Last plea to save Chelmsley Wood schools

Sep 22 2008 By Tony Collins, Birmingham Mail

DOZENS of parents were today making a desperate plea to keep their children’s primary school open.

The future of two primary schools in the Chelmsley Wood area will be decided this evening when members of Solihull Council’s Cabinet meet to decide whether to close one or both of them.

Kingfisher Primary and Bosworth Wood Primary have both been suffering from falling pupil numbers and were said by education chiefs to be “extremely vulnerable”.

The council’s cabinet will be told that maintaining both schools without a substantial increase in pupil numbers within the area would create hundreds of surplus places.

But parents of Kingfisher Primary fear their school will be axed despite a new, enlarged, £7 million building due to be opened on the site next year.

They are being bused to the Civic Suite in Solihull for the 6pm meeting to make a last-ditch plea to councillors.

Tracey Woodall, a parent governor at Kingfisher Primary, said: “Everyone is very concerned about the future of the school, especially as the report seems to be in favour of keeping Bosworth Wood open.

“The report is very biased towards Bosworth Wood even though it’s in special measures and doesn’t have a head teacher.

“We have just bought new school uniforms ready to move into the new building next year, but this money could be wasted.”

The report to Solihull’s Cabinet said Bosworth Wood was presently subject to special measures after failing its Ofsted inspection in May last year, while Kingfisher has been on the local authority’s schools of concern list for a considerable period of time.

There are 160 empty places at Bosworth Wood and more than 100 at Kingfisher Primary, but this would increase to more than half when it moves to the new building.

The report said Kingfisher Primary was the weaker of the two schools in relation to standards, while local parental preference also favours Bosworth Wood.