attracts parents rather than puts them off, especially if the children and those parents are involved in the design of those new buildings, which is a commitment we would give.

JW Do you want to say anything Jonathan?

JB I’m intruding on your territory here.

JW I was just wondering how many points there were.

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JB There are one or two things I’d like to say, to yourself as a prospective parent, we actually wrote to you, I think you should’ve received a letter from me, explaining it and I was trying to reduce some of the fears which I could understand people having and encouraging to be involved in this whole process. When all these meetings have taken place, we plan to actually invite all of our prospective parents, and present parents, to a meeting to discuss again some of these issues. One of the big concerns that everybody has is the fact about transport and that will be a commitment that we would make as a school, or pressure we put on, and I’m well known for putting pressure as much as I can on most things, we’d make sure that transport was put on because I can understand that if you’re here, how do you get up there, so that would be a problem we would look round. As we’ve got the year six-day coming up when the little ones come up, and I will be speaking to allay some of those fears. I was involved. I’m quite lucky. I don’t think it was by a very careful chair of governors selecting, I came from a school which we rebuilt and we were lucky, we rebuilt a school down the road and then decanted into the new school, and the disruption was minimal. Of course there was disruption during the actual few days when we were moving, but it was far better than having builders on your actual site with rooms being closed and all the health and safety issues that go on when parts of the school is being closed down. I think that’s very important to know about. Also, when we were doing some work we looked at refurbishment of some of the older buildings, and it was phenomenally more expensive to refurbish and to change and to restructure an existing school than it was to rebuild it. In actual fact, you still never end up with what you really want. You end up with a good enough rather than a superb opportunity. Ashmore School in North London has become, and it was a very good school, but it became even more popular because people were so excited that we actually had a school designed for the education we wanted to do rather than having to make do with the resources. I think once we actually have a decision made, and that’s around about the Christmas time, it’ll be a very good Christmas present for myself and colleagues and the students here. I’m not going to pretend. Of course I want this school to be rebuilt and redesigned. It will still be this school, it will just be new buildings, and there will be some fantastic teaching and learning going on there. So, I think lots of the problems and lots of the things that concern parents can easily be overcome by listening and talking to you, but also by having the experience from these folks who have had experience of doing these things, and myself and other people around who’ve done lots of this sort of work before.

JW Has your question been answered yet?

?M No.

JW Could we go to him and then we’ll go to the lady with her hand up there, and then we’ll pick up on your other list as we go along?

?M Talking about the transport, my daughter is coming up in September. We live just down the road by John Henry Newman School, right next door to us, really. Could you explain what type of travel arrangements there are

Appendix 1B(i)

going to be because looking at the map there is going to be a very long walk and they cycle, and not so bad in summer, but come the middle of December I don’t really want these two walking home, three, four miles, at four o’clock at night. That is the major worry I have.

PD The County Council and nationally, there are rules about students qualifying for free transport if they live over a certain mileage away. If the move of the school means that your child has to travel further than that rule then you will qualify for assisted travel. What we do when we’re doing this sort of thing is we have close liaison with our passenger transport unit because they’re responsible for the network of buses, either ordinary public buses or specific school buses that serve the schools and the pattern of schools and the pattern of people who attend them. Clearly, we will be working with them quite carefully to make sure that when we’re changing the pattern of schools, they take account of those changes in the bus routes that they have. So, they could potentially change a public bus route, they could lay on more school buses, and if your child qualifies for free transport then they do, and if not, you can have options of buying into those.

JD Just add to that, I’d love to say this was really good strategic planning, but actually what I’m about to say is pure luck. The authority is having a root and branch review of its transport arrangements. The transport arrangements across the County are very, very complicated indeed. They’ve evolved over time and they’re, frankly, difficult for officers, never mind parents to understand. So, we’re conducting that review right now and we’ll be reporting to elected members before Christmas on proposals, and some of the proposals are quite radical. Clearly what we will do is feed in the outcomes of this review into that process so they can take on board. The other thing to say is when you look at where the children live who currently go to Thomas Alleyne, for many of them the new site actually will be closer, so it’ll be more of an issue for some parents than others, and clearly your concern is for your own children, that’s fair enough, but actually where a lot of the children live they do live near the closer site. We will, and already, have made clear that the team that are doing that review, which are partly education and partly environment officers, take into account the Stevenage review is underway. In fact, they’re also taking into account that the future BSF waves will move on from here to well in Hatfield, Hertford and Ware and Potters Bar, so they’re also taking that into account as well.

JW The lady in white there and then I’ll come to you.

?F It’s just another mention about the transport. I actually live, and my children live, in the south of Stevenage and I’ve actually clocked, on my car, from my house to the new proposed site, it’s almost four miles. I’m assuming they will be entitled to transport? How would that happen? Would it be from the town, would it be from here, where would they be expected to get on a bus to get to the new school?

LM It would actually be based on where you live. It won’t be from the town centre. It won’t be from here. Depending on which bus it is, whether it’s a

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public bus or whether it’s a special education route, it’ll be the nearest pick-up point where you live, rather than from here or the town.

?F And that would be back at the end of the school day?

LM Yes, absolutely.

PD And that distance I was talking about that qualifies is three miles.

?M [no microphone]

LM It’s by route.

JD There are some added complications. I don’t want to turn tonight into a transport review, but we will be consulting and it sounds like we need to actually target parents in Stevenage as part of the review. Where, for example, parents on certain levels of income and on certain benefits, get free transport even if they’re closer than three miles to their schools. Also, if the three mile route involves what we think is an unsafe journey, so if we feel in order to walk to school the children having to follow what we think is unsafe so it’s poorly lit, are difficulties, again, we would lay on free transport. So, a number of our children get free transport to school even though they live well within three miles, but we think that the routes aren’t safe, and we have criteria for making those judgements. It’s quite complicated but certainly if you live four miles away then you would benefit from free transport.

PD What we’ve done on other reviews, when we get a bit closer to it because we’re talking quite a few years away now, is we will have specific meetings for parents talking about transport arrangements, routes, and things like that.

JW Can we go to the gentleman here and then to this lady at the front and then come to you?

?M I’ve got two questions. Firstly, my elder daughter is in Year 8 at present and therefore will be finishing her GCSEs when the transition takes place. When we made the decision to send our daughter to this school it was quite a challenging decision with reputations and all sorts of things to take into account of the school but we made the decision because it was our local school, we trusted that Jonathan Block was going to remain in position and deliver what he was talking about when we first came to see the school. I’d like you to give me some detail of the reassurances you can give us as to how you maintain and support Mr Block through the four years so that teachers don’t haemorrhage from the school and/or pupils are persuaded from coming here because they’re uncertain about the future of the school? Obviously, what we don’t want is our daughter to head into her GCSEs with a school that’s fading and dying around her. My concern there is for all her year group and what will be a very sensitive time for them.

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JD As Pauline and Lindsay have been saying, we are talking about quite long term plans here because how long it takes to go through this process, draw down the money, procure the contracts and get the schools built and the children in, so if you’ve got a child in Year 8 at the moment, by the time the new school is built and children are walking through the door, she will have completed her GCSEs and will either be in the school in the sixth form. I don’t know, she might have some younger brothers or sisters but she will be through. So, the disruption she would have would be any distraction caused by the planning of the new buildings and that’s something which we would look to minimise. In terms of supporting the head, perhaps he ought to leave the room, I don’t know, you have a head teacher who is a very difficult person to ignore. The authority see your head teacher as one of our senior, very successful heads and a head other colleagues elsewhere in the County would want to emulate and learn from. He is a head that fights for his school, and we would expect him to putting us under pressure. We would expect that from all of our heads. We will respond absolutely positively because this is a community school, it’s a local authority plan, we are responsible for making it work, and therefore we’ll put all the support in place. We’ll make this, literally, our top priority in terms of making this work for Stevenage. Stevenage has been waiting too long for BSF. It’s been waiting for BSF before I arrived and I’ve been here for three years, and it’s still going to be a number of years before the schools are built, so we’ll do everything in our power to make it work. It’s not just the head here, actually. The head teachers in Stevenage are a very cohesive group that have been brilliant to work with and much of the vision we’re talking about has come directly from the heads who actually are leading on the review in terms of the curriculum of teaching and learning as much as the Authority. I can give you an assurance we will give all that support.

LM I wonder if I could add something about timetable because I think it’s important that we all get a sense of what actual years we’re talking about because I think we may not have made that quite as clear. Can I go back, Jane, forgive my fiddling about? I just want to get back to that slide earlier on. Late 2009 is the earliest that we would expect to start building work, but we won’t be doing all the building at once because it has to be programmed for the construction process, and I think probably not likely that Thomas Alleyne’s new build will be the very first to be undertaken. Sorry about that, Jonathan, and I know you’ll probably argue about that over the next year or so, but I think it’s probably unlikely. But even if it does, let’s say, start in - late 2009 is quite an optimistic estimate – early 2010, two-year building programme – 2012, completion in 2012, something like that which is from now going on for five years on. So, all of you can work out, in a sense, where your children will be in five years’ time. It may be six years, if it’s not actually in the first tranche of building, so I think that maybe gives you an idea of the time scale for the likely opening of a new building. As I say, you can work out how many of your children will actually have left by then or will actually be in their very final years. As it’s a new build, as Justin and others have said, and not a refurbishment, a remodelling, here there should be no disruption while the new building is being built, not in terms of physical disruption, and we’ll be providing support to schools to manage their involvement in the project,

Appendix 1B(i)

obviously that takes school time as well as school staff time as well as officer time, and school staff, Jonathan, governors and his colleagues will want to be involved in that project. I can see the share of governors nodding, absolutely right. We want you to be involved and you wouldn’t let us not involve you anyway. So, there will be some attention given to that new build project by senior staff management within the school, and we want to provide some support to schools to enable that to happen without distracting management attention to running the school which will still be here at the time.

?M But I think the question there is that on the largest project, as part of BSF and Stevenage, the one that’s going to impact most on pupils hopes and expectations will be moving to the new school, and on that one point you seem very vague as to when that could be, and that it’s going to be lower down the programme. So, say my daughter is in school, she’s led to believe that she may attend sixth form there, and then the projects slip then for her and her peer group it’s going to be very disappointing.

LM Yes, I am vague at the moment. I have to be vague at the moment because we are required by government to get through this consultation and reorganisation process before we’re allowed to go out to the procurement stage. Until we get into detailed discussions with the bidders to actually do the work, until we have a construction company on board that can programme the actual building works, I can’t say exactly when that will be. I can give you earliest times, in that sense, but I can’t give you latest times, I’m afraid.

?M For the pupils’ sake, when would they know?

LM We will know somewhere around the end of the next academic year, so at the end of your child’s year nine, I guess.

?M Can I give you my second part? Following on in sympathy with the lady at the front who’s child’s going up in September, we’ve got a child in Year 5 at a local junior school who was very crestfallen when she was informed by her junior school of the prospects for the school that she was looking forward to joining her sister at, what will be done over the coming year to reassure parents like ourselves who’ll be making choices prior to your decision being made. We’ll have to decide by mid-October on something a school that may not even be here for her to go up to. I have huge sympathy for the people who are moving up in September; all the uncertainty there. It seems to be as important for us and what can you say to parents in our position.

JD If I could pick that up. The first thing for this school, by the time we get to Christmas the uncertainty will be when the new school will be built. Compared to other projects that’s quite an exciting position to be in. What we’re trying not to do is mislead. If we were to stand here and say, the children will walk through the doors on September 1st 2011, we know that we can’t guarantee that. By the time we get to the end of the next academic year we can be pretty sure of those dates because our procurement arrangements will be underway. There is an issue about the capacity to do all the building in one go. Just to return to Lindsay’s point, the reason that we would put other

Appendix 1B(i)

schools first, to be frank, is you’ll see from the proposals here that our preferred option, and expected option, is that Heathcote will close, and we’re there on Thursday night. We think it’s fair to say to Heathcote parents, the first buildings that will go up will be the buildings to which your children and your school will go to. We think that’s an important commitment to make. We might not be able to pull that for contractual reasons and land reasons, but our aim would be to relocate those children who will be displaced first because there is a certain level of anxiety there. The thing about uncertainty is to turn it into excitement, so the children in the primary schools, as soon as we’ve got the decisions, we will be talking to those primary schools and to those children, and involving them. If you think of the kids currently in Year 2 and 3, they are the kids who are actually going to benefit most from the schools. The beauty of this project is it’s a town-wide project. Once all the decisions are made we will be working with our primary schools to involve those children in what we think will be quite an exciting project, and build that into some of the curriculum, and the primary heads here I think will be up for that. What we don’t want to do is make this a major distraction to the core business of schools between now and when the buildings open. There is a balance to be struck. There is a letter which is going out, I think, tomorrow, that Keith’s been working on today, to parents of Year 6 pupils just to make sure, if they didn’t get the consultation document, they’ve got it with some points. And, what we’ll try and do for these kids is once we’ve taken the uncertainty out is make it exciting and interesting rather than daunting.

?M So, basically, my last point is that when we come to make our decision in October, if you were sending your child, or expecting your child to come up here, would you still choose Thomas Alleyne knowing that...?

