Agenda item

Councillor Paschoud declared a personal interest as Trust Governor of Watergate School.

Matthew Henaughan, Service Manager – School Place Planning, introduced the item.

The Committee heard that:

·         officers were looking for potential sites for new schools

·         greater special school provision is required within the borough

·         Consideration had been given to part-funding schools with neighbouring boroughs for schools close to the border, but neighbouring boroughs were experiencing the same land constraints

The time being 9:20pm, it was MOVED, SECONDED and RESOLVED to suspend standing orders to allow the meeting to continue beyond two and a half hours.

·         Some smaller schools were sharing resources. An example was sharing a member of staff or sharing IT services. In these cases one school would need to take the lead.

·         6 forms of entry were vital to the financial viability of Addey and Stanhope, and to any new secondary school.

·         Reusing bulge classes was a cost-effective option as it attracted no additional capital cost. However, where children had left bulge classes midway through primary school, this impacted on the Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) received by schools since schools received funding for the actual number of children on the roll, rather than the Published Admission Number (PAN).

·         There were concerns regarding the availability of local teachers given the rising cost of living in London and school budgets tightening.

·         Lewisham was in a good position to attract new talent, with Teaching School Alliances in the borough. Schools needed a range of staff for budgeting and affordability purposes.

·         Lewisham was not unique in facing these issues – all London schools were in similar positions. The key would be to market the borough’s schools well.

·         It was not known what impact Brexit would have on school roll projections.

RESOLVED: that the report be noted.