The Isle of Wight Council is looking for local primary schools to lower their admission numbers in a bid to solve the crisis of underpopulated classrooms and prevent school closures.
Instead of closing schools, the council has approached leadership teams asking them to lower their pupil admission numbers (PAN) due to a lack of children enrolling. But school leaders think this is not enough and are still calling for primary schools to close.
Previously, a group of headteachers and governors called for a quarter of Isle of Wight primary schools to shut their doors. This comes as the number of births on the Island has reached its lowest since 1941 — when the country was at war — and there is a significant decline in pupil numbers forecast in the next 5 years.
In primary schools, the number of pupils should drop from 9,200 in 2017 to 8,000 in 2025, but in secondary schools, it is set to grow by 400 in the same timeframe. Having some surplus places allows flexibility the council says, but too many can have severe consequences and when schools are disproportionately affected by falling pupil numbers, they are at risk of ‘spiralling decline’.
The Isle of Wight Council cabinet has made it clear school closures should be avoided wherever possible and there should be local schools for local children, that are educationally and financially sustainable in the longer term. Councillor Debbie Andre, education cabinet member, has previously said she is confident a model exists to support smaller schools.
Now a council report, to determine a way forward, has said action is needed in primary schools to ensure demand and capacity are aligned and schools continue to provide the best outcome for children.
Council officers have presented to headteachers and governors the forecast data for pupil numbers. As a result, so far 4 primary schools — Oakfield, Barton, Godshill and Wroxall — have asked to lower their PAN. Further meetings have been held with other primary schools that will have a significant number of surplus places by 2024, including Broadlea, Bembridge, Niton and Greenmount.
School leaders say they feel more radical steps are needed than just reducing pupil numbers — including school amalgamations and closures — and ae frustrated the council was over-relying on PAN reductions as the main strategy.
You need better public transit if you want kids to travel further to a school…
We have the lowest birth rate in 80 years yet our population is growing rapidly. The the number of under 65 year-olds has shrunk while the number of over 65s has grown dramatically in the last 10 years.
It isn’t schools that are needed, its care homes.
Something needs to be done to persuade young people to stay on the island We need to stop developers building for, and advertising to, mainland retirees or this place will turn into a massive retirement ghetto.
I have a solution, get barratt homes to build a multi hundred house estate in these places, I’m sure the planning commission would agree with my suggestion.
Whilst the number of births on the Island may be dropping, I’m pretty sure that is more than offset by the number of large families being brought to the Island and housed here.
I don’t know if official figures are released, I doubt it, but from working in schools it’s obvious that the number of families being relocated here has increased massively over the past 5 years or so with many being housed in areas close to each other (I think we’re all aware of which areas) – hence some schools being over-subscribed and others with not enough pupils.
These are the facts about how the population has changed between the 2011 and 2021 censuses.
The Isle of Wight population has increased by 1.5% from 138,300 to 140,400
The number of people over 65 on the Isle of Wight increased by 24.7%.
The number of people between 15 and 64 on the Isle of Wight decreased by 5.3%
The number of children (under 15) on the Isle of Wight decreased by 6.3%
The birth rate on the Isle of Wight is the lowest for 80 years.
So the Isle of Wight population has increased by 2100 despite the number of all those under 65s decreasing. Please explain how you fit those facts to your “large families” hearsay?
But the benefit scrounges are coming over en mass. I know because the daily mail told me.
It never ceases to amaze me how gullible these people are. They read a paper owned by a wealthy non-dom Tory donor (Jonathan Harmsworth, 4th Viscount Rothermere) and believe everything that is written in it.
And then bleat about the BBC and C4 being “biased” (because they read that in the Daily Mail, too).
It won’t happen. The schools get money for each child on their registers. As long as schools get funding on the amount of kids they have in classes, they will keep the doors open. Schools nowadays are big businesses, and as with all other businesses more of something means more funding. So in this case, more kids equals more money! Until they change the pot to be governed by region, ie.Isle of Wight rather than numbers, this will always be a problem. They should also bring back catchment area. Live near a school, go to that school not one ten miles away!