JD Yes, that’s a fair question. I would jump at the chance to send my kid to Thomas Alleyne School. I wouldn’t hesitate partly because I think it’s an excellent school now. Basically what we’re proposing to do is to move the school to the new site. The school really is its staff, its kids, its parents, its governors, support staff, so basically what we’re saying is, it’s the same school moving to another site and welcoming additional children, and I wouldn’t hesitate to send my kids to Thomas Alleyne.

JW Could we have the lady down here then there’s a gentleman at the back there and then this lady here, then I’ll come to you.

?F I’ve got a Year 4 and a Year 1 child. Now the Year 4 wants to come here already. She knows that, which is fair enough. My concern then is the Year 1, when this new school opens, is he going to get the chance to go there or is there going to be some push towards him having to go to Barclay because that’s going to be his nearest school because Lisa [?] won’t be here?

PD No. The admission rules for the County Council mean that your child, because there would be a sibling connection, will gain priority because of that sibling connection. The rules won’t change.

Appendix 1B(i)

JD Can I just add to that? In the long term we expect the pattern to change, so when the school opens, or this school opens on its new site, bearing in mind we’re relocating a school, then there will be quite a lot of travelling up because of the sibling rule, but over the years then we would expect, because the admission rules would kick in, children living near the remodelled Barclay School would tend to go there. But it will take up to a decade for that unravelling, if you like, to take place.

JW Just the gentleman there.

?M You seem to have presented us with a fait accompli, either this school closes or pupils have to move. You say this decision was made by a stakeholders’ committee. Was there any parent representation on this stakeholders’ committee, and who were they?

LM Essentially they were parent governors. We invited parent governor representatives to all the stakeholder meetings. But I should say that stakeholders don’t make decisions. What stakeholders do is to inform the process that enables the County Council to make decisions. So, what we did was to consult. We consulted stakeholders and with their assistance we drew up a larger range of options which the Authority then decided to consult about. The important distinction there is consultation with stakeholders. The decision is ultimately a County Council decision, but parent governors, as I said, from all the schools in Stevenage were invited to all the stakeholder meetings.

?M Unless I missed it, it was the first time I ever heard of any of this when we were given the choices, so I feel it’s somewhat abrupt especially for people like myself who, like the gentleman over there who has a daughter in Year 8, we also live locally. We chose this school on the basis that it was a local school and, despite all the assurances of minimal disruption, from what I’ve heard, I don’t think you’ve got any idea what you’re going to do to minimise disruption for people who live in this area. The fact that he quote that the majority of the students now come from the Great Ashby area, that’s fair enough but they chose this school not on the grounds that it’s about to move, they chose it for other reasons. I don’t think you’re doing very much for the minority so what are you going to do to minimise disruption?

JD I’m reluctant to say this but I think we need to have cards on the table. If parents are living really close here and don’t want to participate and move with the school into its new location, then they can apply to other schools in the area.

?M I don’t want my daughter to go to Barclay, I wanted her to go to Alleyne, and so I’m quite happy with this school. What I’m saying is you’ve given us no choice. It’s move or close.

JD Actually we’re not saying that. We’re not saying move or close because as officers the last thing we want to do actually is close what we think is a successful school and ready to expand. The option we think we’re giving you is to move to the new school which we think should be exciting. I accept

Appendix 1B(i)

there is disruption in terms of the children might have to move further, for other children they’ll be closer. If, on the other hand, parents like yourself object to this and say, actually, this is not what they want we will feed that back into the consultation process. We are expecting, but we might be entirely wrong, that there will be broad support from most stakeholders for what we’re proposing. If we’re wrong about that and we feed that back into the County Council process, members may well say, no we don’t want to do this. So, in that sense, this is a consultation process. But what we’re trying to do here is not just make provision for the children who are currently going to this school, we’re trying to create a pattern for the town as a whole, and clearly we need more provision in the north and less provision in the south. That’s what this is about, really. But if parents don’t want to do that they can either vote against it and make their points known, and we’ve logged your point tonight, and there are options to move to other schools within the town. What we’re looking to do is leave 10% of vacant posts, vacant places within the schools across the town to allow for that parental choice. What we’re hoping is that the great majority of parents who have a lot of trust in Thomas Alleyne will move to a brand new school and all the opportunities that brings, but we accept that some parents might disagree with us on that.

?M No, you’re quite right. I, for one, am quite happy for my daughter to carry on at Thomas Alleyne but it is going to be considerable disruption to her being used to walking to school, and now potentially having to travel. It might not sound like much of a big deal but it certainly will be for her, a child who has been used to a very local school. I’m sure there are a lot of people who live in the old town who are in much the same boat.

JD But you need to bear in mind that for the children who are currently going here, they will have left by the time the school moves to its new site. It’s the children in Years 5 and 6.

?M Well, I think that’s the only saving grace, so I won’t pursue the point any further.

JD If the children currently in the school, we hope that they’ll get involved in the design of the new school, but they’re not likely to be transferring to the new site. The issue you’re making, though, is important if there are younger siblings who would want to follow through. The point is well made and I accept it, and I do accept the point that some parents... there’ll be some difficult decisions, but overall I think what we’re creating is quite an important and welcomed pattern of schools throughout the town.

JW There’s a lady here and then we’re coming to this gentleman.

?F I’m just a bit concerned that you’re shutting our school in the old town where they’re both very well attended and you’re leaving behind a school that’s over-subscribed at the moment. There is a lot of building going on in the old town. There are a lot more flats going up and people moving into the old town. The school that you’re going to leave behind will not be able to cope with it. Where is the overspill going to go? Great Ashby has had a lot of

Appendix 1B(i)

money spent on it and there are a lot of new houses up there. It’s a very affluent area, and they all moved up there knowing there is no school, so they’re all prepared to take their kids wherever they’re going to go. Why can’t you build a new school on this site or something?

PD Take that in order. There are people moving into the old town. As you say, there are flats being built. Our experience is that when flats are built they don’t actually have a lot of children in them. They have some children but not as many as you would expect when there are houses. Our projections of the pupil distribution in the town, and we’ve planned this quite carefully, was to make sure that we’ve got the right number of places to serve the resultant communities. We’re fairly confident, because we will be expanding Barclay School, that there will be enough places for the children in this part of the town. Because we’ve got such an uneven distribution of places, people are travelling quite a way to come to different schools, and therefore when we improve the pattern, when we get more schools closer to where people live, people won’t have to travel so far, so we expect that a redistribution of attendance to schools, as Justin said, sometime in the future but it will work its way through. In terms of the people at Great Ashby, yes, they’ve moved to new housing and, no, there isn’t a school there, but that doesn’t mean to say that those people shouldn’t have a school within reasonable distance just like everybody else in the town. In terms of building a school on this site, it’s not possible to expand this school and to expand Barclay School because there isn’t enough land to do that, so we feel that, A, we don’t need two 8 FE schools to serve the community and, B, we couldn’t achieve it if we wanted to.

?F I’d like to disagree with you there because I think there are a lot of children in this area and a lot of people coming to these schools and need the schools round this area, and the places. I don’t think Barclay’s can be expanded that much more to cope with it all. Can I ask what your plans are for Barclay?

PD Barclay School will be an 8 FE school, and the buildings will be expanded and improved to facilitate that. We’re not intending for them to use the buildings of this school. We will be basing new buildings and extended buildings around their existing school, but we will be expecting that school to use most of the playing fields of this school, because the more children you have the more land and playing fields you need.

?F Will you be building on this land when it’s all finished so there’ll be more houses going up here?

PD That’s still to be decided. As Lindsay said, it’s quite a long term prospect. There may be a part of the site, and we’re open and honest with you, that could be redeveloped, but not all of it.

?F So we’re going to be back to the old problem of not enough spaces for people in the old town if it happens.

Appendix 1B(i)

JD Just to add to that, you need to bear in mind, as Pauline was saying, flats tend not to generate lots of children of school age, some but not a lot. We have a general rule of thumb that to generate 30 kids a form of entry you need to build in excess of 1,000 houses. Even if part of this site is developed sometime in the future, those kind of numbers will not be generated with the land available because they’ll only be able to be built on what is brownfield, the footprint, where the buildings and the hard play areas are, so it’s not going to generate that many. You also need to bear in mind we’re going to expand Barclay in terms of the number of places offered, and also you need to bear in mind that the numbers we’re talking about allow 10% vacant places throughout the town. Even though the numbers are going to rise slowly over the town by 2017, there will be 10% places available. The schools will be bigger, so we think Barclay will certainly be able to more than cope. What we’re trying to do is create a pattern of schools which reflect where children live and where the developments are coming up. We’re very confident in our predictions. We get questioned about our figures and our forecasts time and time again because they are very important. You need to bear in mind two things, one, where we’ve carried out school area reviews in the past and people have questioned our figures, our figures have proved time and time again to be pretty accurate, certainly well within the 10% we’re leaving behind. Also, we’ve had our forecasting systems looked at time and time again because they are, quite rightly, under close scrutiny, and they’re accurate within plus or minus 1% which is pretty good. It’s certainly well within what we would expect, so they’re good forecasting figures. You need to bear in mind, for secondary schools, it’s pretty good data because of the children already exist; we know where they are, we know where they live, and then we can predict other housing developments. So, the forecasts we think are very accurate and there will be sufficient capacity within Barclay to cover the points you’re raising.

PD One of the points just worth mentioning is that people often suggest that what you’re doing is not leaving enough spare capacity in the system, and we believe the places we’re creating will do. What we’re also making sure of is that the sites are large enough so that should there be future expansion there will be the opportunity to expand those schools even further. It’s not what we’re expecting to happen, but should it happen, then there will be the capacity to add more places to meet that demand.

JW Sorry, excuse me, could you wait for the microphone a moment, please, because it won’t be heard.

?M [inaudible - no microphone]

JW Could you just wait? There you are, now you can...

?M The question was, can this school be expanded, but before I take up on that point, I’d like to just say I’ve had four children all who have been through Alleyne and we chose the school because of the architectural diversity of the school and the fact that the school was small, over and above the equally excellent school of Barclay where friends of my children have

Appendix 1B(i)

equally performed well. Fortunately for us our children will be out of this school by the time all this, I think, fiasco takes place, and I do feel sorry for anybody whose children are coming into this, especially if they’ve chosen this school two or three weeks before the announcement that it’s potentially going to close or move. But, notwithstanding that, the question that was asked by the lady here, which I think deserves a better answer, is whether this school could be expanded. As far as I know no one ever tells us the exact boundary and land ownership of this school. They playing fields are immense over there and there are further playing fields further over that is prime residential land. I suspect that’s what is driving this whole decision with this school. There is plenty of land for this school to expand double the size it is now and be incorporated with Barclay, it could be one of the largest schools in the country. But to suggest this school is short of land is ridiculous.

PD Let’s be clear about this. I wasn’t suggesting that the land associated with this school isn’t large enough for this school to expand. What I was suggesting is that we believe we need one school to serve this part of the town, that we believe that needs to be an 8 FE school, and that we don’t need two 8 FE schools, and it wouldn’t be possible to expand both schools. So, you may then ask, why move Thomas Alleyne and not move Barclay? The reason is that you’re right about the architectural diversity on this site. There are some very, very old buildings that, quite frankly, aren’t suited to education in the 21st century.

?M [inaudible – no microphone]... too old. It’s patronising. Sorry to say that this school and the age of the buildings have nothing to do with the educational development of a child. I’d like also to know, in the same token, we hear about these stakeholders, but which educationalist have advised the County Council that to build bigger and bigger, larger schools is better for the education of the child, when everyone who knows anything about education development, the smaller the school and the smaller the classes, the better the outcome.

JD I think we just need to separate facts from emotion here. This is one of the first schools I visited when I came to Stevenage, and yes, it is an interesting site but it’s not a coherent site, it’s not a site coming anywhere close to the quality of a what a new building could be. Can I just finish the point, because I did listen carefully, and we might have to disagree on this. It’s an interesting site, it’s a welcoming site, there are some fascinating characteristics to it, but in terms of good open spaces, good communal areas, a school which has coherence to it, really good sporting facilities, a bigger hall than this, the site actually will be difficult to develop and deliver a site which is up to the quality of the 21st century. I have to say, because Thomas Alleyne will get a brand new built-from-scratch school it is in a better position to some other schools in the area. In terms of the size of school, 8 forms of entry is not a big school. If you look at the national pattern of secondary schools throughout the country, Hertfordshire is unusual in that it has a lot of small schools, and what you’re suggesting in terms of standards, actually doesn’t stack up. There are as many good schools in terms of high quality standards as there are very large schools. Twelve form entry schools will deliver the

Appendix 1B(i)

same kind of standards in terms of GCSE results as 6 form entry schools. We’re not suggesting 12 form entry, but there are schools that big. There are advantages and disadvantages to both. One of the big advantages to 8 forms of entry or bigger is it generates a Key Stage 4 cohort which makes it financially feasible for the secondary schools in Stevenage to spend a lot of money on vocational options at Key Stage 4. They tend to be more expensive than, say, maths and other areas. It’s difficult, unless you get up to 8 forms of entry, to generate the budgets you need to lay on the kind of vocational courses which a number of the children in Stevenage would really benefit from. It also has an impact on sixth form numbers. As soon as you start having 8 forms of entry or higher, the numbers in your sixth form go up, and what that does is release hard cash into the school’s budgets because the fixed costs don’t go up that much between 6 and 8 forms of entry. They go up but not that much. So, the budget of the school goes up and a greater proportion of the money can be spent on additional staff, teaching materials, and the rest, so 8 forms of entry is not a big school. It’s a standard size school and has a lot of advantages to it. We have looked at the research, obviously. We have experts in terms of our own Education Department, and we have consulted widely with the headteachers.

?M [inaudible – no microphone]

JW Okay, thank you. Excuse me. Could we have some other points because I think at the moment you’ve had an opportunity to make several points. I’ll come back to you a little later.

?M [inaudible – no microphone]

JW Could we have just one final point?

?M With the Great Ashby development, when the planning permission was applied for and a master plan was submitted to the Council and to Herts County Council, there was no mention in that planning application or the master plan, of a need for another school in that location.

LM That’s because master plans deal with additional schools. We’re not proposing an additional school here. What we’re talking about is moving an existing school to a new location, so it wouldn’t, therefore, have featured on a master plan which is about new facilities.

?M [inaudible – no microphone]

LM Far from knee jerk, we’ve been considering it for very many years. As I say, the master plan would’ve shown new community facilities where they’re necessary, though, fact we have sufficient school places in our existing system for the Great Ashby children because they’re going to our schools now. That is not to say that the schools are necessarily best located at the moment. The population pattern in Stevenage has changed and our secondary schools, of course, have remained exactly where they’ve always been for the last 40 or 50 years, so we haven’t kept pace in that sense with

Appendix 1B(i)

the changing pattern of accommodation and houses in the town. We’re not actually suggesting a new community facility for Great Ashby with a moved school better to reflect the pattern of demand.

JW Thank you very much. If you’ve got any more points you can raise them with the panel perhaps later. This gentleman here has been waiting. Has your point gone? Your point’s come and gone. There’s a gentleman over here, and then we’ll come to you.

?M A similar thing really, I’m very suspicious that bigger schools are even better for our kids because you talk about being more efficient which, to me, means cheaper to run and you can save money and make money out of selling off the old properties, and so on. It’s not that I’m suspicious but that sort of thing, in a sense. What I really want to know is where the money is coming from [unclear – due to shuffling papers] private sector partners? Now does that mean that the money is not actually coming from government or at least not all of it, that private companies are getting involved or investing in our schools, which presumably means if they’re investing they want a return, they want to make a profit out of it?

LM The answer is no. No private sector money. All the money is government money. It may be topped up with some County Council money, but all public money. The private sector partner’s involvement is in the actual construction process, in actually building the schools as a partner with the County Council, but they won’t be putting in any money. They’ll be taking some risks involved, like if they’re late there will be penalties, that kind of thing, but they’re not putting in any of the £145 million that I referred to at the beginning. That’s entirely public funding.

JW The gentleman in blue over there.

?M Thank you. I just have a couple of points. Out of £145 million you say that’s going to be available, how much of that will actually be put towards building the new school, and in the next five years, how much money will be going into this school, bearing in mind that you’ll be closing it down, or the proposal will be to close it down? Will the buildings be falling to ruin and will there be no facilities available for the children that are already here?

LM It’s something akin to planning blight. I know that if you’re about to rebuild something and you don’t spend a vast amount of money on something that, in a few years time, you’re going to knock down and rebuild. Jonathan and I know the chair of governors will make sure that the County Council maintains the existing buildings to the standard which is necessary because, clearly, until the new building comes on stream, many of your children would’ve served out their entire education career in these existing buildings and, therefore, they deserve the standards appropriate to the whole of their education. We won’t let these buildings fall down, we won’t let them deteriorate and we won’t allow that the facilities become unusable during that process. I think what you’re asking, if I’ve got it right, is how much money will go into the new building on the Great Ashby site. I can only give you a very

Appendix 1B(i)

broad rough estimate but it’s going to be in the region of £25 million or thereabouts. It’s £133 million capital expenditure for buildings and £12.6 million for ICT. Of the £133 million I would say about £25 million will build the new school, approximately.

JW Just prior to going to this gentleman here, [inaudible – no microphone] and then back to you. Is there anybody who hasn’t asked a question who wants to? Right, I’ll come to you in just a moment. I’m conscious that time is rolling on.

?M Just a very brief question. Would this decision be changed if there’s a change of government in the next two or three years, or is it something that is earmarked and set in concrete?

LM That’s a very good point. We’re worried about that as well, of course, because we’re expecting to get the money and spend it here. As you know, there is a comprehensive spending review of government expenditure every two years, and that’s happened as far as the tranche of money is concerned for here. The money for Stevenage is earmarked for the year 2008/9. That’s the financial year in which the money is made available. We won’t start building until late 2009, perhaps the beginning of 2010 even, but the money is allocated to us in the government’s 2008/9 spending year. So, in that sense, that’s not likely to be under any threat because there certainly won’t be an election, as it were, and change of government in time to affect government spending plans that start next April. After that subsequent waves of funding within Hertfordshire for other parts of the County may be more at risk, but I think Stevenage is pretty much 100% assured.

JD That’s a very key point. It’s just one of the reasons that the Authority made very aggressive bid, if you like, to get into Wave 4 at the expense of other authorities because we were concerned that a change of government or future spending reviews might cut the tail off the BSF programme, so the earlier we’re in the more of Hertfordshire gets access to the money, and so, in a sense, Stevenage has benefited from that because it’s been brought forward a few years.

JW Gentleman here and then the gentleman... [inaudible – no microphone]

?M I just wanted effectively repeat a question that’s been asked more or less twice, once by the guy over there and once by the guy behind me. I’ll ask it in a slightly different way. If this school was not going to move or close, how much would you have invested in it over the next five years? Will you maintain that investment even though this place is going to close? That, to me, will affect my children’s education if it isn’t.

LM We will certainly maintain investment. How much we would’ve spent if things were going to remain exactly as they are now, if nothing else was going to happen, how much we would spend is a very, very difficult question to answer. The reason it’s a bit difficult... [overtalking]

Appendix 1B(i)

?M But normally you have five-year plans, surely, on investment?

LM No, actually.

?M You do...

[overtalking]

LM We don’t and the reason we don’t is that government only provides us with capital funds on a two-yearly cycle, believe it or not. So, we only know how much capital grant we’re going to get from government for two years at a time.

?M So you don’t make any plans longer than two years?

LM Well, we don’t make plans. What we do have is a set of priorities. In other words, we do surveys of the existing buildings. Every two or three years we do condition surveys of all of our buildings out of which we draw up a priority list... [overtalking]

?M No, that’s maintenance. I mean investment. Things like new lab systems. Would you bother to fit a new lab system in the school if you knew it was going to close in two years?

LM I thought you were asking me about expenditure if things stayed if as they were.

?M No, I’m on about if things stayed as they were, i.e. the school was staying here, how much would you have invested in the school for its future? Will you still maintain that investment even though it’s going to close?

LM No, not in the sense of...

[overtalking]

?M ... affect our children’s education.

LM Well, I can’t guarantee that any significant money would have been spent whether the school was going to close or not, because it would depend on competing priorities from the other 81 secondary and middle schools in the County that also need work... [overtalking]

?M Don’t you think you’re skirting around the question?

LM No, I’m not skirting around the question. I’m trying to give as honest an answer as I can. There are more competing priorities County-wide than we have capital funds to meet. That is the case every single year. So, every single year some schools are successful in getting some projects, others are not. The far greater number are not. We can only scratch the surface, really,

Appendix 1B(i)

of the things we need to do with the capital money that central government makes available to us as a County Council. That’s quite a competitive process, and it’s a process that is reviewed every year. Our priorities for spending are reviewed every year.

?M I’ll ask the question differently. This place is going to close, will its priorities for funding decline?

LM From this point, no, they won’t decline from this point.

JD Yes, can I chip in? I think there are two issues here, there is one about maintaining the existing buildings, updating the IT, those kinds of issues, that’s unaffected because the school will continue. It’s unaffected for two reasons, one, a lot of that funding is actually delegated for the school in the first place. In terms of decorations and upkeep of the school, that’s money in the school’s budget, and so the school will continue to do that. Where it will change is if this school, let’s say in two or three years’ time, the school was to say, actually, we need a whole new maths block, or, we need a whole new set of science labs, then that is something we would not be building. If you’re a school in Watford, which is 12 years away from BSF, their argument would be, hang on a minute, you’re going to build them a brand new school with a brand new science block in it in a few years’ time, we’ve got a decade to wait, you should start with us. So, there are two issues, one, what we wouldn’t do is invest in any very large capital projects in the school, complete new buildings. What we would do is maintain the existing commitments we’ve got to the school to maintain it as we go through. So, there are two separate issues. I think Jonathan wants to make a point.

JB Just to add to that. We do get in our budget a certain amount of money and I can assure you if it gets reduced significantly over the next few years, then I’ll be making a big fuss and bother about it because we have to maintain this school and keep things going. Also, I will not allow something that affects the learning that goes on in the school. We’ve had a lot of investment, we’ve built a brand new... we’ve probably got the latest food technology labs, only opened a year and a half ago. We’ve got a new reception area which we’ve done in-house because we actually have a builder on site, and so we can do lots of our own work very cheaply within the site. We’ve got a new reception area for the students which, again, was paid for by the Authority because of the Ofsted report saying our reception was appalling.

?M [inaudible – no microphone]

JB I absolutely agree. We are going for specialist school status and so there will be a large amount of capital money coming in, £150,000-odd worth for capital works. We would not, as a school, because when we go to the DfES and say, our plans are to put up a new environmental study centre, they would say no you can’t do that. But what we will be able to do is to use that money to facilitate the improvement of our standards in science and sport which are going to be our key areas, and we’ll make sure all the facilities are. We have to make some tough decisions and that we will do, but we will not

Appendix 1B(i)

allow anything to happen, but if I went into a lab and it was inappropriate for teaching, I would be calling Justin and I’d be calling John Harris, I’ll be calling all of them down, which I do, and say, we can’t deliver the education here, and it would be impossible for them not to support and make sure. What they won’t, perhaps, do is to gut an entire suite of rooms and put them in. I have to be financially aware as well. I can see other schools. I have a view of other schools in Stevenage, other schools further afield but I won’t allow there not to be things. I won’t allow the place to be falling down. I won’t allow the toilets to become more and more inappropriate and all that sort of thing. I’ll be still chasing the same people for funding to keep things up. Your child is here now and somebody who won’t give a monkey’s where we’re going to be, is where they are now. I said to Justin when I first met him, would you send your kid to this school? That’s how we should be judging it. I’m a dad and I know I wouldn’t want my children going to a school that I thought was going downhill, and that’s how I measure it every time. Not what’s in the best interests of the parents necessarily, or in the best interests of the teachers, but what’s in the best interests of the children, having their one opportunity at this school.

?F [inaudible – no microphone]

JB Yes. I think what we’re doing now is good anyhow and we’re doing lots of work and lots of changes to the curriculum, and after four years, we’re actually beginning to really get this school back where it should’ve been. The other thing is, you talked earlier on about teachers and people, people want to come now to Stevenage because of the fantastic things that are going on in all the schools in Stevenage, and Building Schools for the Future will actually encourage teachers, I think. Maybe not this year, but in a few years’ time. I have friends at the London Academy and when you see the facilities there and what they can offer there, the range of things, mind you they did spend a bit more than £24 million, but London Academy what they can do there. Ashmore, we spent not nearly as much as £24 million. Again, the things we can offer the young people it’s like a dream. I know there are emotional attachments to this school. I love it. I never believed I’d be in an office 450 years old. I’m a simple North London lad, and to be in this Tudor building is fantastic, but it’s not appropriate, and I know people say it is, for this type of education. What we have to do is make do and teachers have always made do with facilities. We’ve even decorated our rooms. I used to plaster rooms to have teaching because we couldn’t do it. To actually have the opportunity of having a brand new school for this school, because it’s just a replacement somewhere else, and for the refurbishment of all the other schools, I think it’s absolutely fantastic and it will only do what’s been happening, this spiral of education getting better and better in Stevenage.

JD Thank you, Jonathan. Can I just add to your point in terms of reassurances, the kind of investment we’ve been making in this school site that Jonathan is referring to, we’ve been making those investments knowing then that BSF is coming. We’ve known about BSF for some years and we’ve kept the same investment up in the Stevenage schools. We haven’t reduced the investment in Stevenage schools at all, even knowing that we would be

Appendix 1B(i)

making some major choices about sites. Hopefully that’s sufficiently reassuring.

?M Leaving those schools is a good idea. I think it is needed. It’s time it was invested. I said that earlier on, but my children won’t see the benefit of it. My concern is their education here.

LM I understand that.

JW Thank you very much. [inaudible – no microphone]

[overtalking]

?M It’s just a question for Lindsay Martin. You said earlier on that the money will be coming from government funding as well as maybe top-ups from the County Council, I was wondering what percentage from each of those, how much from government and how much from the County Council?

LM The vast majority will be central government. Until we know... [overtalking]

?M You don’t have a figure or...?

LM In terms of top-up, no I don’t have a figure. It’s difficult to say until we get to the outline business case agreement with central government which will be about February next year. Using historical examples of authorities that are earlier in the BSF programme than we are, they contributed up to about 10%.

?M That’s the Council about 10%.

LM Yes, up to 10% has been the historical figure. Whether that will be the case in Hertfordshire in how many years’ time... [overtalking]

?M And if it was to go over would the County Council be expected to finance that, or would the government pay?

LM We’ve been expected to finance an element of it in any case, part of the core money will have to come from the County Council, and a possible top-up if our agreed plans for Stevenage exceed the amount of money that central government are making available.

?M So the tax payer could end up paying the extra money.

LM Well, the tax payer is paying for all of it anyway because it’s all public funding whether it comes central or local it doesn’t make a great deal of difference. I would have to say that the County Council is committed to keeping the project for Stevenage within the funding element which is available. In other words, we will be attempting, to the best of our ability...

?M That goes without saying, doesn’t it?

Appendix 1B(i)

LM Of course. Actually we don’t have millions of pounds sloshing around in a capital budget in Hertfordshire to top up the scheme. It’s going to be tough for us to do that, so there is a strong incentive to keep it within £146 million which is available. But in the nature of these things projects of that scale over that time period there is inevitably some movement.

JW Thank you very much. [inaudible – no microphone]... is there anybody else who has some really interesting question, but is there anybody else... [inaudible – no microphone] at this point? If not, what I suggest is that we close the... [inaudible – no microphone] this meeting and if any of you wish to continue to debate or... [inaudible – no microphone]. Thanks very much.

Appendix 1B(i)

Thomas Alleyne 2 20-06-07 

Speaker key JW Jane WiltonJB Jonathan BlockLM Lindsay MartinKH Keith HuttM? Male speaker from floorF? Female speaker from floor

JB Down that end at the 450 year old ones. If you come up here they get less and less interesting. Actually the 450 year old ones are sometimes in better condition than the more modern ones that were moved into about ten years ago. I just want to say welcome and now I’m going to hand over to Jane who is the facilitator this evening. I just thought I’d tell you something. Last night I went to Barnet, where I live, and I went to a forum for local residents where there was a meeting because Barnet had removed all its sleeping policemen because [unclear] if you remove sleeping policemen ambulances will get to the hospital quicker. Which is the same as the government saying, slow vehicles down because you might survive if you get hit. So I suppose if you let the cars speed up and they kill people it wouldn’t matter how fast the ambulances get places. But that’s not the point apart from the fact that I’m not happy with the policy because I have children, my own children near that area, and cars go up and down the roads near us. The thing that I was amused at, they removed the bollards and now they then sent out a consultation to see if we wanted them moved. So I asked the question - how come you’ve only done the consultation after you’ve already done it? And they said, oh, well. And I said the other thing is having done that and said at the consultation that we all replied, you haven’t told us what the result of it was. And they all looked at each other and said, haven’t we said that? No, nobody said that. And one guy said we’ve run out of money so we can’t send the results back to you. Why the hell are they bothering with the consultation? One it’s already done and two they weren’t giving us the feedback anyhow. And would they, if we all said we wanted the sleeping policemen, would they spend another couple of million pounds to put them all back in? I’m pleased to say Hertfordshire doesn’t quite work that way. There are a few [unclear] I could tell you about Hertfordshire that perhaps would be along those lines but I’m not going to do that tonight. I just want to say that I’m pleased that we’ve had lots of arguments and discussion about the possible proposals. The heads have fought hard and had many, many discussions, and now there is a proposal on paper I’m very pleased that there is an honest – and I do believe it’s going to be an honest consultation exercise, and then some decisions to be made. And people are genuinely listening to what you have to say and I hope generally listening to what I have to say. So please, if you have questions and worries and concerns, I know which of those proposals I’m very much in favour of, our school buildings aren’t suitable for education today. They were suitable for education 450 years ago but they’re certainly not suitable for today. We make them work

Appendix 1B(i)

and we do very well to make them work in the conditions we have to. But to have a purpose built building – that’s not the one, my picture’s not in there, that’s why I’m worried, I’m not there. But having a new school is something I’m going to be supporting. I’d better shut up then in case I’m accused of being biased. [unclear]

JW My name is Jane Wilton and I work with an independent research company called accent and we’ve been asked by Hertfordshire County Council to come and help them with these meetings and to facilitate these meetings. The reason being that I’m totally independent. Accent is independent of the council and we’re here to make sure that your voice is heard and that the consultation is run in a fair and proper manner. We’ll start the evening with a presentation that Lindsay Martin will begin and then after that’s finished we’ll have an open session where you can actually ask questions and the panel will answer them. That will run to about 8.45 and then after that you’ll have time if you want to go and talk to people individually. As you can see we’re all miked – is that somebody’s phone? We’re all miked up and can I just tell you that mobile phones don’t help the miking system, they interfere with it. So if you can just make sure that your phones are off properly unless you need them on silent for babysitting or some such purpose. But they do interfere. Anyway, the point is that we’re recording this and it will hopefully, possibly, be streamed on the web, on the Hertfordshire County Council website. But there will definitely be a transcript and that again, is something that councillors can access and see so that there will be a record of what goes on this evening. So without more ado I will pass you on to Lindsay to kick off the presentation and I’ll come back and run the open meeting. Thank you.

LM Thank you Jane. Okay. Can you hear me in the background? Excellent. Welcome again. This time on behalf of the County Council. It’s good to see you here this evening at the second of these consultation evenings at this school. As Jane has said if I snuffle it’s the hay fever. I’m not infectious, it’s hay fever, it’s a bad day today. We’re going to do this, I’m going to do some introductions, I’m going to talk about the future which is the context within which the review of provision in Stevenage is happening. My colleague Keith will then talk about why we need an area review and what our proposals are and then the bulk of the evening will be a sort of question and answer session.

I’m Lindsay Martin; I’m head of school planning and the program director for Building Schools for the Future. And my colleague, Keith, is a member of the team who is working on the detail of the review in Stevenage. We have reviews in a number of parts of the county and Keith has been working on the review of Stevenage. And we’ll be presenting the County Council’s proposals and between us we will try and answer your questions. So, building schools for the future. If you were here last time, I’ve done this before. So if you’ve come twice you’ll get bored.

It’s not actually 450 years ago – I haven’t got a picture, because they hadn’t got pictures 450 years ago – I might have had a painting or a drawing but I

Appendix 1B(i)

couldn’t actually go back as old as the school. But here’s a picture of Victorian education of 130, 140 years ago actually. And nobody in the hall remembers what that was like! But some of you may well remember some of the things that we used a little more recently than that. Slide rule, Grant Thornton’s slide rule. I certainly had one when I was at school. I was never very good at working it mind. There’s a slightly more detailed version. Does that say Woolworth’s up there? No, it doesn’t, it says something else. Smith’s or something. An early calculator. I’m not sure that calculators – they barely came into school when I was there. I do remember somebody telling me that one day calculators would be cheaper than shoes. I couldn’t believe it. It seemed amazing. Now the price reversal is complete, in a relatively short space of time. Some of you may remember four figure tables. I think I do. I was never very good at using them. And 40 or 50 years ago, this slightly murky picture, I apologize that the picture isn’t a bit clearer, this is what our schools looked like all over Hertfordshire. This isn’t a school in Stevenage; it’s somewhere else in the county. Lots of flat roves, lots of window walling. All looking a bit tatty now, basically. The schools in Stevenage were all built between the early ‘50s and the late ‘60s. First was Barclay and the last was The Valley. They’ve all had blocks or additions added on since then but the original buildings were built between the early ‘50s and the late ‘60s. And they’re all in this flat roofed, window wall, steel frame construction. And they’re all ageing at the same sort of rate and are now 40, 50 years old. They could look like this. I’m not sure if this is Jonathan’s one. We haven’t got as far as doing a design for a new school yet, in fact we certainly haven’t. And indeed this isn’t an actual school; it’s a picture of what an exemplary new school can look like. The department for education and skills commissioned a number of leading architects to design what they called exemplar schools. And this is an example of an exemplar design. You won’t find any of those in Hertfordshire yet. Yet.

So what is this Building Schools for the Future program? It’s the government’s major capital investment in secondary schools and special schools with secondary age pupils in England. At a cost of about ₤ 2.2 a year. Which I thought was a huge amount of money until I discovered how much terminal five at Heathrow had cost. It was ₤ 4.3 billion. It set me wondering on how you could spend so much on a single building but it’s very, very sophisticated apparently. And I won’t go into the whizzy design features that terminal five has got. But 2.2 billion sounds a colossal sum of money but when it’s divided up around the country it’s very significant but not absolutely enormous. And the first wave of that funding in Hertfordshire is in Stevenage. It’s ₤145 and that includes a specific sum of ₤12 million in recognition of information and communications technology. In recognition of the importance that ICT has in the future. So it’s an incredibly exciting opportunity for us and for everybody, all pupils in all schools in Stevenage to benefit from a hugely improved physical environment.

And of course we’ll be building these schools for generations to come. The last school built in Hertfordshire, a brand new secondary school building in Hertfordshire, was in 1975, 30 years ago. So this doesn’t happen very often

Appendix 1B(i)

so there’s a huge burden on us to get it right. Because if we don’t spend that money in the best possible way we won’t be doing future generations of pupils any favours at all. And that weighs heavily actually, it’s very important. And you don’t get ₤145 million of government funding without quite a lot of red tape attached to it, quite a lot of strings attached as you might imagine. So it’s a pretty lengthy process. We were told that we were in this particular round of funding in December of last year, late December, just before Christmas actually. The 20th. I remember it well. Because we were waiting for the announcement with bated breath I suppose. By April we had to submit the first of a series of documents for government approval in order to get the money which has been earmarked. We have to do a further submission in October and then a third one around February, March next year. And only after that can we begin the procurement process, which is the process of tendering to get a private sector partner who will do the actual construction work. We can’t start that process until we’ve been through these stages. And that procurement process will take some time. And we don’t expect to actually put a spade in the ground or whatever one does first on a building site, and you can see that I’m not a buildings professional, I’m and educationalist, we don’t expect building work to begin until late 2009. Possibly even early 2010. It depends how quickly the process goes. But really that’s enough about buildings, because in a sense the buildings are only a means to an end, aren’t they. They are the means of providing education so that pupils can achieve. They’re not the end; they’re simply the means to an end. So we have to start with the education. We don’t start with the buildings, we have to start with the education and then the buildings have to fulfil what it is that educationally we all want to do.

So with that in mind we have engaged with headteachers and a range of other stake holders, but particularly headteachers in Stevenage, for developing a vision of what we and they want in terms of teaching and learning, in terms of the educational process. And we’ve done that first and indeed that is what the government requires us to do first. And that vision includes a focus on excellent teaching and effective learning. A commitment to raising attainment. Schools which lead and serve the community. The range of public services. Commitment to healthy lifestyle and participation in sport. A diverse range of specialisms including vocational ones. I mentioned the importance of information and communications technology earlier. A way of providing more personalised study for individual pupils. Providing community access to learning programs. All sorts of possibilities. And last but not least, light, attractive and flexible spaces in which all of that can take place. The buildings need to be light, attractive, good places to be. Places where both teachers and children want to be and can achieve in. And flexible because if we’re building these buildings for the next 20,30,40,50 years, then they need to be flexible enough to accommodate changes in teaching and learning that might happen in 20 or 30 years time, which it is well nigh impossible for us to predict now. Because who would have guessed when they were using those slide rules, when I was at school, what computing power we would have available and pupils would have available? Fantastic change in the course of not that many years.

Appendix 1B(i)

So, what do we need in Stevenage to develop that vision that the previous two slides were about. Well, again, we consulted a wide range of stakeholders, particularly schools and most stakeholders agreed that we need a smaller number of mainstream schools with larger sixth forms and a wider range of specialist options. Big enough to be flexible and efficient but small enough to support relationships between students and staff. They thought that we should have closer links between mainstream and special schools and Keith will say a bit more about that. They felt that we could develop even closer links with North Herts College. And I say even closer because there’s a very good working relationship between the schools and the college at the moment but it can be developed even further to the benefit of both pupils and students. And we need improved facilities for the education support centre. That is children that are educated out of school because they are currently in a double mobile classroom on the edge of a primary school and it’s just not acceptable. So those are the things that most stakeholders that we consulted agreed on. And Keith will now tell us why, arising from that, we need a review of provision in the area.

KH It’s great to be here. We share out who gives these talks and I’ve been lucky enough to be here and to be at Marriotts yesterday. I think they’re the schools really who are going to do best out of all this so it’s rather nice to be telling the story to you. Normally when we’re doing reviews of areas it’s because we’ve got less pupils. We’ve got too many places, more than we need and we’re looking really to close schools. That’s not what we’re doing here. As Lindsay has just said, we have for the first time in my lifetime a very significant amount of money to spend on schools. We can really make a major difference to the building stock that we have and that gives us a real chance to invest in the kind of buildings that we need to deliver the kind of education we want for the future rather than the education we had in the past. And Jonathan said right in the beginning that this school does an extremely good job and that’s true. But it does an extremely good job despite the difficulties of this building. Because there are constraints about this building and if he had better buildings it would make the life of him and his staff much easier. So we’ve got a significant amount of money, ₤145 million to spend in Stevenage. And it’s very important that we spend it as wisely as we can and that the generations to come, who are going to use these buildings, get the best possible advantage our of the money we’ve got now. And of course we need to make sure in thinking about what we’re going to do, that the schools we’re going to have are actually in the right places, that they actually serve the community as it now I and as we expect it to be as it develops into the future. So we need the right number of places and we need them to be where the people are actually living. And there’s been a shift in the distribution of the population of Stevenage.

So what have we done so far? Well, Lindsay said the announcement about the money we’ve got was made immediately before Christmas, just as we went off for the break at Christmas, and we began a review of what we might do in January. And we consulted and a wide range of people, particularly headteachers, but governors and all sorts of organisations, and asked them to think about, not buildings but what kind of educational vision they had, what

Appendix 1B(i)

they thought we should be doing educationally for the future. And they came up with all sorts of possibilities of what we might do and we put all those together into what we call the long list of options and we evaluated them against four tests. And the next slide actually shows you what those tests are. And using the four tests we then narrowed down the list of options, those that might meet the four tests criteria. And from that the director of education has actually selected what he considers to be the best possible options for us to go forward and what you’ve got there in the document, in this is what the director believes is the best possible solution for Stevenage. Somebody said to me as I was coming in, well, it’s all rigged isn’t it? You know what you’re going to do. We know what we’d like to do, we know what we’d intend to do but the whole point of this consultation tonight, and there have been lots and lots of these meetings, is to actually hear what people have to say. And if the consensus is that we’ve got it wrong then we will think again. We don’t believe we have got it wrong but nevertheless this consultation is a genuine consultation and it is important that you actually share with us whatever it is you think about our proposals.

So the four tests – I won’t dwell on this too long – but obviously we need to make sure we have the right number of places to meet the demand, not just now but as the population progresses into the next 10, 20, or 30 years. And we have very sophisticated technology to actually help us to predict what the population will be and where it’s likely to be, where the buildings are likely to be and so on. It’s about raising educational standards but if you go back to the vision that Lindsay was talking about that was the first thing, it’s about educational standards, about teaching and learning, about making sure our children and their children actually get the best possible education that we can provide. We obviously need to make sure the buildings that we provide are as efficient as they can be, as flexible as they can be, can actually be adapted to meet whatever changes that come in the future. And that’s one of the problems with these buildings, they’re actually very difficult to adapt, they’re not flexible, they’re very difficult to put ICT in for example, and they’re very, very energy inefficient. We waste large amounts of money in Hertfordshire and in buildings that weren’t built to be run efficiently. We can do much, much better than that and we can stop spending money on wasted energy and actually put it into education to make sure the children get as much money as we can. The last one up there, and perhaps we’ll come back to this a bit later as well, obviously change does bring disruption. It does bring uncertainty and it’s absolutely crucial and something that’s absolutely central to what we will do and are already doing to make sure that the arrangements for change, the transitional arrangements, are as smooth as possible, and they affect the pupils and indeed the staff who have to implement the work, as little as possible. And actually in Hertfordshire we’re very experienced at building development. Not of this scale, it’s 30 years since we last built a secondary school in Hertfordshire, but we’re very used to building development in our schools and we’re very used to managing change as it happens. There will be change, there will be disruption and so on but we’ll manage it as efficiently as we can.

Appendix 1B(i)

So let me just talk a little bit about how things are changing. We’re required by the government to predict at least ten years hence and actually we’re predicting that we will need 48 forms of entry. A form of entry is 30 pupils. So across Stevenage we are expecting 48 forms of entry. That’s a bit of an increase on what we’ve got now. When I started I talked about normally when we’re doing area reviews we’re looking to reduce the number of places, here we’re actually looking at a slight increase over time, in places. But built into that the expectation is that people will want to choose the schools that are nearest to where they live and generally that’s what people will do now. But some people for all sorts of reasons choose not to do that and there is a 10% surplus built into that 48 forms of entry so that if people do express a preference for a school that’s not immediately where they live there is scope in the system to allow for that.

So, places are currently distributed unevenly. The population of Stevenage is moving north. Not literally, but the balance is moving north, isn’t it? And we now have more places in the south than we need; we haven’t got enough places in the north. So the Great Ashby area, for example, is being currently served mainly by this school, but also by Barclay School. That’s reflected in the housing development. There is also the prediction of the housing to the west of the A1, A1(M), 3,500 houses initially, rising to 5,000. There is separate provision for that. People who build the houses, part of the deal is that they have to pay for a new secondary school, and that’s built into the proposals. So as and when that development happens there will be a new secondary school built for that community. You’ll know this I’m sure but at the moment we’ve got John Henry Newman, the Catholic school, up in the north of the town but serving a quite wide area. Obviously serving a constituency of people. Two schools very close together here. Thomas Alleyne that we’re in, immediately next to Barclay School. We have Marriotts School serving the centre of the town, Nobel serving the east. And down the bottom here, down the bottom here actually, Heathcote School and Barnwell School. And at the moment Barnwell is using two sites, it’s using this site which was the old Collenswood School site. In addition to that there are three special schools that serve secondary aged pupils. So we’ve got Lonsdale there, serving children with profound physical and neurological difficulties, a severe learning difficulty school at Greenside and a moderate learning difficulty school at The Valley. So that’s the provision at the moment.

We need to expand some of those schools. Well all of the schools. Let’s have a look at the proposals. Barclay School we intend to expand to eight forms of entry. Indeed they’ll all be eight forms of entry. And to do that the intention will be that most of this site becomes part of Barclay School. There are some parts of this school that are listed. The older parts at the front end there that are obviously subject to preservation and so on. But broadly speaking is the expectation is that we’ll need both of these sites to serve a single eight form entry school. We talked about bigger schools earlier on. Eight form entry is not a big school. Across the country we have much, much bigger schools. But it is a very efficient school. The headteachers all believe that eight forms of entry is about the right size. It helps them to organise the curriculum efficiently. Economically it’s efficient to run a school of that size

Appendix 1B(i)

and it actually generates a sixth form that enables a wide range of courses to be offered efficiently and effectively. So that’s why we’ve gone for eight forms.

The Thomas Alleyne School, as I said at the beginning, is one of the winners out of this, Thomas Alleyne moves on to the Great Ashby site and instead of getting a school which will be significantly refurbished, actually you will get a brand new, purpose built school. And I don’t think the slide that Lindsay showed you was necessarily the best. There are some fantastically exciting schools now, out there, already built. And our intention will be that the schools we build in Stevenage will be as good as those. They will be the schools that in future people from other parts of the country will want to come and see. If you want to see a really, really well designed school, a really, really good school, go to Stevenage. People have said that about Hertfordshire schools in the past, that’s what we want for the future. So Thomas Alleyne will get a fantastically new and exciting school and we’ll involved pupils and parents and staff, a wide range of people, in helping us make sure that that is designed and built to be as exciting as I’m making it sound. Nobel School will be expanded. So a lot of new building on the Nobel School and refurbishment of some of the existing buildings. Some of the existing buildings there are no longer suitable and we’ll probably need to get rid of them and put new ones up. But, a lot of work to do there. The Marriotts School is completely unsuitable as well. The buildings there are very inappropriate now and they’re very, very difficult for us to adapt. The corridors are too narrow and some of the rooms are too small. It’s that kind of thing. It’s a bit of a rabbit warren. So the intention at Marriotts is to build a brand new school as well. So that’s pretty exciting. And again, in a very lovely part of the town. Barnwell School we intend to move onto one site and that means that we need to take both of the sites served at the moment by Barnwell School and Heathcote School. So the intention is that Heathcote School will be closed and Barnwell will use both of those sites. And the site that Barnwell East is currently using, the old Collenswood site, will cease to be used. Certainly the building’s part of that, we may want to keep the playing fields, but not the buildings. The Catholic School, John Henry Newman, also to be expanded. So pretty exciting stuff there and ₤145 million is a fantastic opportunity for us to do some really exciting things with every one of those.

What I’ve just been talking about is our intention. That’s what we want to do, that’s what we expect to do, that’s what everybody hopes we’ll be able to do and we’re pretty confident that that is what we’re going to be able to do. There is a proviso though and it’s right that we share this with you. This is really because in consulting you it would be wrong not to tell you that there is some uncertainty still in what we’re proposing. There’s some uncertainty but not very much. We still have a few hurdles to jump over before we actually get the money. Lindsay was talking about various documents that we have to present. We fully expect to do that. But the problem we’ve got is that the site in the north that I was talking about is not owned by the County Council. The new Thomas Alleyne site currently is not in our ownership, the person that does own it, a private land owner, has said he’s happy to sell it to us, that’s all going ahead. The expectation is that that will happen but it would be wrong of

Appendix 1B(i)

us not to tell you that something could happen and we could be prevented from being able to use that site. And the outcome of that would be, because this site is not big enough to develop, we cannot have two eight form entry schools even if it was appropriate to have two next to each other, we cannot have two schools on this site. So the outcome of that we’d have to consider closing Thomas Alleyne School. We have a similar issue with Marriotts School. Slightly different but we need to create a new access onto the Marriotts School site. That’s currently again, not in our ownership, it’s owned by the Borough and there are some negotiations still to be done about actually how that will work. We are very confident again, that that would happen, what we expect to happen. It would be wrong not to say there is a possibility that it might not happen. If that were to happen, if we were not to secure ownership of that land, or at least access through that land, we would have to close Marriotts School. What we would do than, if either of those two things were to happen, the schools that are mentioned there we could actually expand to ten forms or nine forms of entry. They would have that capacity to grow to that size. That’s not what we expect to happen; it’s just that we need to share that with you. If you want to raise some questions about that later, please do so.

The special schools, some exciting possibilities with special schools. We’re very conscious of issues to do with integration, issues to do with equality, issues to do with all sorts of opportunities relating to people with varying needs, across the educational spectrum. One of our possibilities, our proposals, is that Lonsdale School could be located on the same site as a mainstream school. Not to become the same school, it could still be two schools, two distinct schools, two distinct managements, and each school would have separate buildings but they could share a lot of what is there. There’s no reason why we need two kitchens, for example. You can have one kitchen serving two groups of people. There’s no reason why some of the sports facilities couldn’t be used by both sets of children. There’s no reason why the children from the special school couldn’t access some of the specialist facilities. Technology for example. The science labs. And similarly we believe there are lots of benefits perhaps is a better word, for having mainstream children actually working alongside children with special needs. So that’s a possibility that we’re actually investigating. It could be very exciting cutting edge stuff. And similarly with Greenside. At the moment Greenside is an all through school in a building that really is not adequate for the needs of the pupils that are there. And what we’d like to do is to move the secondary department of that school onto the Barnwell site, the new Barnwell School site, same point, separate school, separate facilities, separate identity but actually the ability to share a lot of the facilities. And where appropriate for some of the pupils to actually come together for some of the time that they’re at school. We would keep the primary children in the building that currently is there. The Valley School is a school that serves children with moderate learning difficulties. Lovely site. We’re less certain about what to do about Valley School. We have a range of possibilities and we’re very eager to hear what people have to say about our ideas and indeed we’ve had lots of feedback already. Including from, obviously, the professionals that are involved in that. There are range of options there. We could do something similar to what I’ve just been talking about in the other two schools; actually

Appendix 1B(i)

move The Valley School onto a mainstream school site so that some of the facilities could be shared. We could keep the school where it is now. It could continue to exist in one way or another, as it currently exists. Another idea we have is where they children would actually be located in mainstream schools but they would still be owned, as it were, if that’s the right word, by The Valley School management, The Valley School staff, who would actually go into mainstream schools to provide the support. So they would be part of Valley School but they would actually work within a mainstream. So there’s quite an interesting range of possibilities there that we’re currently exploring and we’d be very pleased to have any feedback you have in relation to that.

I said before that building schools, changing things, is disruptive. There’s no point in pretending it isn’t. The clever bit is managing that well and actually there’s lots of benefits as well of course. We could engage pupils in a whole range of ways in what’s going on. We’re already working with a national organisation for example, to engage with pupils next term about what kind of designs we might have for new schools, what kind of things matter to them? So they will actually have an impact on what we come up with. And as each school is developed we would expect the pupils within those schools to have quite a say in what’s actually going on. And to have opportunities to see what’s going on, to talk to architects, to talk to the wide range of experts that are involved. And we’re working with already, particularly staff and governors at each of the schools and with the headteachers, about how we might take all this forward.

We’ll have transition plans so as we develop – for example if we take this school, this school would continue to exist in its current buildings, when the new buildings are ready it would the start of a new year in September and then the school would move. So there would be some disruption as the school is relocated but reasonably minimal disruption. The most disruption I guess will be for students and staff who are at the schools where we are actually developing and upgrading those schools. But we can move students and teachers around as buildings become available. We’re obviously very, very conscious of how to handle Heathcote School if that is the school that is closed and I imagine the possibility of one or two other schools that could possibly be closed, and we’re very sensitive to that. It’s very important that we keep engaged with the staff and students from those schools and we are already engaged in that. And we’re very, very anxious that every member of staff from those schools will stay in Stevenage if that’s what they want. There’s obviously a turnover of staff, isn’t there? People move for all sorts of reasons. But we have a really excellent record in Hertfordshire as we organise our education, of retaining staff. In fact we’ve never had any reorganisation where a single member of staff who wanted to stay working in Hertfordshire hasn’t been able to do so. So we would expect that to continue in this case.

So that’s pretty much all I’ll be saying. I’m not going to labour it too much. Other than to say that one other thing I pick out of that is that one of the things that makes Stevenage very, very different and is actually seen as a national example, that people in other parts of the country have pointed to Stevenage,

Appendix 1B(i)

is the close collaboration between the schools. That the headteachers at Stevenage work very, very much as a team of people together with the college. The principle of the college is part of their team, and they meet very regularly and they see themselves as serving the staff and students of Stevenage. So they’re not in competition with each other, they work collaboratively together. And they are already working together now about how they can make sure that this all moves forward in an appropriate way. So that’s pretty important as well.

So, what’s going to happen, you’ve heard most of it, what we’re doing now is this consultation, which will run through to the summer and what I said I’ll repeat, it is a genuine consultation, we do want to hear what people have to say. The outcome of that will be that the director of education will put together his proposals from the consultation, they will be taken to the education panel of the County Council in October and we expect a decision therefore in the Autumn, by the end of 2007. The cabinet will have made a decision about how we’re going to proceed. So that’s where we’re up to. This is your opportunity to now to share with us whatever it is you’d like to say. So over to you.

JW Okay. Right, so now it’s the other part of the meeting where the panel will take questions from anybody who’s got questions. Can I just reinforce the fact that we are recording this so if you could please put your hand up and there is a microphone coming round, so that you can be heard on the tape as it’s recording. And if you could try not to speak over one another or speak without the mike because it won’t be recorded and we want really to record everything that you say and all of your views. I will try to get to everybody and I’ll go round you in order if I can. If I miss somebody I apologise, I will get back to you. The gentleman at the back.

M? Thank you very much. You’re talking about Barclay School taking over this school. Will it take over everything, the land included? Because bearing in mind that this school has a lot of land, not this little patch out here, we’ve got the football ground alongside the avenue, there’s also the ground the other side of Martins Way. Unfortunately in the past we’ve had deals done where land is sold off or done an exchange, like it was at Round Diamond. Is this going to come into it yet again? Thank you very much.

LM We didn’t say that Barclay School was going to take over this school, what we said was that this school, if our proposals are accepted, will move to a new site. So the Thomas Alleyne School will continue exactly as it is now but on a different site and part at least of this current site would be used by the Barclay School because with its expansion to eight forms of entry it will need more land. So it would need at least part of the current Thomas Alleyne site. But there’s no suggestion that Barclay will take over this school, that it will continue exactly as it is. At least part of the land.

M? What part?

Appendix 1B(i)

LM I can’t tell you that exactly until our design team have done the designs for the new buildings and the new layouts of Barclay School. Because Barclay School is of course a listed building, which means that it will have to be a combination of maintenance of some parts of the existing building and remodelling of the rest. And until we’ve done all of that layout I couldn’t say exactly how much of this current site would be in use. I any case, in general, all of the playing fields of a school are protected, both in town planning terms and actually by central government as well, from development. So we would expect all the green spaces to remain green essentially.

JW Any more questions? Yes, the lady down here, thank you.

F? My son goes to Heathcote School at the moment and I actually chose it because of its specialist status as an engineering school. Firstly what happens about that? And also you say there will be parental preference. You’re going to leave one mainstream school in south Stevenage, where’s the choice?

LM Okay. There are two questions there. Specialisms are for limited periods of time in a school, usually three or four years, and then they’re reviewed. Clearly engineering is a specialism that we would wish to retain within Stevenage and we’ve been in discussions and the heads have been in discussions with each other about a distribution of specialisms around the schools that would remain following the proposals. In terms of parental choice, yes there will only be one school in the south, the enlarged, as it were, Barnwell School, serving both sides. There would also be an enlarged and newly built probably, but certainly enlarged Marriotts and an enlarged Nobel. So all of those places would be available depending on exactly where people live. But the total of 48 forms of entry as Keith has said, includes a measure of spare capacity over the number of pupils we forecast to exit from primary schools in 2017, which is the year that we’re required to forecast for. So we reckon, 48 forms of entry minus 10% is the product of the primary schools, the extra 10% is to allow for some slack in the system, to allow for some degree of choice. Now as we said on other occasions, choice is the wrong word, it’s a word that we all use and we use it quite popularly. But strictly speaking there isn’t a choice, there is the opportunity for parents to express a preference for three schools and the admission rules allocate places according to those rules and the preferences that have been put down on the forms. That’s the way the system works and you’re probably as aware of how the system works as I am. But what we have tried to do, what we are planning to do and what our proposal does, is to leave that margin of places in the system. So there should be about four point eight forms of entry available.

F? My only concern with that is that I don’t want my son to go to Barnwell. T here is no way that I will send him to Barnwell, because I’ve got my own personal reasons about that school. If I wasn’t then to get him a place at say Nobel, because again, I won’t let him go to Marriotts what then? Because I’ve chosen the school that I want.

Appendix 1B(i)

LM I’m not in a position to discuss individual cases; neither would it be appropriate to do so in a public meeting. The fact is that the admission rules work the way the admission rules work and we’re not in a position to change the rules, they will be the same as they are now, and places in schools will be allocated according to those rules. They are of course allocated, in a sense, afresh each year. So all the places in Barnwell and all the places in Marriotts and all the places in Nobel are allocated according to the rules each year. So the sort of, for want of a better term, catchment area, that is the sort of pattern of attendance that is in place now, will not necessarily be the pattern of attendance that happens when schools are changed and enlarged. That pattern will alter because the distribution of places is different. So it would be difficult for me, impossible for me, to talk about an individual applicant because it would depend on the number of places available and the number of places sought, ie the pattern of preferences in each particular year. That’s all I can say I’m afraid.

JW There’s a gentleman just at the back there who’s got a point, and then we’ll come down the front again. The mike’s coming. She’s only got little legs!

M? I’ve got a question but just a comment first about the question the lady just asked there. Nobel of course is going to be bigger than it is now, so a bit of extra capacity is going into Nobel. That might help. What I wanted to ask, you said that the site for the new school in the north, you were negotiating with the land owner and you hoped that that would go through. I’m not entirely convinced that the site that you’re negotiating about is the right site and I was just worried that that wasn’t going to be part of this consultation, that you were going to go ahead and buy that and then if everybody who perhaps lives in that areas says, this is entirely the wrong place to put it, it will be too late because you will have already bought the site. So I would like to think that you weren’t actually going to go ahead and do it until you’d heard what everybody had to say.

LM We haven’t done it yet, certainly. And we haven’t taken the sleeping policemen away and consulted you afterwards in a sense. We’re doing that in advance. This is quite a tricky one actually, in terms of timing. First of all, about the site itself, we feel that it’s the best site that we’ve been able to find that somebody is prepared to see us. Because obviously you can only buy a site that somebody is prepared to sell. So we had to do a search and our land agents did a search throughout that area and tried to find a site that would meet the necessary town planning requirements in terms of suitability and access and had somebody that was prepared to sell it at a price that potentially we would be able to afford. So those are all the sort of constraints I suppose on what site you can actually get. In terms of timing there’s a balance here. On the one hand, yes. We may well want to know, mayn’t we, the outcome of this consultation exercise, before signing a contract to purchase land. In fact we might have to do more than that, we wouldn’t do that until any formal statutory proposals relating to doing that had been agreed, had been through. Because if we were to do that and something was to go wrong with the statutory process for the school changes, we could be

Appendix 1B(i)

landed with a site that we couldn’t use and we could have wasted our money. So that, there is a constraint therefore. Equally, I think that people want assurances as to what is happening as quickly as possible. In other words, people who are making their secondary transfer preferences, let’s say for Thomas Alleyne or for Barclay or whatever, want to know or might well want to know, where that school is going to be. And they might want to know that either before they express their preferences or as quickly after that process as possible. So there’s another imperative for getting some certainty around what is happening as quickly as possible so parents know what their preference is and what their choices are for. So we’re pulled a bit in two directions I think. Ultimately of course, the negotiations with the land owner and how long that takes to agree a price and sign a contract and all the rest of it, that sort of legal process is going to take its own speed I guess, whatever the other factors are. But those are the things that are pulling us in the two different directions I think.

JW Thank you. Did you still want to make your point?

F? I’ve got two questions. The first one is what happens to the children that are already in Heathcote, because my eldest son is already in there? And the second is, my youngest son is moving up there next September, 2008, which obviously he’s going to end up going to that school because the eldest one is there but he’s got no future there, so what’s going to happen to him? Because we’re out of the catchment area at the moment, for Nobel which is the only other school I would send him to. I wouldn’t send him to Barnwell or Marriotts.

LM Right. Well we are in discussion with the head governors and senior leadership team of the school at the moment about the arrangements for children who are already there or who are coming up in the next year or two years, ie this September and the September after. And we’re giving an absolute undertaking that no children would move schools during a key stage. If necessary we would keep the school open a year longer than is in the proposal here, in order to make sure that children are able to finish either key stage three or key stage four. And that does, to some extent, apply to people coming up either in this September or the September after. I think children who are already in the school will be – we wouldn’t have to make any special lengthy arrangements for because we wouldn’t be doing any transfers of pupils to other schools until 2011 or 2012.But children coming up in 2007, 2008, we will need to ensure and we will absolutely ensure and guarantee, that they are not moved during a key stage. Even if that means the school continuing until 2012 when for other purposes it could close in 2011.

JW The gentleman here.

M? I’ve got two questions, quite separate so maybe you could answer the first one first. The first one goes back to the Heathcote and the south of the town question. I wonder if you could elaborate a little, Lindsay, about the rationale for selecting Barnwell for expansion and Heathcote to close, rather than say, the other way around or closing both and creating a single school on

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that site, which when these proposals were first being thought of I thought was the kind of thing that was going to happen?

LM Well, there were certainly discussions of a longer list of options during the stakeholder stage. That’s quite right because that’s what that stakeholder stage is for. In terms of, I mean fundamentally our thinking was, and the directors’ view was that Barnwell has already been enlarged to approximately eight forms of entry, the size that is the target size for schools. And it’s already been through that level of disruption and change and incorporating the former Collenswood pupils. So we felt that that combination of factors led us to the view that Barnwell should be retained and Heathcote should be closed. That was the basis of our thinking.

M? Just a comment on that and then I’ll ask my second question. It’s hard to see how, with the best will in the world, there cannot be a sort of grudge or dwindling away of Heathcote once this happens. Even with all the best planning teachers will start to look for other jobs and so on and parents will try and move their children. Obviously these things always happen.

LM I think Michael, and I want to say something about that that’s very important and it’s the focus of our discussions, not only with Heathcote but with all the heads in Stevenage. What our human resources colleagues are working on with all the heads in Stevenage is a protocol, is an agreement, for how staffing matters will be handled. Because there are a variety of ways in which we can offer continuity for staff in Heathcote who we would very much like to keep and also to new appointments. New appointments can actually be linked to more than one school so that newly appointed staff for example will know that they have a future if Heathcote were to close. There are a number of strategies that we can use with the co-operation of all the other heads, to provide a stable and secure future for staff. Even if they’re actually appointed to Heathcote let alone already there now. I mean, I think we have to bear in mind that we’re not reducing the number of pupils in Stevenage; the number of teaching opportunities is going to stay much as it is now, and indeed will be rather, I would argue, a rather exciting place to work. With the new buildings, the new schools, the state of the art and up to date equipment and technology and resources and so on. Actually it will make Stevenage rather an attractive place for staff. Particularly young staff, staff wanting to go on. So we think that those combination of factors, together with the cooperation of head throughout the town means that we can keep stable, viable, secure, Heathcote during the transitional period of time.

M? Well obviously we’ll watch that.

JB It’s very easy, I’ve noticed that Lindsay’s doing it and I’m doing it, but we’re talking about teachers and it’s quite important to say that we’re talking about the staff, and there’s quite a wide variety of people working in schools and all the things that we’ve just been talking about apply to all the staff and not just to teachers.

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M? Can I put my second question, which is about this school and where it’s going to move and so on? It’s hard to envisage the site exactly but I assume it’s either in East Herts or…

LM North Herts.

M? So it’s outside Stevenage. Can I ask at what stage, if any, discussion are with the appropriate planning authority in North Herts and to what extent you’ve started to think about access, not just highway but given that compared with Stevenage, Great Ashby has virtually non-existent public transport. Thoughts about non car modes of transport.

LM Yes. That’s right. Well my Hertfordshire property services colleagues who lead on town planning and development matters have had a number of meetings with planners both in Stevenage and in north Herts because this is clearly a wide ranging proposal affecting a number of schools without the town and indeed slightly beyond it in the sense of the site in the north. So we have been in discussion with planners in both district councils. We also have been in early discussion with our environment and highways colleagues because this degree of change will need to be reflected both in revised public service routes and specialist education routes and buses, bus routes. Public service bus routes and education routes, they’d all need to be looked at afresh because of the changing distribution of pupils throughout the town, not only the new site to the north but different numbers in different parts of the town. And so the pattern of bus routes and provision will have to be looked at. And we’re in very early, I think it would be fair to say, very early discussion with our environment and highways colleagues about that. But you’re quite right, that’s an important factor.

JW If we go to the lady in the black at the back there.

F? I too have two questions. Firstly, can you clarify what you meant when you were talking about proposal two? Because you started off saying that no decisions had already been made and then when you were talking about proposal two you actually said, well, if Thomas Alleyne doesn’t move then it closes. Now that suggests to me that there has been a decision that because this site isn’t big enough or because the buildings aren’t suitable for refurbishing or rebuilding, that actually there is no way that education will remain on this site as Thomas Alleyne, although I understand the move down to Barclay. So could you clarify that for me?

LM Well, it’s part of a proposal so the whole thing on that page and indeed on this slide, let me just go to proposal two. All of that is a proposal. So what we are proposing is that if we are not able to obtain the land necessary for either the move of Thomas Alleyne or the rebuilding of Marriotts then the proposal is that we would consider the closure of either Thomas Alleyne or Marriotts as part of that overall proposal, which would include making the remaining schools larger than eight forms of entry, not nine or ten. But the whole of that is part of a proposal; it’s not an automatic consequence of something.

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F? My second question is actually very [unclear] because I have two children at this school and we’re talking about parental preferences. And I chose this school because it met the needs of my children and that was against walking out in the rain and all the horrible things about this school. Now, I’d say where Mr Block is that we have a school that is excelling and the standards of this school is going up very high but nowhere in these conversations has anything been addressed about the children who will still be at this school. Because if Thomas Alleyne moves to it’s new site that’s where the funding will be and actually we’ve been waiting for funding on this site. Now what’s going to happen, what investment is the County Council going to put into this site for the children who are already doing GCSE, A levels, etc? Because that hasn’t been addressed at all.

LM No, that’s a very fair point. I’ll start it and Jonathan might well like to say something about that, because you did last time. I’d be more than happy if you said it again. We will invest sufficiently in this school during the transitional period, to ensure that pupils get the facilities that they need. What we won’t do is to invest in anything over and above that, to be frank, because it would be a waste of money to say build a new block onto here, if two or three years later the entire school is to move somewhere else and that new block is not needed any more. That would be a waste of money. But what we would do is make a commitment to maintaining standards necessary for the pupils who are in the school at the moment. And I know that Jonathan will say in a moment, and he will say it I’m sure, that he wouldn’t let us get away with not doing that. But I’ll let Jonathan say it himself.

JB Just so people know – there is a certain amount of money that comes into a school anyhow; that is based on the number of pupils and a whole range of things and that money is set. So that what ever is going on elsewhere they can’t change that. To be honest with you there hasn’t been a tremendous amount of capital investment above and beyond the money that I normally get, for many, many years here. And that obviously won’t change. In spite of the fact that I’ve put in bids and all sorts of things all the time. Having said that. In the last few years we’ve probably got the best food rooms in this area, maybe the county, we’ve got new sixth form buildings. We’ve just had a whole new reception area put in. So there has been money because there’s always somewhere, pots of money that you can… And also with this becoming a specialist school there will also be quite a lot of money coming into the school. ₤150,000 for capital works, and it can only be used for that, plus money every singe year. The other thing I would say is, and I’ve said it to all the officers that have ever come in, including the director of education as he’s now called, the old title, and John Harris who is in charge of everything, would you send your child here? Would you allow your child to..? And I’ve said it to them each time, because I will not allow – because our children have one chance here and it doesn’t matter what’s going to be in the future, 2020, whatever it is, the students that you send here will get the best education they can get and it won’t get any worse, it will get better. I will continue to improve and you have my total commitment to that. I think what the people are always concerned about is about transport and again, we will be putting pressure on

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folks in county to make sure that the transport systems are set up so that students that are here during that transition period, if we are fortunate enough to go up there, and I’ve got my everything crossed, if we go up there, there will be transport laid on for folks there. The thing is though, Richard, the governors and I did a series of assemblies and he’s local, so he was asking children where they all came from and actually, if you go to year seven 90% of the students came from that area. Year eight a little bit less, probably 80%. As you went through the school more and more children come to here. So in fact, this is Richard’s joke, we are actually moving to where they are so they won’t be late for school any more. We are actually moving to where most of our kids are. So all those sorts of things. And the other thing is if I can just have a chance to say why I won’t allow it to happen because it wouldn’t be good for me and my career anyway. If standards drop here the local authority would be chasing me and saying why are standards dropping here? So I can’t allow that to happen. Not that I would. The other thing is that some people get worried about 1,200, in actual fact by making the school slightly bigger you can design them and manage them in a way which makes them far more intimate. When you’ve got the wrong sort of numbers as we have now, which is 900, it’s very difficult to chop the school up into little mini schools within the school. And so with a larger school you actually can cut it up into viable groups and you can put on a far greater range of courses than you can with this size school. Hertfordshire has always been strange because I’ve only worked in Hertfordshire a couple of times, and Hertfordshire has always been strange with this idea of a 900 school. Most authorities have slightly larger schools because it’s been recognised for many, many years that it’s a better way of managing your schools. But you have a total undertaking from myself, and I’ll speak for Richard as well, we would not allow the standards and the students who come here to suffer because of that. And the last thing I’m going to say is if this does happen we would be in the best position because the school would be being built, so the needs and what we asked for it to be, and then over a summer holiday we may have to break up a few days early and go back a few days later, but over that summer holiday everything would be shifted, we’d work through that period and the students would walk straight into the school and there wouldn’t be this continual disruption of trucks and vehicles. Because I’ve worked in a school where we’ve had that done and I’ve also worked in a school where I was responsible for the whole of the re-build, another school in Barnet. So I’ve had the experience of doing that as well. So I’ll be putting pressure on making sure that all the things I want happen and it doesn’t affect the students here. There, I’ve answered a few questions all in one.

JW Thank you. There was a lady here who’s got a question.

F? I know the question I’m going to ask has been partially answered already. I chose this school for various different reasons, my daughter’s due to start here in September. I have two younger children as well, three years between each of them. My concern is transport. I live in Symonds Green area. The school to me sounds absolutely fantastic, what’s being proposed sounds wonderful for me, for my children, but the problem for me is I have multiple sclerosis and one of the reasons I chose this school is because of the

Appendix 1B(i)

area it’s in. It’s in my catchment area. I chose it over Barclay because I preferred it; I thought it was better for my children. It’s been mentioned about transport being laid on maybe, for children of a certain distance away from the school. And although I can understand you can’t give any guarantees or whatever you can probably see where I’m coming from. I need guarantees myself. There are times I’m laid up; I’m in bed for three weeks a year, even more times a year, although I look okay now.

LM I understand, I understand entirely. And again, I won’t go into details of what’s available in a public meeting but afterwards I’ll be happy to chat to you about what government provisions there are for helping in people in particular circumstances with transport. Because there are such things that apply not to everybody, but to people with particular needs and I can talk to you about that afterwards.

JW Any more questions. This gentleman here.

M? It’s just following on the gentleman with the white beard over there about the site and the consultation.

LM There are two of them actually.

M? The one – oh both of them have got glasses as well! The gentleman with the dark shirt! Just following on about the site. I hear everything you say about it depends on the land owner etc. What about the power lines and the health of the children? I know public opinion is divided about power lines, do they cause problems, whatever. The map that you put up there, it seemed, I think it’s sort of perilously close to the power lines. Those two lines that run along, are those pylons? It’s just, has the project team considered whether it has an impact on the kids?

LM It’s a very good question. I don’t know. If I don’t know I’m happy to say I don’t know and I’ll jolly well find out.

M? I just feel that five years, seven years the kids are going to spend up there, we don’t know the effect of power lines, could it just be chucked into the pot.

LM Sure. Yes, that’s a very good question. I don’t know the answer. As you will understand a project of this size has a number of work streams and we have something called a technical work stream, my colleagues in Hertfordshire, property services, are dealing with that and I will have to ask them. And I don’t know the answer but what we will do – how shall we feed it back? Are you a parent at the school here? Okay. In that case if I let Jonathan know the answer, and we’ll put it on the frequently asked questions on the website.

JW Gentleman at the back.

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M? Regarding the buildings of the school. Many years ago there was a lady came here, long before Mr Block, called Miss Parish. She was the headteacher of the girl’s school in The Valley Way. They amalgamated with the boy’s school which was Alleyne’s. A considerable amount of accommodation was done to this to accommodate Miss Parish’s young ladies as was the term then. Mind you it changed very quickly when they got here. The buildings here are much younger than Barclay school, the vast majority of them are, the modifications are. And any building that must be younger than Barclay School has got to be better than the monstrosity that now exists in the playground, commonly called the port cabins. That was my first part. The second part is, is there any provision being made for a new vehicular access to Barclay School? The vehicular access at present is totally useless. Vehicles are getting bigger and bigger, coaches mounting pavements, going over drains and sewers and gas mains. Something is going to go. So put that in mind would you please.

KH I’ll try and answer that for you. We’ve been systematically getting rid of port cabins and temporary buildings and of course that’s not our intention to have those buildings, certainly not the ones on Barclay School site. So you can expect the new, exciting, expanded Barclay School not to have those buildings in the playground any more. Especially that one. We are conscious about access and that’s one of the issues we’re looking at for all the sites, especially this one. And there is a possibility that we could access the new Barclay School from the north. I think you can see it from the dual carriageway, the roads across the top. That has major benefits of course of separating the vehicles that need to come onto the site for most of the students who would actually come through the current routes that we’ve got onto the site now. There is the possibility and we’ve been talking to planning about this, of a different access onto the site. Just picking up your other point, the buildings here as Jonathan said, it’s not just the buildings that are pretty inadequate but the whole layout of the site is inappropriate. This long street is not a very good layout of buildings. The buildings on that site, because they’re listed we have to keep some of those buildings but they are adaptable. We can actually do some very interesting things to the buildings that are there as well as all the new buildings that we would put on the site. Does that answer the various questions that you had?

M? Partly about the buildings. Five years ago I brought up this very same question about access to Barclay. I live right on the damned gate of the place. Every bit of traffic in and out comes past my house. That’s including coaches at half past five on a Sunday morning.

JB Good news for you isn’t it then, really, that we’re looking at moving. And on top of that when they have a function, half past twelve, one o’clock on a Sunday morning, when they go home. I said this coming up about Martins Way. Oh, no, no, we can’t do it there, we can’t make an access way across there. Green belt land. Now you say you’re talking about trying to do it. I only hope you’re successful.

LM So do we.

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JW That would make one happy punter. Thank you.

F? Part of my question has already been answered. Our son’s starting at Heathcote in September. And you explained why Heathcote was chosen to close over Barnwell. But what I don’t understand is if the land that you buy for Alleyne’s doesn’t happen or you can’t go ahead with Marriotts and one of Alleyne’s or Marriotts closes, why does Heathcote still have to close?

KH If we’re going to have eight form entry schools and this is what we want for the reasons we’ve talked about, neither the Heathcote site or the Barnwell site is big enough. Together they are big enough for one school. So what we would propose to do is to have the buildings effectively on one part of that site and all the sport and recreational facilities on the other part. So that’s the idea. Those two sites are not big enough, either of them, to have an eight form entry school on them. So that’s just not a possibility. Apart from the point I was making earlier on that when you look at the distribution of schools across the town we need a new school in the north and if you look at where we’re proposing to put the schools the balance across the town is much more appropriate to where the population is now and where it will be over the coming decade.

F? I’ve just got one other question. We missed the Heathcote meetings. I know there’s a couple more which we will be going to but I was told that the transcripts would be on line but they’re not and up until yesterday there’s been five meetings and only the Greenside transcript is on line. I mean I don’t expect last night’s to have been but where’s Heathcote’s? I want to read it before I go to the meeting.

JW It generally takes a week or more to get the transcripts on line. Karen, any update please? I think the next Heathcote meeting is the week after next so you should have time to read the transcripts of both the Heathcote meetings before the one which is – I think it’s Monday week is the third one and then one after that.

JW Right. Can I take this lady here because she hasn’t actually said anything yet, and then I’ll come to you.

F? One is a follow up from the gentleman behind. I live in Walkern Road and I’ve actually got a son starting at Barclay but if you’re going to make Barclay bigger you have to review the access because Walkern Road is servicing Almond Hill and Letchmore Road it’s an absolute nightmare and most of Walkern Road doesn’t have parking and we can’t cope with any more traffic coming up here. I mean, that’s just – that wasn’t actually the question I was going to raise but it’s following on from what that gentleman said. I’ve a couple of questions. I’m not exactly clear where you’re locating Thomas Alleyne’s to but from what you’ve been saying it’s going to be in the North Herts district. Which looks as though it’s going to be in the North Herts area. Does that mean that you will allow, [unclear] Stevenage but if it’s that part, will you be allowing people from Hitchin to apply for that school? Because

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obviously we’re not allowed to apply for Hitchin schools and I’m a parent that did apply for Hitchin School and didn’t get my son in because I’m in Stevenage.

LM It’s not a question of being allowed to but any parent can express a preference for any school. There is no restriction which school you can express a preference for. The rules might not enable you to get in somewhere because you’re too far away say, or for some other reason, but there is no bar on expressing preference. I mean, at the moment somebody in Hitchin can express a preference for a school in Stevenage. Somebody in Stevenage can express a preference for a school in Hitchin. And that won’t change and that’s a situation that we have now.

F? The other question I had was, you’re expanding John Henry Newman to be a higher… Probably a controversial question but does that mean it’s going to be people from Stevenage that can then apply to go into that school, or is it purely going to be Roman Catholics? Because John Henry Newman do take from a large area. Is it going to be a situation where it’s going to be a catchment area for the people of Stevenage or it’s Roman Catholics from whatever area they take them from? Because I know for a fact that they take them from quite far away. Yes, it will be the latter. There is no suggestion by the school that they’re intending to change the admission rules so the admission rules will continue to give priority to Catholic children. You’re quite right, at the moment something like 100 children in John Henry Newman come from Hertfordshire, quite apart from outside Stevenage. In fact I think only about 28% is it, or 30% of children at John Henry Newman come from Stevenage. Something like that isn’t it. Nearer 40% is it? But there is no suggestion from the school that they will change their admission rules. So I’m afraid that what it will mean is that more Catholic children would be able to go there and that may well mean a slightly larger radius than there is now. On the other hand it might not. Because with the extra housing in Stevenage, assuming that roughly the same proportion of the residents of the new housing are Roman Catholics as in the general population, which is about 10% probably the extent of the catchment area will stay much the same. But certainly there’s no change in the rules.

KH Just about the issue of access, which will please you I’m sure, the obvious preference were we not to be able to access from the north is to access from here, actually. And so were we not to get the new access from the north I think we would almost certainly come off the dual carriageway this way.

JW Thank you. The lady at the front here is waiting.

F? One thing is, the lady at the end asked about Heathcote and you were saying why Heathcote and not Barnwell? Earlier you actually said Barnwell was the obvious one because it had already been expanded to be big enough for eight forms. Now you’re saying we couldn’t keep Heathcote because neither site is big enough to be eight forms.

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KH Yes, because at the moment Barnwell is on two sites. It’s using the old Collingwood site. We need to bring all those students onto the same site. Once we do that we need both sites.

LM Part of the reason of that split site working is very unpopular and difficult to do. And we’ve only got two split site secondary schools in the whole of Hertfordshire and I’m sure that both heads, I think any head, I’m sure Jonathan would, any head would rather work on one site so that’s the principle behind that.

F? I also wanted to ask what’s going to happen to the new engineering block at Heathcote and the new gym? Which have only been completed in the last year.

KH We haven’t actually got to the point yet where we could answer that question. What we’ve had done is some initial work by architects, looking at each side. Including for example looking at each one and Heathcote, but every school. Really asking three questions, which bits are just not fit to use and we can’t do anything with, which could we keep, like the listed bit next door, but significantly change? And which bits are fine as they are and we’d just need to upgrade them, improve the decoration and so on. So we’ve had some work done but of course we haven’t had the design work done. We will want to try and keep the best bits where we can, obviously. Because there’s financial benefits to doing that.

F? Thank you. And then I just have one last question. I actually work at Barclay School and so I know the port cabins very well. But also you’ve got a scout hut for Stevenage within the grounds. Is provision going to be made for that. Because we’re both cub leaders within Stevenage and obviously it’s important for us.

KH One of the things that Lindsay mentioned early on was that one of the government initiatives but indeed one of our own initiatives as a county, and I know each of the schools, is that the facilities that we have should be for the community. The old idea that the school puts a big fence round it and opens at nine and closes at whatever, half past three or whatever when the students go home, is no longer acceptable. We want the communities to access schools and to use them and to see schools as an educational resource for everybody. And the last thing we’d want to do is to put anybody off. And the specific answer is that we want to make provision. Make sure that any facilities that are on sites now that we keep. But actually we want to expand the opportunities. So for example we might have a health centre, which is one idea that we might want to locate on schools. Because Jonathan has got a bit of a thing about that. Do you want to say something about that?

LM I thought he wanted the police.

KH Well, he wants the police but he also wants orthodontists, I think!

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JB There’s a big thing about having extended schools. The days when schools do open at eight thirty’s and finish at flourish, I mean we’ve got fantastic resources and this was the first time in all the schools, that we can have an extended school and to have a youth club. Where do children round here go? There are no youth clubs. Well, actually they don’t always want to go to youth clubs but there could be that sort of thing. Let’s just take it from my own position. The things I’ve been writing down and planning for the new school, we would have a branch library. It wouldn’t be the school library, it would be a branch library. So local people would have a library they could actually go to. It could be designed so that they could have access to it at certain times or shared access. You only have to go to, when I trained, 20 or 30 years ago, Washington, Newtown, that library was used as a shared library. The sports facilities were shared sports facilities for the local Newtown. You go to Toronto, you go abroad, public library, public swimming pool, are shared between the school and the local community. So, doctors surgeries. The thing that Keith was talking about, we have children that go off for a quick tweak of their braces and they go off for ages because they’re going miles away, where in fact if we had an orthodontist on every single school site or a doctor’s surgery, they could go and have that done and get straight back into lessons. They’d hate that but it would certainly improve their education. But there’s loads of things. We’re setting up even here. We offered to the police a little building, because we’ve got lots of little buildings with little rooms, the police use it when it’s pouring with rain as a place to keep under shelter, to have a cup of tea, to use the loo. And I love having them on the site because I always say to them, any police officers who want to have a cup of tea, it’s on me on the site. Because again, they’re part of our community. So if someone wants to be interviewed or have a chat with the local police officer or one of the support team, they can meet them on our site there. And all those sorts of things would be designed into these schools. And we’ve been asked to write a paper, yet another paper, called strategy for change, and in that we’re supposed to be identifying how the new schools will look. Well, I’m lucky because I’m thinking of a complete blank piece of paper and we’re working from that. The other schools is a far more challenging project, seeing how they can adapt those schools. But all those things like scouts and cubs and beavers, youth clubs as I said, drop in centres and health centres, things about when we have an issue of Stevenage, we know we have an issue of one parent families, we have an issue of drugs. All those sorts of social issues there can be opportunities to teach and train students outside school in a youth club environment. Now I actually spent a year working in youth clubs and I know that the facilities in schools are not right for setting up youth clubs but you can have on the same grounds a purpose built centre for the local youth. The possibilities are fantastic. I know that I won’t ever see another ₤150 million being put into education and I think we really should take advantage of that. There sadly are, as I can hear from your voice, there’s casualties, and we know Eddie Gaynor, the head there, and it is tragic for the individual people there. And I don’t really have an answer to those things. But all those sorts of things are possible for the new schools and we will be asking parents and teachers and students, most importantly I would guess, what would make a really good school. And it would be the first

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time I know where we could actually say, the school is designed for what we want it to do rather than, here’s a building, now try and teach in it.

JW Thank you. There was a lady at the back there.

F? Hello. I’ve only got one son who is now currently in year two. He’ll be starting his secondary education just as all this is taking off. I only live up the road and I would probably send him to this school. And it would have been very useful tonight if the headteacher of Barclay School could have given an equally glowing of the future of Barclay School because at the moment my vision of it is of this wonderful school that is going to be out of the reach of the catchment area that I’ll be in and my son having a hard hat on his uniform list because this will be a building site. So I think in future consultations if you have other headteachers to state their case on the schools that are going to be refurbished. It’s great to hear of this wonderful school with state of the art facilities but I don’t think my son will, in the catchment area, have a chance of going there, and it just would be nice.

LM I mean, that’s a very helpful comment and I understand that. All I can say about Barclay is that it will be substantially rebuilt. It won’t be a completely new school like Thomas Alleyne will be but will be substantially rebuilt and I think would only leave standing the bit which is currently listed, I should think. But yes, there will be considerable building work on that site, yes.

KH One of the things we will have of course will be this school. So as this school decants it will become available as an overspill as we need to, we’ll have facilities here to move pupils from Barclay so that the disruption will be minimised. The other thing, rightly I suppose, because at Thomas Alleyne we’ve been emphasising the benefits to Thomas Alleyne but we do have very exciting ideas about every school actually, including next door, Barclay School. And there are some very exciting ideas about how we might develop that including some discussions we’re having with the college for example, about how we might share facilities in various ways. So I think we’ve been emphasising Thomas Alleyne for obvious reasons but actually the prospects at Barclay are very exciting.

JB Can I add to that? What the head have actually been doing, we’ve been looking at say for example – I missed a meeting that took place last night after school which was to look at the sporting facilities in all the schools. And so we were saying right, what are the basic sporting facilities we need in all schools. Not just in the new schools because they’re all in effect being regenerated. So every school will have a certain minimum level of facility and we’re going to work through those areas. So on behalf of Barclay and all the other schools, they’re all very, very keen about this because there will be certain disruptions and certain things, because by decanting properly, by managing it properly, the disruption can be minimised. The guys up there have never said there won’t be disruptions, especially for the schools that are being built, and they would be daft to say that. But the idea is to make sure that all schools do have a minimum. We do always talk about the thousand

Appendix 1B(i)

and something children in Stevenage in each year group and we actually do look at it as headteachers. And it is – I mean, they say we are totally all on one team – no we’re not, we are slightly in competition, of course we are, we’re not that daft, but we do work very closely together and so things like this, a project like this, we are very much working together to say, that’s the minimum that every school should have, this is how we can make sure that if engineering’s not in one school, engineering will be in another school and the specialism will spread round. And we’ve discussed all that. People are going for second specialisms. And so where have the resources got to be. And so it is very much a collaborative thing, having a minimum standard for every single school and then other schools having specialist bits attached to them. And of course there may be some that will get better deals and other deals but that’s life sometimes. But I can assure you that the head at Barclay will be just as thrilled about this whole project as I am.

JW I’m conscious of the fact that we are heading towards quarter to nine. I’ve got hands up from people who’ve spoken before but I’d like to know if there is anybody who hasn’t spoken who would like to contribute. Okay. I’ll just take the two final people. The lady in black there and the gentleman here.

F? I’ve got a strange question because it’s not about the education; it’s about the monument, the listed buildings on this site and about what the County Council is going to do with those. And about they’re part of Stevenage’s heritage and their plans about how they’re going to be utilised later. Because we’ve got 450 years or something next year. So it’s about what we’re going to do as part of Stevenage heritage about those buildings.

LM Well, we’re certainly going to keep them. We can’t do anything else. We have had a variety of plans over the years to do something with the buildings over the years that are not actually brilliant as far as school buildings are concerned, are they Jonathan? Keith, have we got any particular thinking about those buildings or not? The listed ones of historical architecture and interest at the entrance.

KH Well, two observations really I suppose. The specific answer is no, but actually we’re already in touch with people at English Heritage. I spent the day a couple of holidays ago, going around with a couple of other people from English Heritage, around Barclay School for example, looking at which parts of that they consider we need to keep and how we do it and what we do with it. The other observation which perhaps I shouldn’t make but, aesthetic stuff, issues about quality of art, the things you are talking about happen to be Lindsay’s obsession and I think one of the things you can be absolutely confident about is that that will be given quite high priority because he’s very very interested in that.

LM It’s true actually. You shouldn’t say it though.

JW Thank you. Letting the secrets out here. Just this last question here from this gentleman and then we’ll close the open part of the meeting.

Appendix 1B(i)

M? I must just comment that there is real concern about the state of the old headmaster’s house. Apart from a little bit that’s occupied as Jonathan said, by the police, it is currently deteriorating and something needs to be done about that. I wanted to make a comment arising from the comment about health centres. I know that the primary care trust is looking for a site in the south of the town for a major surgery development. They’ve got one sorted in the north of the town near Great Ashby and I hope that someone in CSF is actually in communication with them.

LM Yes. We’ve had a series of meetings with them and with the LIFT, the private sector partner, is it South East Midlands Consortium I think it is, of health, which includes Stevenage. But we’ve had discussion both with the PCT and the private sector partner that are working with them. You’re quite right, they are very very keen to get premises, not just for surgery but I think a little bit more than that, aren’t they? In the south of the town and the possibilities have ranged from The Valley site to the Barnwell site. It’s something around those two but we haven’t concluded that yet but we’ve been talking to them for six months or so, I would think.

JW Thank you very much. I think at this point we’ll close the open part of the meeting and the panel of two will be here for you to talk to if there’s anything else that you’ve got to say or any individual concerns that you didn’t want to raise in the open meeting. So they’re there for you. Thank you very much for your patience this evening. Thank you.